Information About Kaja - Islington teacher

Personal Description:

I am a creative non-fiction writer. I specialise in memoir, auto-biography and life writing, nature writing, travel writing, personal essays, biography, genre-bending works which combine forms and some journalism particularly literary journalism.
I also specialise in critical writing including academic essays, literary criticism, creative criticism and braided essays.

I am a PhD student at the University of East Anglia. My PhD is in Creative and Critical Writing. For it, I am writing a critical analysis of the representation of rural people in New Nature Writing alongside a full-length book, a biography-cum-investigation of a group of rural boys from Downham Market in Norfolk who defy the rural stereotype.

I gained a first class master's degree in Creative Non-fiction Writing at City, University of London. For my final project, also a full-length book, I walked the A10 road observing the wide variety of places and people that lie along it whilst reflecting on my childhood growing up in a commune in a small rural town.

Previously I was also a journalist for Forbes Middle East where I wrote travel and business articles focussing on the MENA region.

Everybody has a story to tell, an experience to articulate and an opinion to express, traumatic, inspiring, thought provoking, seemingly mundane. Writing that is based on real life to express these experiences is for me the most impressive because the truth is often the hardest to understand and articulate, it doesn't always make sense and is rarely logical. The process of writing one's thoughts and experiences down is cathartic, it gives the writer a chance to reflect on and review anew experiences that have lingered in the background for years, changing the writer in the process by laying to rest an issue because of the intricate and multi-faceted ways the writer needs to consider the experience or thought in order to be able to relay it coherently. As a reader, creative non-fiction writing opens up the world through the eyes, mind and life of someone else, an empathic, intriguing and educational endeavour. I think everybody should leave this world having documented in some small way, through words or in another medium, their experience on this planet.

Through my formal education I have learnt about creative non-fiction techniques to aide with the process of writing including structure, plotting, pacing, characterisation and form. I have also learnt, because of my critical PhD component, ways to look at this writing analytically, from a distance and within the context of other genres and forms. My creative work means I have experience with sitting down to write itself as well as ways of refining an idea, searching for funding, publication, an agent and other forms of publication.

Teaching Experience:

I have eight years teaching experience. I have been teaching creative non-fiction specifically for two years whilst on my PhD course at the University of East Anglia. I have taught modules including Writing Across Borders and Writing the Self. I have also been teaching creative non-fiction in schools to children of multiple ages including high school and primary school. In all of these academic settings I have provided detailed advice and feedback on student's creative and critical work. I have also taught students, through the analysis of other literature and texts, key concepts which relate to their work and practice.
Before teaching at the university I was required to complete the 'Preparing to Teach' course in order to prepare for my academic teaching.

Previous to this I taught English as a Foreign Language. I worked in a language school and as a private tutor with adults and children alike. During this time I also undertook extensive editing and proof reading projects, mainly, helping students with their dissertations and in some cases creative and speech writing. I have a CELTA (Certificate in English Language Teaching to Adults).

Teaching Approach:

I conduct student lead classes meaning that I tailor classes specific to the interests and needs of the student, designing workshops which will help enable students to fulfil their goals whatever they might be. Lessons are interactive and include feedback and writing exercises to practice relevant skills.