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ABSTRACT
This paper explores what happened in the English classroom when two innovative projects merged and spoken word poetry became part of multilingual digital storytelling. As a Spoken Word Educator and Teacher Educator, we wanted to explore the complexity of bringing together these multimodal art forms. Making a poem come to life though film is hard and the research presented here interrogates these processes through working with a group of 13–14 year old students in the English classroom. In the process of bringing together spoken word and multilingual digital storytelling, these students interrogate notions of belonging and uncover stories that matter through emotional and creative encounters with personal and cultural artefacts. These young people discover a shared imagery across languages and cultures and reclaim ownership over learning in the English classroom. Foregrounding spoken word and multilingualism in the English classroom had a transformative effect on young people’s self-expression and imaginative thinking.
Acknowledgments
We would like to express our gratitude to all the students involved in this case-study, the school for supporting the projects, the Poet Educator, Jacob Sam-La Rose (SWEP), and the Media Educator, Joana van de Meer (British Film Institute).We would also like to thank the Paul Hamlyn Foundation for funding our work.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Project website
https://goldsmithsmdst.com
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Sara Hirsch
Sara Hirsch is a British poet and spoken word educator, currently based in Wellington, New Zealand. A former UK poetry slam champion, Sara ranked third in the world in 2014. She is a TEDx speaker, has toured internationally, and her work has appeared on the BBC. Sara has two poetry collections with Burning Eye Books and her work has been published in journals and anthologies in four continents. Sara has a Master’s degree in Creative Writing and Education from Goldsmiths University and is one of a handful of spoken word educators working globally. She was based at Lammas School & Sixth Form for two years, is the annual poet in residence for Marlborough College and has taught poetry around the world. She has presented her research on spoken word in the classroom at the Critical Connections Conference, Michael Rosen’s Reading Revolution Conference and in the EAL academic journal and has led workshops for The University of London, The BFI, The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama and international schools in Thailand, China, Scotland and Germany. Sara is the Education Director for Motif Poetry in New Zealand and runs the poetry in performance course at the National Youth Drama School.
Vicky Macleroy
Vicky Macleroy is a Reader in Education and Head of the Research Centre for Language, Culture and Learning at Goldsmiths, University of London. Vicky teaches on undergraduate, PGCE, MA and MPhil/PhD programmes, co-ordinates the MA Children’s Literature: Creative Writing Pathway and was Head of the MA Creative Writing and Education (2012–17) and PGCE English (2007–2015) programmes. Vicky’s research focuses on English as an additional language; language development; creative writing practices; poetry; multiliteracies; and transformative pedagogy. Vicky has led research projects in the field of EAL, multilingualism and literacy. Vicky was principal investigator with Jim Anderson of a global literacy project funded by the Paul Hamlyn Foundation, “Critical Connections Multilingual Digital Storytelling” (2012–2017), that uses digital storytelling to support engagement with language learning and digital literacy. She continues to lead multilingual digital storytelling projects funded by the Language Acts and Worldmaking AHRC project and a public engagement grant from Goldsmiths.