Stockport Children’s Poetry Festival
Stockport Town of Culture 2023/24
Organised by Seven Arches Publishing We have had a fantastic promise from a wonderful children’s author and poet, Michael Rosen. He will come to a Stockport stage to read some of his own poetry and to give encouragement to the children who have written poems for the festival.
The Festival starts in the autumn but the exciting day when Michael Rosen is on a Stockport stage is 20th March 2024. Children who have written really good poems can join him on the stage and read their poems either on their own or with friends.
THE ENVIRONMENT
This is our theme for the poems. Young people can interpret that as simply the environment of the playground or park. Or they can explore our wider world and how we need to take care of it.
Help With Poetry
(we all need a little help sometimes)
Joseph Coelho, Waterstones Children’s Laureate 2022/24 has a page on the Book Trust website called Poetry Prompts. This helps make teaching how to write poetry easy with sessions on repetition, similes, metaphors, alliteration and onomatopoeia. You can watch all the episodes of Poetry Prompts on the Book Trust website.
Of course there is also our wonderful guest, Michael Rosen's own YouTube Channel on writing Poetry and Stories.
How To Take Part
Starting from September 2023, if children want to take part in the Festival, they will need an adult (parent, teacher, group leader) to contact us at admin@sevenarchespublishing.co.uk to tell us that they are going to send in a poem or some poems on the theme of THE ENVIRONMENT written by a primary aged child/children (any child up to the age of 11 years). They need to give their name and the name of the school or community group.
As long as you have registered that you are taking part, you can send in poems whenever you like. But the closing date is Friday 26th January 2024.
When you send in an entry do so like this:
• Name of the poem
• Age of the child that has written it
• Name of the person sending it in
• Area of Stockport the child lives in
The poems will be read and judged by a well-known Stockport poet, Linda Cosgriff who will create a long list. These long-listed poems will be sent to Michael Rosen to select seven of the very best poems.
Memories of the Festival
Although we can only give prizes to a few of the children let us make this festival one to treasure for years to come by celebrating the poems of each child who puts pen or pencil to paper.
There will be a video of the Festival day that can be shared by all Stockport schools.
There will be a Stockport Children’s Festival of Poetry display folder in the local libraries containing all the poems sent in from children living near to that local library.
And a beautiful book will be produced by Seven Arches Publishing which can be purchased by anyone in the world from bookshops or online book sellers and, of course, Seven Arches Publishing website.
