I’ve just got home from a week tutoring for Arvon at The Hurst, in Shropshire.  My co-tutor was the fantastic Jonny Zucker, and we worked with 16 bright, funny, extraordinary-ordinary children from Year 5 and Year 6 at Hargate Primary in West Bromwich.  The week could not have been what it was without Hargate’s wonderful headteacher Andrew Orgill, and Year 5 class teacher Kirsty Cross, not to mention the warm, skilled support that every one of the staff at The Hurst provided for us.

Rising to the demands of such an intensive week, the children were so focused that they grew as writers and poets almost by the hour.  Jonny and I also made good use of the 26 acres of woodland around The Hurst, which inspired some great writing.  We wrote stories, we wrote poems.  I took my Crow.  We wrote a group poem for Leap Year’s Day ‘On a Day that Shouldn’t Exist’. You can get the idea, I think, from the pics that follow.

I had the best time.  Arvon rocks.  Thank you everyone!