Page 18
Thinking About Poetry
Apart from laughing to myself in public toilets, my department learnt to tackle the restrictions of the English curriculum in a range of ways. Most of these have involved a lot of extra work, (be warned!), but they pay off big time. We started running an oulipo scheme in year 9 – although we really had to shoehorn it in at the start of the school year to do it! The ‘Boys into Books’ sessions involved being at work late and started quiet, but getting Dads to support their sons reading helped move on their skills and gave a nice boost to the English department’s status. We also entered any and every writing competition on offer and managed to get lots of our students published! That’s when we realised the bonus of high profile events. They take a lot of work, but they go in the school newsletter, they get discussed across the school and everyone knows that the department is doing something extra – this is great for SLT (who in my most recent school were actually very supportive of creative practise!) and as a result, great for us, allowing us to manoeuvre more creatively in future. The higher the status of your guest speakers, your events and competitions, the more freedom you can get as a department. We’ve been running poetry slams, reading competitions and spooky snippets readings for the past few years – as well as getting literacy themes into major assemblies. And all of it just about gives me the strength to go in and teach my Heaney and Clarke. © Mark Grist