The Festival Education Programme has been organised by Festival Education Officer, Angela France, MA (with distinction) in ‘Creative and Critical Writing’ at University of Gloucestershire. She has read at major poetry venues including Cheltenham Literature Festival and Ledbury Poetry Festival; and has run workshops for undergraduates, mixed adult groups, recovering addicts and challenging young people.

 

 

1 The children at Campden Playgroup have story telling with Diana Humphrey, poet, teacher, former director of the Society for Story Telling, a ‘voice’ for Spoken Word Books, and part of Sun and Moon Stories and the Whisper and SHOUT theatre company.

 

2 St Catharine’s and St James’s primary schools’ Key Stage 2 pupils participate in ‘Poetryclass’ with writer Dave Reeves. Publications from his school residencies include Wordbreak (Birmingham's Catholic Partnership) and The Write Mixture (Abbey Junior School).

 

For details of Dave’s work with schools go to the Poetry Society ‘Poetryclass’ website at http://www.poetryclass.net/team.htm and click upon his name, Dave Reeves, in the list at the top of the page.  

 

 

3 Chipping Campden School (CCS) has a full day of workshops with UK’s leading Poetry Slam organisers, Spiel Unlimited:

The UK’s leading Poetry Slam organisers and presenters, Spiel Unlimited, host up to a dozen slams a year at arts/literary festivals and theatres, while orchestrating further written and spoken word activities through wordshops, residencies, demonstrations and their own live gigs in schools, libraries, pubs, cafés and elsewhere.  

They hosted the first ever slam in a prison – ‘The Slam in the Slammer’ at HMP Gloucester – and were invited to present an exhibition Stars of Slam! at the prestigious ‘creating SPARKS’ science-meets-arts festival in London. Their contact with poets throughout the UK gives them a broad knowledge of who-does-what-well and allows them to find ideal performers for any poetry event. They are:  

Marcus Moore Until recently Production Manager and ‘fringe’ mischief-maker at the Cheltenham Festival of Literature, he has appeared in over 200 performance poetry gigs and residencies in the last five years, including the Oxford Union, Glastonbury Festival, Leyhill Prison, Ledbury Poetry Festival, Central TV, BBC Radios 3, 4 and 5. He has had poems published in various Macmillan Children’s Books anthologies and is a regular contributor to the BCC TV series, Call My Bluff.  

As a performer or compère, he walks the tight-rope of ‘wit with width’, balancing invective with the inventive, while juggling with irony, parody and hickory-dickory-dockery. It’s even funnier when he falls off. He has just completed two screenplays, written in collaboration with England wicket-keeper and acclaimed artist, Jack Russell, with whom he shares a birthday, as well as a passion for the arts and cricket.  

Shame about the dress sense, which fades into irrelevance alongside his co-host: Sara-Jane Arberry Herself a finalist in the first UK Allcomers Poetry in 1995, she has been performing poetry far and wide ever since. She has worked extensively as a writer-in-residence, including posts in Taunton, Bristol, Swindon and Worcester and is an experienced workshop leader and facilitator, running poetry workshops at schools, colleges and community groups throughout the South West.  

Her poems are published in several anthologies and she is co-editor of ‘The Bristol Poetry Slam Anthology’, featuring the work of 108 poets who performed at The Bristol Poetry Slam 1996-1999. Sara-Jane’s work has also appeared on television, radio and the Internet. She is the organiser of the Voices Off programme at the Cheltenham Festival of Literature and also a founder member of Stet Press, a collective that produces daily on-site newspapers at literary and other festivals.  

 

The workshops lead to a competition of poetry or micro-fiction in two age groups. Saturday 8th May CCS students read their own work – prizes* to be awarded by Nigel McLoughlin, Reader in Creative Writing at the University of Gloucestershire, and Course Leader for their MA in Creative & Critical Writing.

 

*Prizes generously paid for by Chipping Campden Rotary Club  

This event leads into event 4.  

 

4 Saturday 8th May After the CCS prize giving, MA students in Creative & Critical Writing from the University of Gloucestershire read their own work. Nigel McLoughlin, Reader in Creative Writing at the University of Gloucestershire, and Course Leader for their MA in Creative & Critical Writing talks about Creative Writing as an academic subject.  

 

5 Thursday 6th May StoryFeast - The Second Chipping Campden School Day of Storytelling for Year 7 classes, as part of PLaTS (personal learning and thinking skills) Chloë of the Midnight Storytellers presents a multi cultural mix of thought provoking traditional stories (myths, legends, folktales). From Middle Eastern wit and wisdom to Knights of the Round Table. Ending with a collaborative story improvisation and Q+A with the students. Storytelling enables vocabulary enrichment and inspires interest in literature and the performing arts. Its emotional power supports the development of empathy and values. Chloë designs schools storytelling sessions to build a long-term legacy of supporting the speech, language and communication skills that students need to succeed. Follow-up work can range from more oral storytelling to written short stories, as far as cross artform creativity such as graphic novels, web pages and even video or street dance. Chloë aims to challenge and inspire students to engage in any creative work that demands focus, original and coherent expression, and good stories.  

 

6 Thursday 6th May CCS students, who have been coached by Angela France, to perform poetry, read poems chosen by residents for a ‘Poetry Please’ afternoon event at Mill House. Event sponsored by Caring Homes  

 

7 CCS Year 12 Literature students have a workshop Moving Poetry Into The Sun – How To Read Wilfred Owen (set text) and Other Poets: Learn How They Wrote and How You Can with Graham Fawcett, President of the TS Eliot Society (UK) and Tutor at The Poetry School in London.  

 

8 Thursday 6th May CCS Media students discuss story telling through film with Lucy Cohen, UCL history graduate, and documentary researcher, and watch her directorial debut, ‘Watch Me Disappear’ Which was shown as part of Channel 4's Generation Next season, documentary new talent strand First Cut in 2008. Each year in Britain around 2,500 people are buried alone. No one claims them, and no one attends their funerals. Driven by a desire to find out more about these lonely individuals, this film pieces together two peoples' lives, and asks how - in crowded, hectic, connected, modern Britain - it is possible for anyone to simply slip through the cracks and disappear.

'Originally, I wondered whether it would be possible for a person to know no one in this day and age. With Facebook and social networks, we are so over-connected it sometimes seems that we can have too many friends. But Sandra and Aki did cut themselves off and that seems to be something about the way we live now. In the old days, you would know someone had died because the milk bottles would pile up on the doorstep. Now, with so much more online shopping, we seem to be cutting down the need for human contact.'  

 

CCS students (and teachers each accompanying ten or more students) are invited to attend free all main evening events in CCS hall. (Free tickets must be applied for.)