I expect I have romanticised the idea of being a writer. I had visions of long afternoons sat in Parisian cafes whilst writing in beautiful notebooks, or writing retreats in quintessentially remote English cottages where I am woken with birdsong and ideas aplenty.

The reality is one of grabbing five minutes at the kitchen table amongst the chaos of life, or starting writing at 8pm after a day of work. Nevertheless, the reality is just as good as the fantasy because I AM WRITING. This month I set myself the challenge of writing a blog post everyday and now that month is almost done I wanted to share the news of a poetry competition I am helping to judge.

If you know a 4-11 year old who wants to have a go at writing poetry then please pass on the information! I love writing, but the teacher in me also loves inspiring others to write. I hope some of my blog posts this month might have done that. I will try and keep them up, but I suspect the frequency will drop a bit next month as I work on a few other projects – including this fab competition:

For more information please check out the:

Conversations with children are great inspiration for poetry. Lots of my poems feature lines which are inspired by phrases or words children have said to me. This poem is a good indication of how my evening went today – if you can’t beat ’em, write poetry about them!

Think about the things children are interested in – you can still cover big “grown up” topics in children’s poetry but it is how you present them on the page that will determine whether they work or not. The poems need to talk to their audience in a way which makes them engage, so why not write from their perspective? How do children talk to each other? How do they talk to adults? How do THEY see the world?

Keep an ear out for interesting phrases or conversations that might work well as poems.

I often use photography with students to inspire poetry ideas. Whether that is showing them photographs someone else has taken, or going on an ideas walk around the space we are in to find something that interests them. This can lead to some brilliant ideas for poems because so much about poetry is observing the world around you and finding your own take on it.

I love taking photographs of our children and, normally, those photographs are of them smiling. Today I took a photograph of their muddy knees instead, and when I got home I wrote this poem. The smiling photos are lovely but there was something magic and different about this photo, which is probably why it inspired me to write.

Have a look through your photographs – do any of them inspire ideas for poems? If not, go for a walk and take a photo of something that interests you, something that calls out to be written about.

Today is Mothers’ Day in the UK. So here is a poem my mum wrote, about her mum. My mum is one of the reasons I write and love poetry. She once woke me up at 5am to tell me about an idea she’d had for a writing project – that kind of excitement and passion for ideas and writing is something I will always be grateful to her for. Now, if only I could be as healthy as her mum, my Nan – then I really would be winning at life…

Have a go at writing a poem about someone who is a different generation to you – they could be older or younger, but think about what interests you or inspires you about that generation and have a go! Remember, you can always share your poems with me at charliebownauthor@outlook.com

This poem was inspired by a drama game of the same name. During the game students take it in turns to perform a simple action (such as brushing their hair) but when asked by someone what they are doing, they have to respond by describing a different action (“I’m eating a pear”) which rhymes. The game takes concentration and imagination and can be lots of fun – because whatever action the student comes up with, the next person has to act out!

I wanted to try writing a poem which worked in the same way but where the reader could imagine a story by reading between the lines. What was the dare in the poem? Did the writer mean to find a bear? How is the bear feeling? Will brushing the bear’s hair work, or is the writer going to be in big trouble? It’s fun writing without answering all the questions for the reader and it works well in poetry to leave that space for the reader to fill in the blank spaces.

Have a go at writing a poem using the same format – “I’m…” where all the words at the end of the lines rhyme.