Ajanta De, mother of Tia, Bishop Cotton Girls

Your workshops have been an absolutely fantastic experience for my daughter Tia. Whether it was the “awareness about environment” workshop at Hide n Peek, Tharangini, “genres of writing” at Jagriti or the “Ramayana” one at UFO. To me, what stands out is that the information is packaged so interestingly especially in your choice of medium – art, craft, poetry, song, story game boarding etc.

In fact my daughter constantly asks me to check what workshops are planned next 🙂 I would really like to congratulate you on the immense amount of thought & planning you put in to design these workshops. Here’s looking forward to many more!

Padmini Govind, Founder, Tharangini Studio

Aparna’s workshops are innovative and dynamic! She explores multiple facets of a topic and finds interesting ways to connect with her audience. Her sessions are always interactive, which truly inspires one to think and create.

Vidya

My daughter Khushi is full of imagination, most of which is inspired from fairy tales and fables. She can spin a story around almost anything, be it mermaids, princess, the kind and gentle or the cruel and wicked. In the end, she tries to bring the best out of everyone.

When I came across Ms. Aparna Raman on social media, I knew I had found the right person I was looking for who could help Khushi channelize her thoughts and creativity.

Aparna has the ability to inspire and enhance children’s creative writing abilities be it with a use of a prop, flash cards or simply spinning a story with a few unrelated key words. Its all about having fun and exploring new ideas, whilst developing creative skills. One thing parents and children can be sure of with Aparnas’ creative writing class is that it will always be exciting, enriching and, in the widest possible sense, educational, too.

Zainab Sulaiman, mother of Ishaan, Mallya Aditi International

Ishaan’s had a blast conjuring up evil murderers (who murder their own brothers!), aliens, tortured twisted young princes (Hamlet anyone?) and even a hero Who Had No Name! All of this of course is because he settled down and became comfortable very quickly (even though he was amongst some of the youngest kids in the class) and hence could focus on each genre and what it offered and pick up a few nuances of that particular style along the way. Kudos for that goes to Aparna and her warm and gentle but witty way of dealing with the kids and making the entire sessions fun and interactive (even though the sessions sometimes over ran the 2 hour slot, Ishaan was always happy to stay back until he had thought that he was really done). It’s been a good ride and we’ll be back for more.

Shruti Koura, Mother of Ved Koura

“Veds journey through various moods, emotions and sentiments in Aparnas sessions has kindled a new dimension to his personality. A child who feared reading and disliked writing even more is writing upto 500 words at a stretch! Kudos to Aparna as I don’t know the magic potion she used with the kids but he was actually enthusiastic to go for the sessions and to my utter joy I never had to push him even once to attend! For a mom whose child hated to write I have a lot to thank to Aparna and her method. The final presentation of course was the climax and the pride and interest with which the kids presented their stories really was satisfying!”

Ananta Shroff, mother of Akash, Vidya Niketan School

“I got to know Aparna thanks to Vidya Niketan School and my small interaction with her left me mesmerized. She brought out the creative side in my son’s writing and I had never realised that he could write this well. My son, Akash, looked forward to his genre writing classes and would be full of excitement when he had a different genre to write on every fortnight. You are exceptionally talented Aparna, and wish you all the best in all your future endeavours.”

S.Dakwale, Managing Director, Lanka IOC PLC, Colombo

Note from Authored by: Event Sponsor:
The book has come out very well which reflects the efforts put in by you both to get the best out of the kids. It was satisfying to see the way these children expressed themselves on varied topics, drawing inspiration from the surroundings. I am sure this is just a beginning with many more to follow. We shall certainly like to engage ourselves in such novel activities.

Wish you all the best.

With regards,
S.Dakwale
Managing Director, Lanka IOC PLC, Colombo

Nazia Rajkotwala, The Sri Lankan Chronicles author

The event has impacted the way I connect to Sri Lanka. In my research I learnt many different things about my country and I have discovered more and learnt to appreciate the many things it offers to me.

Yes, Authored By has changed my life, as I now view myself as an Author and Writer, someone who releases words that people read and engage in.

Yes, it has definitely changed my view of the environment, for example when I was researching Sri Lanka, I was opened to the beauty and diversity of our country, and I learnt about different cultures of Sri Lanka.

Yes, it has changed the way I tell a story, as in my story it was written from different points of views of characters, and that made me understand and made me more inclined to listen and accept different people’s points of view on different things.

Thank you for the amazing experience

Dr.Jaya Thakur, mother of Siddharth Jha

Colombo Event: authored By: Dr Jaya Thakur, mother of Siddharth Jha

Dear Aparna,
I’m writing this to appreciate the creative writing workshop held in April 2015 under the title “AUTHORED BY”.

My son , Siddharth ,who attended the workshop found it immensely enjoyable and useful. He specially liked the fact that it was very interactive and he could express himself as he would like to. I have noticed quite a difference in his way of writing and he is now able to express his thoughts more freely.I would love to enrol him for your workshops in the future and also recommend it to other children who want to develop their creative writing skills.

However,I think it could have been advertised a bit more as many people didn’t know about it and only got to know after the event.

Best wishes,
Dr.Jaya Thakur

Rajashree Behera, ICC Colombo

From Authored By: Venue sponsor:
My heartfelt congratulation for a very successful event and Indian Cultural Centre is proud to be part of this event for children of so many nationalities. Hope we will work together in future.

Regards,
Rajashree Behera,
ICC Colombo

Ryan

proud to see / hear the lovely stories that were being created by all the students.

Ryan has already told me that he wants to take part in both the workshops next year. He was hoping that this workshop was going to be done monthly….he was sad when he learned otherwise.

Thank you for having given these children the chance to be “the storyteller” instead of always only being “the reader”. I would like it if this is something that can be done much more often than once a year….

Jailen

Authored by: Creative Writing Workshop participants:

I enjoyed the creative writing workshop very much. It was not boring like most other classes.

The Time I spent with you at the workshop was really Interesting, and useful to me, I learnt about why a Logo is important in characters, and how to identify a character with the logo.

I like to attend more workshops like this, and hope it will help me with my school test.

Publishing

The publishing experience has been a wonderful memento of the children’s works and they are so proud of it. The beautiful illustrations supporting the book have made their stories alive. The book readings also were very sweet and confident boosters. It was interesting to hear the young authors speak confidently to an audience, often with no inhibitions, and divulge to others how they thought of their stories.

Shibani Rangaraj, mother of Dhruv Rangaraj

7 yrs Creative Writing Class Experience:
My son has enjoyed the creative writing class immensely. For a child who does not like to read, the class has helped him ideate, express himself in words through the fun exercises and topics. His imagination has become vivid and it is interesting to see its manifestation in his words and ideation, ably helped by Aparna.