Well-Dressing and Beyond

The children's writing sessions at Bradwell mobile are now finished. Thanks to everyone who took part especially Natalie, Shannon, Abbie and Suwannee, who added a line in Thai to our Magical Mobile poem.

The last crop of this year's well-dressings is in progress. Recently I came across the one pictured here, depicting a village in Nepal. Residents of Great Hucklow are sponsoring Kanchha Babu Sherpa, a Nepalese medical student who is studying at Manchester Uni. There's got to be a poem in that. I'm trying to work on a sequence about water and well-dressing, inspired by this and by the report in last week's Guardian about the UK water footprint (4,645 litres per person per day when hidden factors are included).

Poetry Olympics

We were throwing the poetry javelins, and jumping the hurdles of rhyme and rhythm at Bradwell Mobile Library this week. I awarded several Certificates of Olympic Achivement. Acrostics were devised for some of the 33 Olympic sports (though Synchronised Swimming was a bridge too far) and a medal goes to Abbie (7) for this one:


Golf

Golfers on the green
Out of bounds
Lost and
Found.

A place on the podium for Shannon (11) for this advice:
How to Swim

Take arm-bands and a dive stick,
a blue swimming hat, lots of slides,
a friend, a spotty towel, goggles.

Don't take tears, a woolly hat,
chocolate, a black cat,
a walking stick
or a brick.

Choose a sunny day.
Mix it together.
Enjoy with chips and lemonade.

and to Eleanor (9) for this:
How to Cycle

Take:
a helmet
your bike
a sunny day
a pump for your tyres


Don't take:
rain
fog
a computer
spaghetti bolognese


Mix well.
Add a force of wind
and a nice breeze.
Serve with raspberry ripple ice-cream.

I'll be in Bradwell again on 20th & 27th August. See you there for more poetry action ...
P.S. 'Reading The Game' is the August theme for the National Year of Reading 2008