HuckleBerry
Center for Creative Learning
Andrew Holyfield
Hi everyone! My name is Andrew. I graduated Summa Cum Laude at UC Riverside in 2016, with a B.A. in Creative Writing. While there, I completed the Honors Program, published a thesis, was an editor for both the campus Research Journal and Honors Program literary journal, joined the Writing Program as a Teaching Assistant, and completed three MFA courses, all with a 4.0 GPA.
Tutoring started for me in the campus Writing Program, in which I tutored eighteen students per week. Around that same time, my younger brother, diagnosed with Aspergers, started college. I tutored him during his four-year journey to receive his Paraprofessional Certificate.
Nerdy as it sounds, I love Grammar and read often (in-between Netflix binges). Until my time at UC Riverside, I abhorred reading and preferred the trusty summaries from Spark Notes. I know English and writing can be both challenging and boring, but perhaps all a struggling student needs a little help and positive reinforcement. If that sounds like you or your kid, I'd love to help.
I’m a published songwriter with 20+ years experience in the music industry.
Writing Across the Genres
While this lab may not require Bunsen burners and test tubes containing mysteriously luminescent liquids, the students in this class are indeed mad scientists! The experiments begin within the deepest parts of their creative subconscious, manifest on the page through trial and error, and result in never before seen works of creative exploration and discovery across all three major genres: fiction, non-fiction, and poetry!
Yes, creative writing is much like the scientific method, only we use simple tools: pencil, paper, and the much-needed eraser. This class is intended to introduce students to the many forms of creative writing. Students will have the opportunity to learn of the various tools writers pull from their creative toolbox. Each trimester focuses on a genre (category or form) of writing, and the unique and connected literary devices each genre utilizes.
FALL
Fall will deep dive into Fiction. Students will learn the three fundamental columns that hold up the pantheon of storytelling: Character, Obstacles, and Desires (C.O.D.). Simply put: who is our hero, what does he/she want, and what’s standing in the way? Students will craft dialogue, unpack tension in its four levels, interweave interiority & complex emotions, paint scenes with description, carefully devise subtext, and discover the moral heart of the character’s journey. By the end of this trimester, students will have written an original work of fiction!
WINTER
The dreary winter is a perfect time for reflection and what better route to self-discovery than Non-Fiction? This trimester will aim to distinguish between Truth and Fact. How do these play a role in a personal account and to what end? Students will have a chance to sample the various forms of non-fictive writing: Memoir, Biography, Research-based Journalism, and, at the trimester’s end, the Personal Narrative Essay. We end with this, as it is applicable to each student’s future: university personal statements, employment cover letters, and grant applications.
SPRING
As the flowers bloom and the clouds dissipate, we turn our attention to Poetry. Students will have the opportunity to write various forms of poetry: Acrostics, Pantoums, Palindromes, Abstract, Odes & Elegies, and the dreaded *dun dun dun* Shakespearean Sonnet. Each of these poems deploys a litany of poetic devices, which students will implement (including but not limited to: Assonance, Alliteration, Enjambment, Slant Rhyme, Iambic Pentameter, Double Entendre, and Metaphor). Students will conclude this final trimester with a portfolio of personally constructed poems!