New Fast Automatic Daffodils

There's a poem by one of the 'Mersey Beat' Poets, Adrian Henri, that I always liked as a teenager. I still have the poetry books, well-thumbed from that time long ago. The other day I browsed through them and came across the poem again.

It's a strange poem, probably not to everyone's taste. Henri has taken Wordsworth's famous 'Daffodils' poem and spliced it with a Dutch advert for a car. (Yeah, weird, but I like weird.)

Here's the first part of it:

"THE NEW FAST AUTOMATIC DAFFODILS

by Adrian Henri

I wandered lonely as

THE NEW FAST AUTOMATIC DAFFODIL,

FULLY AUTOMATIC

that floats on high o'er vales and hills

The Daffodil is generously dimensioned to accommodate four

adult passengers

10,000 saw I at a glance

Nodding their new anatomically shaped heads in sprightly

dance

Beside the lake beneath the trees
in three bright modern colours

red, blue and pigskin

The Daffodil de luxe is equipped with a host of useful
accessories

including windscreen wipers and washer with joint control

A Daffodil doubles the enjoyment of touring at home or

abroad

......"

I showed the poem to the kids. Then, egged on by their interest,'You mean you actually like it?!', I printed out another Wordsworth poem, and gave them some old magazines to make their own 'Mutant Wordsworth' poem.

So, this is the original they were working with:

Hmm..well it doesn't really float my boat. But take a look at the new improved version by ds1:

(alterations to the original are marked in bold type below)

"THE RAINBOW

By Public Relations

My luxury car leaps up when I behold

Cheaper online access in the sky

So was it when my life began

So is it now I am a van;

So be it when I shall grow old

Or let me fly

The child is father of the car that is man

And I could wish my days to be

Bound each to each by the tax increase."

So, you see, whatever you think of poetry - and most of the time I think it's a pile of pompous pants - it really is just playing with words. Yep that's all it boils down to. Iambic pentameters (or should that be pompous pantameters?) aside, there are times when poetry can be crude and fun. And - though I've only just noticed - ds1 has even kept the rhyme correct in some of the lines - man/van, sky/fly. There was no prompting from me, I gave them free reign to do as they wished with old Wordy. Blimey! That means my child actually READ the poem and THOUGHT about which words would fit best.

Sometimes we seriously underestimate our kids, don't we?

Er, yeah, me again.

Feel like I can hardly keep up with our weeks now. I have so many photos to post, but haven't loaded them up yet, so a quick whistlestop tour right now and then I'll get around to doing the photos soon. Promise. No more boring posts, after this one. Go on, sue me.

We had a day out on Saturday with friends at a little theme park to celebrate dd's 7th birthday (half-price voucher for tickets, always a bonus). Then she had her birthday with home-made hedgehog cake, a wolf suit (which was kinda purple when it arrived rather than grey, but she was dutiful enough to try it on) and a visit from her auntie. Then on Monday it was cinema in the morning (Schools Film week - free films) and her 'animal-themed' party in the afternoon. All surprisingly chilled. Today, cinema again, this time to see Ponyo, one of the Japanese animations by Studio Gibli that we love.

Previous weeks the kids have been creating knex crossbows at HE group, doing poetry (well, doing 'Mutant Wordsworth' more about this when I post up the photos), ice skating, and er lots of stuff. I find now if I don't keep a note of it all it's soon forgotten. Ds2 has done a long hike and overnight camp with cubs, ds1 has been film-making with a friend.

Part of me feels I should be booking some group workshops at museums, or doing some outings with the kids, but another part of me knows that I can't really take anything else on at the mo. If you read my other blog (http://www.the-idle-pen.blogspot.com/) then you'll know that I have other things to fret about, like Jane Austen and her literary chums.

Sigh.

In order for me to have time to tackle JA and Co, I've been trying to keep some structure to our weeks and a while back I came up with a plan to tick a few boxes. So, we do one week 'writing' (and anything associated with) and one week 'maths (and anything associated with). Writing has included poetry (Mutant Wordsworth), filling in a museum trail sheet, writing a letter to penfriends (it took a whole week for that) etc. Up to an hour a day max. Maths is less exciting and flexible...just workbooks until I can come up with the energy to do something else. Of course I could do cooking or some other sort of measuring, but cooking with kids is even more stressful than stapling them to the table to do a page of a maths workbook.

Saying this, I DO have plans to cook with the kids, using the River Cottage Family Cookbook which looks fab (have it on loan from library at the mo). Still at the planning stage though. Or maybe it will just make a nice coffee table book, or doorstop.

The kids started fencing lessons this week. Kindly offered at bargain price by another home ed family, my bunch joined others to have their first lesson on Tuesday. The best thing is that the teacher is a boy who was home educated himself, AND his mother was the first ever HE contact I ever made, about 8 years ago. Lovely stuff. Amazingly dd did not bark, or miaow or growl or make bear noises or crawl around the floor on all fours or hug the tutor's legs until he fell over. No she participated and cooperated and enjoyed. Miracles do happen.

Christmas is approaching. Am very aware of low funds, bulging credit card, and children's expensive tastes (and, more importantly, very few relatives left alive to meet these tastes, or even any to buy them some cheap tat so they have something to unwrap on Christmas day.). Oh and the small matter of nearly 2 grand's worth of course fees, still to pay this year. I'm going to blame it all on Jane Austen.

p.s. check out this wonderful explanation of the defence cuts:
http://archers-at-the-larches.blogspot.com/2010/10/defence-cuts-explained-simply.html

'Assonance means getting the rhyme wrong...'

Today I received my course handbook for the part time diploma in Creative Writing I'm starting in September.
Slap on the doormat it went, a slender A4 spiral-bound tome containing a recommended reading list of 168 books.

Yes 168!

I counted.

In a panic I emailed a friend who is also signed up for the course. She replied saying that yes, she has read most of the books at some time or other (damn, no sympathy there then).

I counted again. Just in case I had missed something. Out of the entire list of 168 books I have read 4.

FOUR books in my entire lifetime.

And 2 of those were 'how to write' type books, so I'm not even sure that they count.

What have I been doing with my life?(Obviously not reading the same books as everybody else.)
Even accounting for periods of drunkenness and periods of hangover recovery, surely I must have read more books on this list.

I read down the list:

Chekhov...Kafka....

And I'm there. I AM Julie Walters in 'Educating Rita':

["Suggest how you would resolve the staging difficulties "inherent in a production of Ibsen's Peer Gynt"
you have written, quote. "Do it on the radio. "Unquote.]

As if this wasn't bad enough (yeah it's bad enough), from week 6 we are 'doing' poetry.

POETRY.

POETRY.

poetry

Nope, writing it in different font doesn't make it any more attractive.

168 books in 8 weeks before the course starts...that makes it about 20 a week, or 3 a day (4 a day if you want weekends off). Yeah, no probs. I'll go get started now...

'Give Children books, not SATs'

Two posts in one day?

Saw this link on an email list and thought I'd refer to it here.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/schools/michael-rosen-give-children-books-not-sats-910225.html
Michael Rosen: 'Give children books, not SATs'

'...."Testing does something to children, something to teachers, something to parents, something to the whole conversation about education," he says. His everyday speech, you notice, has the same lively stream of consciousness as his poetry.
But by far his biggest concern is what testing has done to his greatest love: books. Literacy standards at 14 fell this year, according to Key Stage 3 tests. Rosen is currently tub-thumping on behalf of the National Year of Reading, a campaign to celebrate the written word, and has written a poem for the cause – printed exclusively today . What he wants above all is to re-inject a sense of enthusiasm into the study of literature in schools. Love books, he says, and school will be a cinch; over-test children, sterilise the English language, and you only make it harder...'

Here's the poem. It's lost some of the formatting when I cut and pasted it, so I've tried to restore it a bit. Sorry Michael, probably made a pig's ear out of it...

'Words Are Us', by Michael Rosen

In the beginning was the word
And the word is ours:

The names of places
The names of flowers
The names of names

Words are ours

Page-turners
For early learners

How to boil an egg
Or mend a leg

Words are ours

Wall charts
Love hearts

Sports reports
Short retorts

Jam jar labels
Timetables

Words are ours

Following the instructions
For furniture constructions

Ancient mythologies
Online anthologies

Who she wrote for
Who to vote for

Joke collections
Results of elections

Words are ours

The tale's got you gripped
Have you learned your script?

The method of an experiment
Ingredients for merriment

W8n 4ur txt
Re: whts nxt

Print media
Wikipedia

Words are ours

Subtitles on TV
Details on your CV

Book of great speeches
Guide to the best beaches

Looking for chapters
on velociraptors

Words are ours

The mystery of history
The history of mystery

The views of news
The news of views

Words to explain
the words for pain

Doing geography
Autobiography

What to do in payphones
Goodbyes on gravestones

Words are ours.

www.michaelrosen.co.uk