Community Youth Experiences

About Our Community Youth Experiences

Thurber House is a creative arts center located in downtown Columbus, Ohio. We are based in the restored home of humorist, author, and New Yorker cartoonist James Thurber, and we also manage an adjacent multipurpose space where we host workshops and events.

Year round, we travel throughout the community to offer K-12 creative writing, cartooning, graphic novel, and calligraphy workshops for libraries, schools, and community centers. We also welcome museum tours and combo field trips to Thurber House and Thurber Center.

Our experiences for K-12 students inspire innovation, build critical thinking, and enhance education. All programs can be adapted for different age groups—simplified for younger students and made more challenging for older students/teens.

Please note: if you’re looking for K-12 teacher professional development or other adult workshops for libraries, community centers, community groups, etc., please click here.

What We Offer

Types of Experiences

• Workshop only at any of the following locations:

  • In-person at your location (library, school, community center, etc.)

  • In-person at Thurber Center (our multipurpose space at 91 Jefferson Ave)

  • Virtual

• Museum tour in either of the following formats:

  • In-person at Thurber House (77 Jefferson Ave)

  • Virtual

• Combo field trip (workshop and museum tour) at the following location:

  • In-person at Thurber Center (91 Jefferson Ave) and Thurber House ( 77 Jefferson Ave)

We will work with you to develop the best experience for your students. We can split up sessions, adjust for class schedules, etc. We will confirm everything with the coordinator before submitting the final curriculum and fee.

Thurber House is a 501c3 organization and all of our teachers have completed background checks.

Available Workshop Topics

We offer creative writing, cartooning, graphic novel, and calligraphy workshops. For a full list of topics, scroll down. If you don’t see a topic listed, custom workshops and experiences are also available. We always tailor the content to your goals and grade level(s).

You can schedule one session or multiple sessions for any given workshop topic.

You can choose to do either a workshop only or a combo field trip (workshop and museum tour).

Museum Tour Experiences

Built in 1873 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places, Thurber House is the home of humorist, author, and New Yorker cartoonist James Thurber. The home has been restored to the way it looked in the early 1900s, complete with antique furnishings and Thurber memorabilia. Several famous stories in Thurber’s book My Life and Hard Times took place here, including “The Night the Ghost Got In” and “The Night the Bed Fell.”

Thurber House is conveniently located in downtown Columbus (77 Jefferson Avenue, Columbus, OH 43215). You can choose to do either a museum tour only or a combo field trip (workshop and museum tour).

Workshop/Tour/Field Trip Length

• Workshops can be tailored to last as long as you like—anywhere from one hour to an entire day of programming.

• Museum tours typically take 45-60 minutes.

• Combo field trips (workshop and museum tour) usually last two hours.

Workshop/Tour/Field Trip Participants

Our youth workshops, museum tours, and combo field trips are suitable for groups of K-12 students. We always tailor the content to your goals and grade level(s).

If you’re looking for college-level workshops, please see our community adult workshops page. For adult tours of our museum, click here for adult group tour information.

Pricing

Workshop only:

• At your location (library, school, community center, etc.) or virtual:

  • Hourly: $250 per hour (after the first hour, we prorate by half hour)

  • Day rate (up to six hours, multiple workshops/classrooms): $725

• At Thurber Center:

  • Please inquire for pricing (via the form on this page)

Thurber House reserves the right to break up students into more than one workshop if you have more than 30 participants. An extra fee may apply.

Museum tour only:

• $4 per student, with a minimum of 10 students (we do not charge for teachers/chaperones)

Combo field trip (a workshop and a museum tour) (two hour experience):

• Please inquire for pricing (via the form on this page)

We offer discounts for long-term, recurring community programs.

Inquire About a Youth Experience

• Journaling

• Creative Nonfiction/Essay Writing

• Novel Writing

• Poetry

• Mystery/Crime/Thriller

• Historical Fiction

• Fantasy

• Short Stories/Flash Fiction

• Writing Ghost/Spooky Stories

• Monster Stories

• Writing About Pets/Animals

• World Building

• Heroes and Villains

• Character Creation

• Writing Dialogue

• Crafting Sensory Details

• Writing Fairy Tales

• Writing Folk Tales

• Fable Writing

• Oulipo (writing using constraints; learn more)

• Graphic Novels

• Cartooning

• Calligraphy

• And many more!

Writing Ghost Stories

Ghouls, goblins, and giggles—oh my! We will share the scary turned silly ghost story from James Thurber, go over the ins and outs of a good scary story, and then turn students loose to write their own. We focus on how to create a suspenseful page-turner and how it can be successful without always being gory.

Pets Misbehaving

These are not your typical pets! We’ll combine different animals to make “smanimals” (smushed animals)—such as a creature with a giraffe head and a whale body! Where does the smanimal live? What does it look like? What is a day in the life like for the smanimal? There’s writing, drawing, and lots of laughter in this workshop.

Dear Monster

Did you know that Columbus holds a Monster Convention and the monsters get very lonely here? To help them feel better, we’ll work with students on the format and content of letters, how to address the envelope, and “mail” them to the monsters. We send letters back to the classroom from the monsters so the students get a response. It’s a fun and creative way to teach letter writing.

Create-a-World

Harry Potter is set in real-life Britain, but with a twist: there’s an entirely new sub-world with wizards, Quidditch, different rules, and more! We’ll meet at Platform 9 ¾ and delve into how to create a new word from scratch. It can be as “normal” or crazy as desired. This teaches setting, character development, and more. 

Superheroes vs. Villains

Even superheroes have bad days and even villains have a heart (sometimes). We’ll delve into what makes us love and hate these characters and how to make them “human” enough so that we care. Students do not have to know a lot about superheroes or villains or even like the genre to have fun with this. All good stories have solid protagonists and antagonists and this is a great way to work on it.

Fractured Fairy Tales

Who doesn’t love a good fairy tale? The villain probably doesn’t. Writers will learn about point of view and create alternative stories, endings, settings, and more for some of our beloved fairy tales. This ties in perfectly with The True Story of the Three Little Pigs that is a classroom favorite.

Fable Writing

Ever wonder how Aesop came up with all of those fables? How do you write a story that ends with a moral? Have no fear—our fantastic teachers will show examples of fables from James Thurber, teach writers what makes a fable, and then put writers’ imaginations to work composing and illustrating their own.

Poetry 101

Roses are red…we’re all tired of this one. Many students don’t realize that poems don’t have to rhyme or that they can be funny, short, long, song lyrics, etc. We’ll bust through misconceptions of poetry and cover several different types in a short amount of time to keep things entertaining. Haikus, acrostics, list poems, and even limericks will be covered.

Journaling

“Dear Diary” is so last generation. We’ll bring notebooks that students can decorate and turn into their own journals. We’ll have a few fun prompts to get them started, but the goal is to encourage students to write outside on their own—whether it’s stories, poetry, or what’s going on in their world. Everyone has a story to tell; sometimes, you just need a cool journal for inspiration.