2019-2022
From 2019 to 2022 I taught courses for beginning editors and authors: visual storytelling, working with text, typography, and editorial practice. Students included journalists and anyone who wanted to make better texts and publications.
What I taught
Visual storytelling. Structure a piece so a reader can follow it. Logic, headlines, leads. Images, infographics, and visual elements that support meaning - not decoration.
Working with text. Editing for clarity, precision, and pace. Cutting what does not belong, fixing rhythm and logic. Working with an author without flattening their voice.
Typography and layout. Type, spacing, composition. Quotes, lists, pull quotes. Colour and layout in print and digital.
Editorial practice. From idea to publication: planning, coordinating authors, deadlines. Decisions about structure and content based on the piece's job, not personal taste.
Format
Practical courses. Real texts to edit, publication assignments, typography exercises. We reviewed mistakes, discussed choices, looked at examples from working publications.
Feedback was central. I commented on each assignment - why one choice works and another does not. Less recipe, more thinking: who is the reader, what is the task, which tools fit.
Who it was for
Journalism students, editors at small outlets, authors who wanted to improve their own work. Some came to change career; others to sharpen skills in a current job.
What teaching changed for me
Teaching forces you to explain. Much of editing is intuitive until you have to justify a decision to someone else.
It also made my own principles explicit - which made me a more deliberate editor and writer.
Good teaching creates the conditions for someone to learn on their own: useful questions, specific feedback, and strong examples. The work still belongs to the student.