Jamie at School

Jamie was interviewed in the Observer last Sunday

On Teacher Training (Education)

“I think 'Dream School' is questioning everything about schools that we know, including whether you need traditional qualifications to be a teacher – I think we both know that’s a no. Govey could be onto to something quite profound there” (p.8)

On children and their potential

“I think there are definitely two types of student: the academic kids and the 50% who fail. It’s very clear to see – it’s a fact. We’re not doing enough for those who fail; they need a more physical, tactile approach, involving people skills, team-building, problem solving, building things…they need to able to knock out seven 18-hour days in a row – you need to know what real f****** work is…” (p.8)

Jamie has his 'finger on the Pulse' (not a cookery reference) of latest thinking from the Tory Coalition government. I expect those who must work 18 hours a day will be the poor and working class. 19th Century values are seasoning Jamie's views.

Inaugural Lecture June 14th

My inaugural lecture has been set for June 14th 2011. If you would like to come do contact me. It will be great to have my friends, colleagues and students there to support me. The great fear must be an empty lecture theatre.

I'm going back the the 'day job' and will speak about children's poetry; drawing on the research I'm doing with colleagues at the moment and considering assessment and response to children's poetry by adults.

A good title is needed: 'Reading Voices: how to enjoy poetry written by children'. Perhaps that's too specific...hmm

Teaching poetry: Teaching Art

A new paper by Jeff (2010) discusses how art is taught in schools. The teaching of art is, of course, linked to the teaching of poetry. This is a bit of what the author says about the role of the 'expert':

"Art in UK schools...frequently characterised by hierarchical concepts of individual talent and genius, and the adherence to a well-established and largely unquestioned canon of great artists whose work within a narrow range of aesthetic codes, normally those associated with mimetic depiction (Downing and Watson 2004). Pedagogically, these regimes rely upon an expert specialist for delivery of skills and appropriate sensibilities to a largely positive set of recipients, the learners, which emphasises the role art plays in reinforcing the socially constraining and limiting function of education"

In this paper Jeff criticises 'Creative Partnerships' as being an example of this hierarchical perspective of 'the artist' and then everyone else. One could argue that in the teaching of poetry the model is often the same. Here, once again we are faced with the post-structuralist challenge and the question of power relations and the freedom of expression and the dangers of schools reinforcing messages about 'real art' only being about the individual genius of others.

James Britton on Play and Poetry (1982)

"Piaget states that roughly from the age of two to the age of eleven children's characteristic activity is that of make believe play, and he calls this 'Symbolic Representation'. In play children work over their experiences, and their enactments are a symbol representing actual experience. By the age of eleven, Piaget says a child is normally able to think in concepts. Children's writing reflects this development. Much that they write at six or seven or eight is more like poetry than prose in that it is a gloss upon experience rather than formulation itself"

"...Poetry, in common with all literature, is as much a rehearsal of experience as is make believe play (Here is trial without the possibility of error)".

Britton goes on to suggest that poems deal with poets coming to terms with ideas and events. Symbolic representataions of experience. This must mean that all forms of art could be described as a form of therapy.

Happy New Year

The ESRC poetry seminar series began this week in Exeter. I am co-convener. There were some excellent papers and stimulating discussion. Poems were read and written too.

One discussion I had concerned the concept of bad poems. I was interested to learn from poets and teachers of poetry what a bad poem looked like. Are there poems out there which are objectively 'bad'? Of course everyone is free to say which poems they like and which poems they think are 'good' and have value and which ones they think are not good (bad) and have no value...for them; but can a consensus be found about poems that are generally thought bad?

Is there a need to do this? There must be dangers here if we do. Being told that bad poems are out there may well contribute to the fear people have of poetry. Yet, writers and teachers of poetry often talk about bad poems, so it is in need of discussion.


Peter Sansum (1994), in his book 'Writing Poetry' says that some poems are 'tripe'. He is certain that bad poems are very common. These are poems which are some-how dishonest about the meanings they convey and how this is done and/or are full of cliche.

Seamus Cooney here ( http://homepages.wmich.edu/~cooneys/poems/bad/index.html ) has this to say

"To achieve memorable badness is not so easy. It has to be done innocently, by a poet unaware of his or her defects. The right combination of lofty ambition, humorless self-confidence, and crass incompetence is rare and precious. (There is a famous anthology of bad poetry called The Stuffed Owl, which I recommend to those interested.)

For the student, having a genuine insight into the true badness of some poems is, I think, a necessary corollary of having a grasp of what makes good poems good."

On his web site about 'bad poetry' Cooney includes Wordsworth aand Coleridge. Cooney, playfully is looking for objective properties of bad poems.


Bad poems? Below I play with ideas.


Bad poems:
1. Poems which are written for occasions which contain language and/or are about subjects which are inappropriate to be read in particular contexts
2. Prose
3. Poems which are stated as being written in a particular form which break the rules - e.g. a ballad which is not a ballad.
4. Poems which are written by someone who has no interest in writing one and little effort has been made in its composition
5.Poems written by those who do not know what a poem is and what it can do and/or have read very little poetry.
6. A poem no one can understand
7. A poem that people know about, but no one has any interest reading
8. Poems written by those who are not genuine about writing poems. There is another motive other than poetry.
9. A poem everyone thinks is bad



None of the definitions of bad poetry above necessarily mean that the poetry produced will be considered bad by everyone. There will always be someone (with the exception of (7) and (9)) who will enjoy them, even if it is just the poet.

So, what is a good poem...? Try changing the definions above. What do you get? For example,

'Poems which are written by someone who has a huge interest in writing one and has made great effort in its composition'.

Will this produce a good poem, or just not a bad one? Or does it just increase the chances of a good poem being produced as it was with a bad poem.

I suspect the definitions of good poetry will be different in nature to definitions about bad poems.

Book Trust Funding Cut

This message was posted by the Book Trust on their website. The funding for the book gifting programme and two other initiatives is going....but there will be a phonics 'check' (test) for all childrern at the age of 6...

Booktrust funding news

Recently we received the following news...
Department for Education funding cuts to bookgifting programmes in England

Booktrust had notification on Friday 17 December from the Department for Education that funding for our bookgifting programmes Bookstart, Booktime and Booked Up in England will be cut by 100% from 1 April 2011. Please note that this news applies to England only.

Bookstart currently gives free packs of books to children up until the age of three-years-old through health visitors, children’s centres and library services. Booktime gives a free book pack to reception-aged children, shortly after they start primary school. Booked Up gives a free book to children when they start secondary school from a choice of 13 titles. These bookgifting programmes support and encourage book sharing and independent reading in the home, as well as the use of public libraries.

We are immensely surprised and disappointed by this decision especially as it has been made at a time when the government has identified a need to improve literacy levels in children of primary school age. We passionately believe in these programmes and the proven extraordinary transformative power of reading for pleasure.

Merry Christmas

A scene from Humperdinck's Hansel and Gretel. You will need to bring the volume up to the limit to hear this clip.

The starving children are dreaming as they sleep lost in the wood. The composer asked for a staircase and angels to guard the children as they sleep. The directors of this production from Covent Garden thought they knew better. The music is wonderful. Is that Gunther Kress as the father in the background?

As well as being a composer, Humperdinck worked with Wagner on productions of Wagner's operas in the 19th Century.