Never Rhyme Venus With...

Poetry. Year 7 are doing poetry at the moment. So far we have covered haikus (bless you!), acrostics and limericks. Today we did a spot of Ozymandias. Only a spot, mind, because personally I wouldn't inflict Shelley (Percy Bysshe) on anyone under the age of 35 but hey- ho, follow the scheme of work I must go.

To ease the tension of a class full of eleven year olds trying to get their heads around some weirdo stuff written by a long dead poet, I said, 'In the last ten minutes of the lesson, have a go at writing a bit of your own rhyme.' (The pupils had already told me on no uncertain terms that if it doesn't rhyme it isn't poetry, and no amount of persuasionary tactics were going to convince them otherwise.)

After a few minutes of deeply furrowed brows, sighing and flapping of arms a la 'look at me in my big frilly shirt', Callum beckons me over.

'I've written a poem, ma'am,' he whispers.
'Good,' I say. 'Why are you whispering?'
'Well,' says Callum, 'the poem has a word in it that, er, well, er...' He pauses and I can see he is trying to formulate an explanation. 'It's very scientific,' he declares.
'Okay,' I say. 'Tell me the poem.' And just to be on the safe side, I continue the whispering theme, so as not to risk over-exerting the rest of the class with the loud blurting out of a dubious sounding scientific word.

Callum begins. 'It's about the stars,' he says, by way of preamble. I nod. I am braced.
'I look up to Mars, and I see the stars,' says the embryonic poet. (Or should that be 'embyronic poet??)

I nod. So far so good. Effective use of concise language. Simple rhyme.

'I look up to Venus, and I see a...'

'Okay,' I whisper, with some urgency. 'I can see exactly where this is going, Callum.'

'But it's scientific,' whispers Callum.
'And no doubt biologically correct,' I say. 'But I'm not sure it's wholly suitable to be in your English exercise book.'
'But it's scientific,' Callum insists. I can see he isn't going to let this one go. I can see he is very keen on the piece of poetry he has written.

'Let's think,' I say. 'What if your parents were to open your book and read your poem. What would they think?'

Callum shrugs. 'They wouldn't mind,' he says.
'Okay,' I say. 'What if an OfSted inspector opened your book and read your rhyme.'

Callum shrugs again. This time he does not commit himself to comment. I suspect he thinks it will be my problem.

But should I have let the lad continue on his scientific adventure? Was I being too censorial? (Is that how you spell 'censorial?'). Should I have embraced his freedom of thought, his right to express himself fully in whatever form he wished? Or was I being restrained by my own prudish nature?

Too bloomin' right I was! There are some things I do not wish to see when I am marking, and school boy rhymes with Venus are one of them.

I mean, it's bad enough seeing the pictures the Year 11s draw of Venus rhymes on the covers of their exercise books. Unless they are really pictures of rockets, of course.