Spun in drafts

Damp white imprints dog the feet; snowbound trolley, snowbound street. Her tip of glove to lip and cheek, “Goodbye.” Go. … More

The fame question

When I visit schools to read and talk about poetry there is often some sort of Q and A following … More

Hysteria As she laughed I was aware of becoming involved in her laughter and being part of it, until her … More

A comment Mark Robinson made in the days following Seamus Heaney’s death in August resonated with me. He said he … More

Timetable We all remember school, of course: the lino warming, shoe bag smell, expanse of polished floor. It’s where we … More

Sometime in 1997 I went to hear Kevin Crossley-Holland give a reading at Exeter Central Library. I’d heard he was … More

When I speak to trainee primary school teachers about their views of poetry I am often struck by their divergent … More

I wrote yesterday about pitching poems in the classroom which are aimed not at the crowd but perhaps one … More

Who? Who is that child I see wandering, wandering down by the side of the quivering stream? Why does … More

I count myself lucky to have been taught by a team of English teachers who I have no doubt … More

I once saw Michael Rosen teach a theatre full of tearfully happy children and adults these wonderful nonsense word games … More

I was lucky. I was taught English in one of those classrooms with complete sets of A Taste of Honey, … More

One year I decided that I would decorate one of my teaching rooms with my collection of Poems on the … More

The Bath Festivals‘ Write Team was a creative writing project designed to develop pupil confidence and engagement in their learning. The … More

In 2007 Sue Dymoke, Andrew Lambirth and I got together and decided we were going to apply to the ESRC … More

Sometimes you do not get a poem, or what a poet is up to, straight away. In the case of … More

Apart from e e cummings and the genius Anon, one of my chief discoveries in the Voices and Junior Voices series that I … More

I I first came across e e cummings’s ‘in Just’ in an anthology, Wordscapes, edited by Barry Maybury (OUP, 1971). … More