Remembrance
Sally Bavage writes:
No, not exactly of Things Past by Marcel Proust, though they have. More WW1, although it haunts us still. The Thing Past this time was a battered old trumpet, owned by our commissioned local writer and poet James Nash, who used it as a starting point for generating original writing and poetry by two year 6 classes at Ireland Wood primary school.
Thursday 28 November was indeed a seasonally cold and frosty morning but the warm welcome afforded to the thirty or so visiting parents/carers by an assembled year 6 was excited and joyful. Less so the subject: the celebrated WW1 poets such as Brooke, Owen or Sassoon knew how to touch a nerve. No less our aspiring writers at Ireland Wood, who read out their powerful and affecting poems confidently to an audience of school staff, parents and four classes of both peers and other pupils. Quite daunting but a triumph over nerves and self-doubt.
Their writing was first discussed, workshopped, drafted, redrafted, polished and prepared for performance. As Mr Crossley (pictured with James Nash), year 6 teacher, said: “The calming soothing voice of James Nash just convinces all the pupils to write with feeling and empathy. He encourages them all to shine with self-confidence and is so good at getting the best out of them. And he spoke for Mrs Bilioni, his colleague year 6 teacher who said “100% we want him back next year!”
It really is a testament by the school to give such commitment to the work and to put so much organisational effort into the assembly – careful choreography, practice with a microphone, even group singing of Pack Up Your Troubles and Long Way to Tipperary. Anyone who's tried that with sixty individuals knows what goes in. And the careully mounted poems were all displayed behind the pupils for some very proud parents to read and in which the writers could take pride. Teaching staff and teaching assistants were unanimously really enthusiastic.
“He's been talking about the work at home, which isn't usual,” said one dad. And a mum volunteered that “her daughter had so enjoyed the work she now 'loved poetry'.” That's no mean feat for one of the less popular aspects of the curriculum. “Wow, she surprised us all,” said teaching assistant Mrs Mirshekar of one young person with special needs. “What a difference between the drafts of her writing as she gained in confidence.” Teaching assistant Mrs Mohammadi confided that “Even when English is not the first language our pupils used imagination, understood similes and were eager instead of struggling to write. They loved it. I've been here fourteen years and seen the results that James Nash has generated before but it's true that the children absolutely love it.”
And the children themselves. Beaming faces all round gave away their feelings. One girl perhaps summed up for all: “I have really, really enjoyed it and even read a book (about the fell-running messengers of WW1) as preparation to set the scene.” Mrs Hutchinson, teaching assistantt, summed up: “Simply amazing.”
Others confided to James:
‘It’s
lovely being creative and coming up with your own ideas’
‘I’ve
really liked learning about how to write a poem’
‘
I’ve
had fun, working with a real poet’
It's impossible to report on sixty poems, so just a very few lines follow:
Why am I here; I should be at home.
My friends are falling one by one.
All you can smell in the trenches is the soldiers' flesh and blood.
Peaceful melodies that break my heart.
How could they play while people are dying?
As they blow it makes me think of a loud and painful scream.
Remember, a trumpet being played
Signalling the end of war.
