Am I growing or am I flying?

I’m celebrating National Poetry Day by adding this post about another marvellous day spent being Poet in Residence for Hargate Primary School in West Bromwich. I go in usually once a term, sometimes more, and this is our second year of partnership. I love the way it’s becoming more and more collaborative and creative.

It’s really exciting to be among such inspired teachers and lovely children. This time, I worked with four classes, two from Year 3, a Year 4 and a Year 6 class. I’d worked with some of these groups before, and one of the loveliest moment in a day rather full of them, was walking into a classroom and hearing the children behind me excitedly whispering “Poet!” “Poet!” to each other.

Here’s some of the work we did. Some groups I asked to write ‘I Come From’ poems, a great standby for early in the school year – one of the teachers came up afterwards and told me how the exercise had helped her hear so many new things about the children in her care.

I come from happiness and laughter and being surprised…

I come from pancakes and jam and a white plate…

In the Year 6 class I read them a lovely poem called ‘My Cat Mitzi’ by Georgi Gill, suggested for National Poetry Day by the Scottish Poetry Library this year. It’s all about floating free of gravity. Great idea for a poem – and the children, as always, did not disappoint. We talked about words that feel ‘floaty’, and white space around words, then did some visualisation, followed by some drafting and editing. Enjoy these!