Living Life Twice

  Book Week 2021 I had so much fun this morning with on line reading of poems- older poems from my books and some freshly minted poems from my recent notebook gatherings. I shared them with two groups of impressionable 5-7 year old  readers & writers from Rowville PS. We explored poetry's vast terrain to show all the worlds in which ideas for writing await us... Not surprisingly,  I enjoyed presenting and sharing. I hope my enthusiastic reading and sharing delivers some writing energy and confidence. Some little spark of an idea to set these young poets going... Finger's crossed. It was fun for me to be able to share a little of my experience and hopefully my love of poetry was apparent to these curious learners. Here are two of the poems I shared. Hope you like them too. Feel free to share them with other curious learners and probationary poets.

I have made a point of giving each of my grandchildren a magnifying glass at an early age. I want them to have the opportunity to discover and celebrate natural wonder. I recall how much fun I had as a small boy with my own magnifying glass. –Seeing snails and slugs up close, watching ants and noticing their fine feelers, or exploring nature’s wonders in the fine lines and patterns on leaves and the trunks of trees. Worms, butterflies, slaters all warranted closer inspection. I became a curious learner. I had a fascination for observing the world through this magic portal; this round window.  It is important to foster the natural curiosity every child possesses and this can be further stimulated by the experience of seeing small wonders up close and personal. I have always held the view that the simple gift of a magnifying glass can further stimulate imagination and creativity.  I retain one in the drawer in my study... A magnifying glass is not a piece of cutting edge techno wizardry,

  One of the challenges facing writing teachers is how best to support student writers to move the writing focus beyond their writer’s notebook towards more intensive and sustained writing projects. We want the young writer to lift their gaze beyond the edges of the notebook and strike out in new areas with their writing.  The writer’s notebook is a tool for writing. It is not intended for the entries to become ensnared; trapped in a word prison. The notebook contains many beginnings and not all of them are destined to be launched beyond the notebook pages, but their presence affords the writer options.  The skill lies in identifying and lifting out that piece, or pieces, the writer feels have the most potential for developing into something beyond the notebook page. It will be a piece they can imagine themselves working on for a longer time. Engaging writers in conversations that encourages a desire to delve back into notebook entries, engage in some considered re-reading and consider

I am noting with concern, increasing attention from Science of Reading advocates towards the teaching of writing in Australian schools. My concern arises from the mischaracterization of current writing approaches, as evidenced by comments similar to the following: 'It’s great to see the growing emphasis on and discussion of teaching writing. This is another casualty of Whole Language’s scorched earth approach to explicit teaching of how spoken and written language work. Teachers did not learn this in their whole language school days and now can’t teach it .'   Apart from the absolutism of the comment, the words totally misrepresent the current reality within writing classrooms. Across the last 20 years of working regularly   with Australian and U.S.  schools, teachers and the young writers in their care, explicit, targeted teaching has been an integral element of the work undertaken. It is by far the dominant scenario I witness when visiting classrooms. When talking about instr