Synopsis
UKLA Academic Book Award 2016: Highly Commended
Making Poetry Happen provides a valuable resource for trainee and practicing teachers, enabling them to become more confident and creative in teaching what is recognized as a very challenging aspect of the English curriculum. The volume editors draw together a wide-range of perspectives to provide support for development of creative practices across the age phases, drawing on learners' and teachers' perceptions of what poetry teaching is like in all its forms and within a variety of contexts, including:
- inspiring young people to write poems
- engaging invisible pupils (especially boys)
- listening to poetry
- performing poetry
Throughout, the contributors include practical, tried-and-tested materials, including activities, and draw on case studies. This approach ensures that the theory is clearly linked to practice as they consider teaching and learning poetry to those aged between 5 and 19 from different perspectives, looking at reading; writing; speaking and listening; and transformative poetry cultures. Each of the four parts includes teacher commentaries on how they have adapted and developed the poetry activities for use in their own classroom.
About the Authors
Sue Dymoke (1962-2023) led the PhD programme at the Institute of Education at Nottingham Trent University, UK. She was editor (with Anthony Wilson, Andrew Lambirth, and Myra Barrs) of Making Poetry Happen (Bloomsbury, 2015) and Making Poetry Matter (Bloomsbury, 2015) and was author of Drafting and Assessing Poetry: a guide for teachers (2003) and Teaching English Texts 11-18 (Bloomsbury, 2009). She was the author of four collections of poems, the last of which was What To Do Next (2023). She was external evaluator for the Paul Hamlyn First Story Student Ambassadors scheme, a member of NAWE Higher Education committee and Nottingham UNESCO City of Literature wider board. As a poet, educator and academic, her impact on poetry teaching was internationally recognised.
Myra Barrs is a Visiting Professor at the University of East London, UK, and was, until recently, Co-Director of the Centre for Literacy in Primary Education (CLPE).
Andrew Lambirth is a writer, critic and curator. An art critic for The Spectator, he has written for a wide range of publications, including The Sunday Times and The Independent, and from 1990 to 2002 he was contributing editor of RA, the Royal Academy of Arts magazine. He is the author of numerous art books, including Ken Kiff (2001), LS Lowry: Conversation Pieces (2003), Kitaj (2004), Roger Hilton: The Figured Language of Thought (2007) and Nigel Hall: Sculpture and Works on Paper (2008). He is the Professor of Education at the University of Greenwich, UK.
Anthony Wilson is a poet, writing tutor and Senior Lecturer in Primary English at the University of Exeter, UK, where he works in teacher and medical education. He has published six collections of poetry, the most recent of which is The Wind and the Rain (Blue Diode Press, 2023). His new pamphlet of poems, Plymbridge, published in 2026. Alongside his books with Sue Dymoke, he has edited Creativity in Primary Education (2015) and co-edited The Poetry Book for Primary Schools (1998). He has tutored for Arvon, the Poetry School and the Poetry Business. He blogs at anthonywilsonpoetry.com.
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