Another enjoyable and rewarding class. Feedback from other students was very helpful.

Had a feeling the Capstone Project will be good but it is truly excellent. I highly recommend completing the Capstone after doing the other four courses - it is like having dessert after a four course meal.

I recently completed the 5-course specialization in creative writing. For the most part the course material presented was good, especially the courses on plot, on setting, and on style. The course on characterization was a little vague. From the syllabus, it looked like it would be a good course, but the instructor did not follow the syllabus and was often very unfocussed in her presentation.

The weakness with this specialization is that all the feedback to the writer is provided by peers in the course. This I found very disappointing. Many of the other students were honestly very poor writers, and as a result, the feedback I received on my assignments was very superficial. In addition, rather than being able to learn from reading the writing of others, I found for the most part that the pieces submitted by others were very lacking.

If you take this course, know that it will provide you some good information about writing fiction, but the feedback you receive on your assignments will not help you learn. You will need to find another peer group of writers to help you with that.

The course has been amazing. I was disappointed with the lack of effort made by students to critique my final draft. The critique is supposed to be a 1-2 page effort. I made sure that I obliged for all other students and did a 'proper' job. This is my only complaint. I noticed on my sanding critique there was only one person who bothered to do it correctly.

Excellent! Worth doing.

Cheers

I finished this program, was invited to Mentor for one of the specializations, so let my capstone story set for a while ... then spent the last month polishing pages ... and submitted this afternoon to Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, one of the few 'pulps' left for short story writers of crime and mystery. Win, Lose, or Draw (Accept, Reject, or ReWrite) I NEVER would have gotten this far without the class and some excellent feedback from classmates. If you're ever planning on "finishing that story" and having others read it, this class is for you!

I enjoyed it and advise others to take it :)

Seems like the patients are running the asylum in these Wesleyan/Coursera courses. The feedback is only useful when the students provide careful, thoughtful readings, which happens occasionally. If you're one of the students who commit to reading your fellow students' work carefully and thoughtfully, and work hard to communicate your impressions, you'll feel cheated when you get in return: "Interesting story. Use all your senses. More dialogue." Do any of the teachers of the courses actually read what the people taking this course are writing? I feel like it all runs on autopilot and no one really cares. Frustrating.

This last course in the Specialization walks you through the process of writing, editing and submitting a short story. Salvatore's prompts, interviews and the advice form other writers are very helpful. This is truly a capstone of the other four courses in the Specialization. I never believed I could learn so much and improve my skills just by doing the exercises, understanding the principles and finding my way of putting them not practice. Many of the pieces form other participants that I had the opportunity to review were really great. An amazing specialization in all regards. Thank you to all the professors that shared their insights and experience and metored us!!

Brilliant! Would be enhanced to have a template for outline a story for future students, if possible

Cheers,

Nev.

Peers aren't well read.

It was challenging and inspiring, one of the best courses I have taken. I took my writing to new places and learned quite a lot : ) Thank you so much for the opportunity and platform for learning.

Overall, I found this course to be VERY ENJOYABLE. My ONLY concern was that the PDF requirement was not stressed at the very beginning of the course. Because I have only an old refurbished computer that does not have top of the line features, making PDF files did not always work as planned. OpenOffice and Adobe Acrobat sometimes easily converted to PDF for submissions, but sometimes did NOT. That made it difficult for some reviewers to open. Had I known earlier, I would have bought a new computer and avoided some frustrating submission difficulties. I really appreciate the effort some people had to go through to open my odd submissions. They gave me some valuable tips in their critiques that I might have missed out on had they not persisted. SO: Suggest at the outset that writers using paleolithic equipment like mine, check to see if their computers can generate PDF files. It will eliminate a lot of cussing later on.

Other than THAT, I had a great time, learned a lot, and HIGHLY recommend the program. Wonderful teachers!

~Jack Hayes

Fantastic experience. I found myself reviewing a story by a well-regarded author. I learned a lot from reviewing the writing of others. That alone is worth the five stars. The commentary I got back was not that thorough, but when people took it seriously it was quite helpful and encouraging.

Excellent!

I loved it. It was a great opportunity to learn how to write a story.

Very helpful! Must take

In general the specialization has been great!

I feel like the capstone project could be a bit more challenging, maybe having more active instances each week where students could improve and receive feedback faster.

Pacing just right; helpful assignments; solid, constructive teaching; tough yet encouraging peer review

I really enjoyed the capstone. I received some great feedback regarding my story but I was disappointed because most time I only received two instead of three reviews. I feel the reviews are the most informative because they are the reader responses to the lessons covered each week so I think it should be a goal that is met each week even if a mentor must step in to provide that final review.

The reviews are also an opportunity for me as a writer to improve my editing skills. It is also an opportunity that forces me to make sure there is a positive in the critical reviews of the pieces. I make sure i review my words to be sure they are not negative but offer guidance and words that will make the writers want to continue writing and improve. As students we all came to this specialization for skills and a chance to publicly share those lessons within our pieces not negativity.

I am glad Coursera provided me with this opportunity to take advantage of this specialization because I am a better writer because of these five courses and their instructors. Thank you.

Amazing, great tutors, for everyone who's looking to expand the horizons. Highly recommended.

I enjoyed the whole specialization. Capstone was a way to put it in motion. I guess I miss teacher's presence but also writer is a solitary job. I had the sensation many of the students never wrote a text before. I think it's a very good training camp for writers but maybe not so good for absolute beginner writers. But I enjoyed it a lot. I would like to know what are the next steps you propose in your mail giving me the good news. Thanks anyhow. It bettered my writing even in latine language such as French or Spanish.

I loved this course! The lectures were magnificent as were the interviews with visiting authors. A 20 minute view into a class at work parsing a mate's story was particularly interesting. My own experience with the reviews by my peers was quite the opposite. From the seven lines one wrote, it was clear that she had not read my story or had not read it carefully. Another copied and pasted most of my story in the comments section and added shallow praise at the end. That was not a problem. We were all directed to seek outside reviews and that is what I did with most noting the improvement in my writing. This class was a fine ending to the course of study and the professor was wonderful.

Helpful program to tackle larger writing projects, detailing how to get started and keep momentum throughout.

Great instructions... professors...and exercises to strengthen your writing.