A page from the 'living notebook' in the Personal Demons project
One of CARET’s most unusual and most successful projects, Personal Demons was the UK’s winner for ‘best e-learning resource of 2005’. The judges loved this multi-disciplinary project, which uses video, images and multimedia to bring to life (quite literally!) the process of writing a novel. Through the website, young people collaborate with novelist Steve Alton, to work through the drafting and development of his fourth novel, itself titled Personal Demons. Originally designed to encourage teenagers to read and write, the site now has followers around the globe, with young people creating and contributing back not only writing, but videos, dance, drama and song.
The project was developed in close collaboration with Newman School in Rotherham, a specialist school for children with a wide variety of different learning needs, including emotional difficulties and physical disabilities. Their input shaped a website with a broad appeal, from passionate writers to some very reluctant readers!
The Rotherham teenagers were particularly proud to personally present their work to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth, during her visit to the University of Cambridge.
