Making Connections: teachers, children and poetry

Abstract

This article argues for a re-examination of the role of poetry as a language art in school and suggests a need to aid the process of experiencing poetry, rather than studying poetry, at least up to the end of Key Stage 3 (age 14 years). An indication of the possible ‘state of play’ of poetry teaching in school led to a reminder of an ‘experiential’ course at pre-service level for primary teachers, and latterly for Secondary teachers, which used the ‘dramatic’ as a catalyst for reconstructing students earlier experiences of poetry at school. However, the difficulty remained of reaching the major constituency – existing teachers in schools. The only route was through in-service courses some of which still take the form of ‘top up’, ‘one-off’, short courses. With this in mind, and based on the conviction that practitioners have to be provided with opportunities to revisit and remember earlier good experiences of poetry, and reconstruct bad experiences as a basis for reconsidering its place in the lives of young people, a number of inservice courses were organised and delivered for KS2 and KS3 teachers and are reported on