It’s Back! Bigger, Better and Bolder than Before: The
Poet Laureate Launches Mother Tongue Other Tongue 2013. Wednesday, 30th January, 2013
The Poet
Laureate, Carol Ann Duffy, has announced that Mother Tongue Other Tongue will
be her next Laureate Education Project. An idea originally developed by the
Faculty of Humanities, Languages and Social Science at MMU, and Routes into
Languages North West, this national multilingual poetry competition aims to
celebrate cultural diversity and the many languages currently spoken in schools
across the UK.
On Wednesday
morning, Carol Ann paid a special visit to Webster Primary School in Moss Side where
she launched the North West version of the competition, the first of a series
of launches that will take place throughout the year up and down the country.
In keeping with
the spirit of the competition, during the morning pupils of all ages and
nationalities from Webster primary school, Manchester Academy and Trinity High
School, worked in collaboration with mentors from Loreto Sixth Form and PGCE students
from Manchester Metropolitan University’s School of Education, to create
original multilingual poems. The workshop, led by poet, Mandy Coe, demonstrated
the benefits of using multilingual poetry in the classroom to lift barriers of
learning and to teach children about different cultures.
Carol Ann Duffy
was very impressed with the creativity and enthusiasm displayed by the
students: “Differences in language and culture are often considered to be a
barrier to communication, but the language of poetry is universal. Children are
the best poets because they see the world with fresh eyes, they do not see
barriers in the way that adults sometimes do. If children can use the language
of poetry to share their languages and cultures, perhaps these barriers can be
removed for adults. Maybe we can learn to appreciate each other’s differences
and similarities. I look forward to what the North West’s talented and
inspirational children will share with us this year.”
Head Teacher of
Webster primary school, Jeremy Jackson, agrees: “We do value the multitude of
languages spoken here at school, but the pressure is always on to get pupils up
to speed with their English very quickly. It is refreshing, therefore, to have
the opportunity to hear the children use their languages in a creative and
collaborative way.”
MMU’s Vice
Chancellor, Professor John Brooks, explains: “The schools that took part in the
launch were selected because of their relationship to MMU and to represent the
age-range of the competition, which is from 8 to 18. All of the schools are
from the Birley Fields area and we are delighted, as ever, to continue working
both with and in our local community. One of our partners for this project is
the Manchester Mela and MMU students will be running a multi-lingual poetry and
storytelling tent at the Mela in July.”
In the afternoon
the celebrations moved over to MMU’s Humanities Faculty, where 300 year 10
pupils from secondary schools across Greater Manchester joined the schools from
the morning session at Webster to watch them perform alongside the Poet
Laureate, accompanied by musician, John Sampson. Cheers and applause ricocheted
off the walls of Lecture Theatre 1 as the children took to the stage to deliver
their poetic offerings.
12-year-old
Destiny Cross from Trinity High School was moved by the day’s events, “I will
remember today for a very long time because I had the privilege to perform my
poem alongside Carol Ann Duffy.”
Manchester Academy
pupil, Nashif Nawferdeen, aged 11 shared: “I have really enjoyed learning about
the different languages that the pupils speak here today. I think the
competition is a fantastic idea and I look forward to entering!”
Even the year 10
pupils were astonished by the very high standard of the work produced by the
younger pupils. 14-year-old Megan Sutcliffe from Lowton C of E High School said,
“It was awesome. I had no idea poetry could be so much fun and I can’t believe
that the pupils only had a morning to put all of this together.”
Mother Tongue
Other Tongue is a free-to-enter competition open to pupils aged between 8 and
18. Mother Tongue asks pupils, who do not have English as a first language, to
write about what a lullaby, poem or song in their native language means to
them, while Other Tongue asks pupils to create an original poem in a second
language they are learning at school. Winners of the competition will have
their poems published in an anthology and will be invited back to MMU in
October for a special NATIONAL celebration event.
For further
information about the competition, including details on how to enter, please
visit: www.mtot.org.uk
Teachers are
also invited to attend a free CPD taking place on February 12th
where they will be able to find out more about the project, the workshops we
run in school and what resources are available to support teachers. To book
your free place please visit: http://mtotcpd.eventbrite.co.uk/
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