ABPA - Australian Bush Poets Association

Marty I have done several schools over the last year and have always recieved a good positive response. The high school kids were a bit of a task but the teacher rang me later to say that they had lots to talk about after the session and interest was good. I find that as Glenny said getting them involved is the secret and as shown on the site The Man From Ironbark with the kids playing the parts in dress up is good. They are also interested in seeing things from the olden days such as what a cut throat razor looks like and I have several pictures of old wagons ect.

I find around twenty kids is ideal for what I do as you can get up close and really gauge the reaction and get even those shy kids involved. My first approach came as you would have guessed from my grandson teacher but teachers talk at meetings ect and word is spreading.


Have a go mate it's an adventure.

Bob

We're back off to Theodore today so I'll post this & catch up when I return....in (?) days.

I think this is important enough to address comprehensively. With that thought in mind, perhaps I could ask Manfred if it is worth the ABPA seriously considering sanctioning a series of workshops for presenters? Those of us who are more experienced in conducting these (with credible proven results) could get together with interested poets within cooee of our location, to share & construct a basic formula etc. I would be happy to contribute & even travel to do so if required. Between us all I think we could launch a very credible & worthwhile service to our youth, & subsequently to the expansion of our craft.

Anyway....a certain scaly object is blowing the horn in the car, so it looks like I'm about to depart....in my dressing gown no less.

Cheeers all...be good...or Zondrae will get ya!

Glenny

Maybe schools are no longer the target, unless we want short term estedford type juniors. I am looking more at 20 years and up. Finished with the distractions of puberty. Starting to settle down a bit, beginning to develop a good sense of humour and events happening around them. I think we need to attract them to some of our shows where they can look and say, hey that looks like fun, I reckon I could have a crack at that.

Primary and secondary schools have rarely, if ever produced a long term writer/performer in our comps and festivals. Still a place for it to be taught, but it will not produce new blood which is so badly needing to be injected into Australian Poetry.

Just another thought on the subject. Hey Marty P.??? Marty P. Marty P.???!! lol

Plank you very much Neil.


Bob

Maybe Plank Poetry could be the go - sounds stupid enough to appeal to teenage brains or even Plank Verse - better still

Plank Verse Good one Maureen.

But what rhymes with planker??

They don't call'em Generation Why?? for nuthin

Marty

My son is a painter he says, old hat been doing it for years and all you get is a sore head.


Bob

Thus every teenager has a 'stupid brain' and Planks!! Ahh so now I see why we should appeal to them with our warm adopting poetic attitudes.

Felt so sorry for those elderly parents on TV last night whose son had fallen from the boot of a speeding car whilst planking - a totally stupid stunt . If he lives the medical bills alone will likely cripple his parents who will then spend the rest of their lives having to care for a disabled man - what about them, and if he lives what is his prognosis for a useful life going to be in the future?

The cost to Australian taxpayers is going to be horrendous if these kind of injuries are going to continue - and they are totally avoidable. Having worked in the Health sector for years I know the costs involved and they are horrendous. Far better things to be spending the scarce publicly available medical $$$$$$ on IMO than catastrophic injuries that are caused by people choosing to take risks of this nature.

Not all teenagers are stupid, the biggest majority of them of course aren't - we only get to hear about the stupid ones through the media, but having said that the worry is that the stupid ones seem to be breeding.

well Maureen you know the old saying put two stupid things together and they breed just look at the things we did when we were young
but then again we werent stupid Just idiots weren't we, Heather, Bill, Neville, Bob, Frank and all the rest of us.

Bill the old Battler