I trained to teach in the 1980s. It was different then. Our tutor chain-smoked her way through our seminars.
But one wet Thursday afternoon she gave us a gift: she made us sit there, write poems and read them back.
She read some poems to get us going. She read Translations from the Chinese by Arthur Waley, which we talked about a little, giving us time to come up with ideas without our realising it. And I remember her saying: “If you think you haven’t got anything to say, write - we write to find out what we know.”
When we shared our poems, we were all surprised by what we had written; they were words that acknowledged our lives.
The next October, I stole that tutor’s lesson. Getting my students to write poems was such a simple thing, and yet it gave them the chance to comment on the world. I discovered amazing things about them, not just the East End summer ritual of lamping for pike in the canal.
Years later, I still remember the impact of reading a poem written by a Vietnamese student who had fallen off a boat in the South China Sea. This was urgent, vivid, necessary writing.
Maybe you are shouting at the screen something like: “It’s different now - we don’t have time to be creative these days!” Hold on. Put your hand on your heart: did you really become an English teacher with the aim of only ever teaching poetry for exam purposes? Did all those poets the pupils study write because they wanted young people across the country to spend their lives writing PEA paragraphs about them? No - they wrote to communicate their desires, fears, joy, rage, love, the pleasure in the everyday and the surprise of the extraordinary. The same human emotions and experiences young people bring to our classrooms, if we allow them. Young people are gobby, opinionated and deserve to be heard. Allowing opportunities to express their world view in their own poems validates their lives, helps them to understand themselves better and - I promise you - it will enable them to better connect with the poets they read.
Write poetry together
So, here is my advice: give it a go.
Offer students a theme, such as: “Why I don’t want to watch the news/why I do watch the news.” Or, you could use a phrase as a prompt, like “It’s not fair” or “Things Gran/Dad/Auntie Vina says…” Allow a few minutes for students to chat about this.
Then, ask them to write. Suggest that they keep their poems short (five or six lines), but allow them to write more. Tell them they have five minutes, then give them 10. Both tactics ease the fear of having nothing to say.
Insist that they don’t use rhyme. If someone ignores this rule and does it well, share why the rhyme works for the poem. If the rhyme takes over the meaning, be honest and suggest that they don’t use rhyme next time. Take a gulp and write at the same time as the kids.
When everyone is finished, have a read around, including your poem.
And finally, another piece of advice from my lovely tutor to share with your poets: “A poem isn’t prose. You don’t need to write to the edge of the page. Let a line finish where it needs to.”
Jane Anderson is a former head of English and initial teacher educator at UCL Institute of Education
The Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award is a competition open to anyone aged 11-17 years old and is free to enter. To enter, click here. The deadline is midnight on 31 July 2018.
Contact fyp@poetrysociety.org.uk for a free teachers’ pack. To celebrate the 20th anniversary of Foyle there will be a free education event for teachers at King’s College in London. Register to attend here.
