This September, Write Our World lead the “Cambodia Writers’ Club,” a bilingual e-book writing workshop, at our Learning Center in Battambang. The workshop was a great opportunity for our students to develop their voice and tell the stories that they think are important.

Students aged 11-13 developed e-books that document some aspect of their culture. In pairs, they chose to focus on Khmer food, traditional dress, popular games and the national flag. The group of 14-18 year olds decided to write about role models and leaders in their community, such as older siblings and teachers.

Each book is unique and includes original photography, Khmer and English text, and audio clips of the author telling the story.

Check out Sreyrath’s story about Tug of War!

Julie Carey, the Executive Director of Write Our World, also used the project as an opportunity to deliver professional development trainings for our teaching staff. In the mornings, teachers who ran the Cambodia Writers’ Club debrief the session from the previous day and prepare for the upcoming session that afternoon.

This type of learning, one based on the completion of a creative project, introduces a new type of pedagogy for teachers in Cambodia. They are eagerly trying new strategies and becoming comfortable with the process so they can continue to help students create e-books and other projects in the future.

For the full library of our students’ stories, as well as many other stories written by children around the world, check out Write our World’s website this Friday! (11/4/2016)