Advice from Cecilia Knapp Chat with the teacher before your session If possible, make sure you have some communication with whoever will be with you in the classroom on the day of the workshop delivery. They will be able to help you with the practical aspects of your session, such as room configuration and equipment. It’s important to know the environment you’ll be teaching in, ideally before you start planning. For example, if you can’t move tables and chairs, you won’t be able to deliver an activity that requires pupils to stand in a circle. If you need to show a video or some slides, you’ll need to ensure that the facilities are available. You can also ask for additional materials at this point such as coloured pens, flip chart paper and anything else you might need. Teachers are always super busy and overworked so make sure you do this way in advance if possible, so they don’t have unnecessary stress on the day. A teacher knows their class better than we do as external facilitators and may have some objectives in mind. I always ask teachers if they have any things they particularly want to achieve in the session and do my best to incorporate them. Most of the time, a teacher will leave you to run the session how you’d like, but sometimes they might like you to touch on something that will build on what they are working through on the curriculum. Perhaps they want their pupils to improve their confidence and their presentation skills by reading out their poems at the end of the session. Perhaps they would like you to talk about the editing process. Sometimes they suggest a Q&A segment of the workshop so pupils can ask about what it’s like being a writer. Many English teachers like to encourage this as a way to promote creative careers. A teacher also knows any specific needs a pupil or class might have. I always ask about this so I can make my workshops accommodating and accessible to all pupils. Are there some pupils who struggle with reading aloud or with their writing ability? Are there pupils who might need more regular breaks? Make sure you plan your session around the needs of the pupils. Make sure that the teacher you are working with will be in the room with you at all times. I like to encourage the teacher to join in with the writing too. Teachers work so incredibly hard for their pupils and it’s nice for them to be able to experience the freeing feeling of creative writing alongside their pupils and to be able to be an active participant, to share in that moment of fun and creative achievement with their class. Participating in an exercise also helps to teach it later on; they know how it feels to do the exercise and what is essential to explain.
Create a safe creative environment where pupils can try, play, write, fail and have fun A couple of years ago, I was standing outside St. Paul’s Cathedral in London about to step in for the very first time. I was delivering a poetry project there as part of my year as Young People’s Laureate, working with local schools. It struck me; despite living in London for over a decade, I had never even considered stepping a foot inside. I asked myself why. And then I realised – I was intimidated to step into a building so big. Would I look silly, go through the wrong entrance, conduct myself in the wrong way? The building was so old, so reverent. It wasn’t a space for me. I think poetry can be a bit like this. A huge, old, towering and very significant building with so much history, so many rules. It’s no wonder young people feel scared of stepping a foot inside, especially young people for whom writing is a bit more challenging, or who have never seen someone like themselves in a poem. A lot of what I do when I first get into the classroom is about making poetry seem less intimidating for young people so they can explore it on their own terms, in the way that feels right for them. I will often do some ‘myth busting.’ I will ask them things like: •
‘Does poetry have to rhyme? They will often say yes, and I’ll tell them that no, a poem doesn’t always have to rhyme. If rhyme is not your thing, you don’t have to adhere to it.
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‘Does a poem have to be factual? Does it have to be true?’ Of course, it doesn’t.
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‘Can you write about anything in a poem?’ Of course, you can.
And then I ask them if a poem has to ‘make sense.’ Which of course, it doesn’t! Poetry is a dream world where we can leap from image to image, without the need to explain ourselves. Metaphors can be wild and exaggerated. We can travel through time. We could be a bird. We could summon a door in a poem that opens onto a staircase down into the sea where our memories live. This leads to an interesting discussion about poetry. We are so often bogged down in what a poem ‘means’ that we forget to think about how it makes us feel. When we reframe our analysis of a poem to think about the sensations, memories, thoughts and feeling it activates in us, and how the poet chooses to achieve that, it’s a much more expansive conversation with much more potential for discussion. After all, a poem never just means one thing: it is different for every reader. Framing its effect as a subjective one can be more productive and help us get deeper into how a poem operates.
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Poet Toolkit
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