Wellacre Celebrates Poetry at GCSE Poetry Live!

Posted at 1:37 pm on 13th March, 2018

Students hear live poetry performances 

Year 10 and 11 English students visited Manchester Opera House on 26th February to be inspired by a variety of poets.

As well as hearing live performances and having the opportunity to quiz the poets on stage, students also participated in sessions to help prepare them for their GCSE exams.

Students heard from:

• Simon Armitage who is one of Britain’s best poets, with a superb ear for language. This was a great opportunity to hear the Oxford Professor of Poetry read his work from the anthology;

• Carol Ann Duffy who is one of the most read, studied and loved of today’s poets and such an inspired choice for the role of Poet Laureate. Her poems are sharp, funny and contemporary, and also full of a literary past, whether from mythology, or Shakespeare.

• John Agard gave one of the most exciting performances in contemporary poetry, not only in the way he delivered his poems, but also in how he talked about them, combining historical awareness, cultural insight and extraordinary humour

• Imtiaz Dharker, Maura Dooley, Daljit Nagra, Owen Sheers and Grace Nichols also read their work.

Miss Alex Flowers, Leader of KS4 English, said:

“It was a fantastic opportunity for our students to hear live poetry, engaging them in this way will inspire and influence their GCSE exam preparation.”

During GCSE Poetry Live! poets responded to student questions and discussed how poems connect to and influence other poems.

Later on, in sessions with highly experienced Chief Examiners, they dealt with two skills vital for success in the GCSE English Literature examinations.  The first session looked at how students might deal with unseen poems in the exam, both how to think about them and how to write for the best possible results and the second session looked at comparing poems, whether they are studied poems or unseen, and how to write most effectively in either situation.

Student feedback included:

"John Agard was utterly inspiring."

"The examiner sessions were really useful."

"Simon Armitage's reading of his introductory poem celebrated a wide range of different people and cultures."