Our School, The Red Room Company & Life Matters

“The Red Room Company works in partnership with schools, teachers and poets to put the playfulness back into poetry. One school which has particularly embraced creativity through these projects is Dapto High School.” LIFE MATTERS I had a fun start to the last week of term today being interviewed on Radio National by Natasha Mitchell about our partnership with […]

Luka Lesson & The Red Room Company

“I’ll close my eyes and admire the quality of the silence I’ll write rhymes in my mind honestly and define them Solidly redefine and memorise them Until like a diamond when I come out I’ll be better than when I arrived in”                           […]

Poetry and The Red Room Company (at our school)

The Red Room Company created a quality learning experience for our students this month with the first two of an ongoing series of workshops. The ‘quality’ and ‘experience’ really does need to be emphasised as the pedagogy employed by our poets – Candy, Lorin and Tamryn – was superbly physical, reflective and high energy, engaging […]

Poetry and The Red Room Company

The Red Room Company’s national poetry education program transforms the way poetry is taught in Australian schools and learning institutions by bringing young and emerging poets into classrooms across the country to run practical writing workshops. During the workshops, poets inspire students to develop read, listen, compose and perform their own poetry, which simultaneously enriches […]

Year 10 English in 2012

cc licensed ( BY SD ) flickr photo shared by Josef Grunig I am excited at the prospect of teaching Year 10 English next year; the first time since 2006. The NSW Board of Studies has been instructed to abolish the School Certificate and there are great opportunities for teachers, with the extra time suddenly available, […]

The Red Wheelbarrow

by William Carlos Williams (1923)   so much depends upon a red wheel barrow glazed with rain water beside the white chickens. Source …so much depends upon using imagery to engage students and creating opportunities for them to use imagery to engage you… Slider credit: cc licensed ( BY NC ) flickr photo shared by […]

‘Out of Time’ – Top 10 Australian Poems

I discovered, via A Pair of Ragged Claws, that the 702 Book Club on ABC Radio is compiling the Top 10 Australian Poems. For me, lists, whether they be a top 10, 100 or 500, can be catalysts for discussing what a culture still feels is important, relevant and uplifting. Many of us spend pleasant hours finding new books, tunes […]

Storm: A Poem

[vodpod id=Groupvideo.2364455&w=425&h=350&fv=%26rel%3D0%26border%3D0%26]   I really enjoyed this ‘beat poem’ discovered at Stephen Downes’ blog. more about “Storm: A Poem“, posted with vodpod     More of Tim Minchin can be found here and here.