Poetry For Good: A poetry competition celebrating Key Workers

I feel blessed to have my poem "Schoolsick" long listed in the https://www.poetryforgood.org.uk/ competition aimed at celebrating the incredible things #KeyWorkers have done throughout the #Covid #Pandemic

I also have to give a big shout out to Brian Moses who reignited my belief that I was a poet, after tweeting an early version of this poem called "I Love School" suggesting it was a great model to get kids writing their own poems. Check out Brian's inspiring blog here

My poem was based on my experiences as a teacher, seeing my class struggling with their emotions in #Lockdown. A lot of them seemed to lose that trajectory which was ready to launch them, just like every Year 6 class before, into the world as confident young future people. That was before the #BeforeTimes

And even though my poem plays on children hating school until they realise it's not there anymore, all of the children I teach actually love primary school. It was just #hyperbole for poetry's sake.

I'm glad to report that my class are back to being as fabulous as they ever were but the emotional and academic scars are still there for all to see.

So here is my poem, Schoolsick, and after that please read some of the children's poems who used it as a model to explore their own feelings about returning to school after Lockdown. In addition, read the incredible entries for each category of the Poetry For Good competition

Let's hope we don't go there again, but if we do, these children will show us how it's done ...