A world of growing things

A world of growing things
Slindon Primary School
May 2015

Stone Age abstract

I’ve spent 4 days in Slindon Primary School between March and May working on stories and writing. We have

wooly rhino

explored a world of growing things. We have wandered through the Stone Age. Mostly, we’ve been finding the Secret Stories of Slindon where, as it turns out, mermaid treasure has been hidden and where in the distant future a faulty spacenav crashlands an alien invasion force into the village. The school grounds gave us a lot of inspiration: they informed riddles and exercises in imagery. They offered settings for stories and ideas for characters.

This post will mostly be filled now with images and words from the artists and storytellers of Slindon

life in Stone Age Slindon

First set: "when you don't know what to say, look out of the window!"

Slindon aurochs

1. As warm as as summer’s day,
As blue as the bluest sky,
As sticky as a melting sweet,
As thin as a twig,
As clear as water,
As cold as the coldest winter’s day.

2. They met an old man as ugly as a rotting tree stump and boring as a fence but as sad as a lonely soldier standing in a field

3. His voice was as comforting as soft flower petals but his smile was a frozen ice spike sending chills down my spine

4. As sad a lonely flower
As sad as a child’s dying heart and soul
As vague as a smile from a cold, cold heart 
As sad a child’s grief

5. As cold as a winter storm,
As hot as a summer’s day,
As sharp as a tiger’s tooth,
As painful as a broken heart

we used natural and man-made objects to inspire us

Second set: riddles: we looked at plants and animals in or visiting the school garden. This gave us riddles and a collective poem but also just good sets of words!

Crow
I’m loud, I’m free,
A dancer is me,
Take my wings and I cannot fly,
But nothing is so selfish or fearsome as I
I stand tall but that isn’t all,
Straight black knives are my feathers
But you don’t know whether I’m clever.


Daffodil

Tall green swords guard
A tall green spear
That blows a golden trumpet
To cheerfully welcome the summer

 Pond

Green weeds float on dark, wind-rippled water, where the knee-deep pond hides frogs and frogspawn and possibly the jaw-snapping, bone-breaking last crocodile in Slindon

a world of growing things..

Recipe for a wildlife garden
Take a tophat full of flowers
And a sheet of the greenest green grass.
You might want some saplings,
20 saplings, any flavour, to your taste.

Throw in a handful of flies,
A sting of wasps,
A carpet of ants,
A rustle of leaves and
An ogre’s ear of spiders.

Shake out a summer wind and
A breeze full of butterflies,
A shower of blossom,
A storm of bees,
A pillow of moths,
A singing gust of robins and
A flight of birds

You will need a tornado of green leaves and
A tsunami of last year’s compost.

You will need a pond with
A welly-full of frogspawn and a
Trolley of pond-weed,
A bucket of ducks and
A beard of worms and
A bag of slow-worms
Stir it all up with a handful of life
And rain,
And sunshine.
And when the houseful of lumpy, bumpy hedgehogs arrive,
Serve your garden with wheelbarrows and goats,
And a chair of twisted tree trunks to rest in,
And enjoy that garden growing around you. 

many thanks to all the artists, storymakers and storytellers of Slindon!

Every stone tells a story

a very smart Marble

Every stone has a story to tell, a story spun out of a million years of growing and crumbling, heating,  freezing, cracking, melting and the heavy tread of dinosaur feet, or maybe the silent weight of mammoths or even the warm, careful hands of a cave-child

At Marsden Community Primary School in the spring of 2015, I worked with a  group of Year 3 children to find some of those stories and use the stones to inspire some new writing. We mixed children from both Year 3 classes and, at the school's invitation, parents joined us as well adding a lovely extra element to the atmosphere

From simply handling our stones and reading up on their uses, our first stone-stories were poems:

In snooker tables and mirrors,

In graveyards and floors,

Safe and solid and strong,

Brown slate will even

Let us draw on the floor

Lumpy as a camel's back,

Yellow and orange and grey,

Hard and heavy as a frying pan,

Granite begins,

Hotter than chocolate,

Hotter than tea,

Hotter than fire

Hot liquid rock

Is where granite begins

We listened to an old story where a boulder in a forest tells a single boy the first stories and he starts storytelling. We took that story and told it back to each other. We mapped it and remembered it. Our schools torytellers took their maps and stories home to tell their familes and like the boy in the story (in our telling one boy became a boy and a girl), to keep the stories spreading

We played with our words, building descriptions:

As red as a rose,

As red as blood,

As red as plums and rubies and beetroot,

As red as cherries,

As red as a volcano before it erupts

(This is actually a description of the hair that grew on Medusa's head after the animals had nibbled her snakes to freedom - but that is another story!)

And finally we gave our stones faces, with wide-mouthed puppets that took their shapes and colours and natures from the stones they started life as. Small, quick pebble-people-puppets provided an avalanche of backing vocals, rattling away like rockfalls.  The bigger stones themselves started talking. Telling their own stories. reciting the poems of their first memories, singing, sighing, arguing and shouting. Whispering their stories to anyone who would listen

Many thanks to Julie and the team at Marsden and 

to all the puppeteers and geologist, writers, 

poets and storytellers - and their parents! - at Marsden

pumice always seems to have a lot to say
- too much  hot air perhaps?

Practical points:
we worked with the core group for 4 mornings spread out over 6 weeks
afternoons were spent with the rest of those classes on similar themes
materials: I brought in some of my rock, mineral and fossil sets, adding some lovely big chunks of rock to handle

Well-wooded Words: a Buxton Poetry Trail

Well-wooded Words

18th and 19th July 2015

a poetry trail through Grinlow Woods 

during Buxton Arts Festival

a delicate moment from the 2014 Art Trail

weaving words through trees and bushes, 

poems through the flowers

inviting visitors to wonder as they wander

to enjoy the richness of the woods, 

the beauty of stone 

and to touch the emotional heart of their summer

In a companion trail to this year's Grinlow Art And Storytelling Trail (website on its way, meanwhile you could visit the facebook page), we are inviting poets, scribblers, scrawlers and storywriters to submit pieces for a trail of words and wonders through Grinlow Woods

The Art Trail and its attendant activities were a great success last year, so we thought it would be good to add another strand to that creative woodland experience.

“We” are Stone and Water, the Buxton-based community group who celebrate the richness and creativity of the Peaks through projects like Exploring With Stories and Ancient Landscapes. 

We are looking for pieces (poems or prose) that might 

• draw their inspiration from Buxton and the Peak District 
• provoke reflection about the area 
• use these landscapes to challenge reader’s own perceptions of themselves
• or something like that

So we invite you, challenge you, to share your enjoyment, your passions, your delights and your despairs of, from or about the Peaks and send us your words for the Grinlow Poetry Trail

our Trail won't take us into the caves but your poems might grow
from those beautiful underground palaces

FINE DETAILS (and some small print!)

What will be happening?

On the weekend of the Art Trail (18, 19 July 2015), our poems and stories will be laminated and presented through Grinlow Woods in Buxton Country Park. The Poetry Trail will follow a similar route to the Art Trail (see below). There will also, hopefully, be storytellers performing, poetry/writing workshops, make your own woodland book activities and perhaps some poetry readings (let us know if you’d like to be involved in that)

Our trail will have its own map and possibly a booklet (available to buy) of all our juicy poems and stories

How long a piece can you submit?

We are allocating each writer the equivalent of 2 sides of A4 (so please, no monstrous tomes or Homeric epics!) and in a largish font, maybe 20pt, for ease of reading. If you're not sure, just send your piece in and we'll advise. Of course you don't need to send in that much: if you compose precise and elegant single haiku or tanka, maybe just one will say exactly what you want. At the moment, we will only accept one submission (ie one longer piece or several short poems) from each poet. If space arises we might invite more contributions from existing Trailers

Where will our poems be?

The Trail will wend its way up through Grinlow Woods from the Visitor Centre car park towards Solomon Temple (but will probably stop just short of the upper edge of the woods

Until we see what is coming in, we can't say where pieces will go. if you have a piece that definitely needs to be displayed by rocks, or a park bench or an oak tree, say, let us know

Complementing the Art Trail

Our poetry trail will run along a similar route to the Art Trail. Poems do not need to associate with artworks unless you want them to. We don't really know what other art is going up until the last minute so we cannot advise you of what's going to be around. If you know an exhibiting artist, why not scheme wildly with them, keep us in the loop, and it might all be wonderful when we display words and visuals together

Filthy Lucre

We are not planning this as a money-making activity but we would like to generate enough cash to design and print poetry trail maps and maybe produce that booklet of poems for sale. We are asking for a contribution of £10 for each submission (ie for each poet's contribution not for each individual poem). Don't send any money with your submission. We'll contact you about money and other fine tuning when your contribution is accepted

Being organised and officious

And we're sorry to say this but there will need to be a bit of editorial control here: please don't send in anything offensive, or discriminatory. Our boundaries are very flexible but there are limits and we will reserve the right to simply say "no". We'll try not to, but that reservation needs to be there

First deadline: we need to have a working set of poems by 31st March 2015: enough for us to know the plan is viable
Second deadline: assuming we get enough poems to make the Poetry Trail viable, we'll go on taking new submissions until the end of May

Submissions:

email your work to

Gordon MacLellan: stoneandwater@btinternet.comPlease send it as an attachment in Word or TextMake sure: your name and contact details are also on the attachmentBy post: to  Creeping Toad, 51-d West Road, Buxton, SK17 6HQ
and we'll be in touch!

Grinlow Woods, paths to wonder

So! flex those fingers, ink up those quills, 

charge up your keyboards, knot your strings 

and carve your runes

Under Grin Low

Buxton Country Park

Monday 15th September 2014

venturing underground

 The first session of a project from High Peak Community Arts' Project eARTh Buxton group. Over the next few months they'll be working with woodcarver Sarah Fiander to create a set of figures that will stand near the entrance to the Park. I will be joining them several times to work on the stories behind the shapes they produce. What will come: visually or verbally, we have no idea! Adventures all round

Monday's session was for first ideas, for exploring and talking and meeting each other.

I'm just going to post the poems that grew out of our walk through Poole's Cavern

where will our sculptures go? what could the group be like?

Introduction - the feel of this project

Almost stones.

Standing stones,

Petrified people,

Called from the heartwood,

Their stories carved into the wood of their bodies

In runes

Under the hill - this poem grew out of comments and notes. It feels like several different voices so if you read it out try getting different people to read different verses. The italic sections I think are the voices of people wandering through the cave

Our modern feet,

In sensible shoes,

Splashing in puddles,

On sensible floors,

Casting shadows over stones,

From the sensible lights.

Get in there!

A long way in,

It's a long way in.

It's cold.

The darkness waits

For us to turn our backs,

To let our guard slip,

To let the drips drop,

And the petrifying water catch us

Or our pennies,

Or our shoes,

Or our mobile phones.

A splendour of rock and water and earth.

Time stands still.

It's surprising what water can do.

It's a long way in.

Nothing here is quite what it seems,

Turn your back for a moment and the darkness comes back

Water made solid

Reptilian

Step into the darkness,

Stooping,

Careful,

Into the shelter and the silence and the cold.

This darkness,

A home for hibernating bats,

A lair for bears,

A grave for the ancient dead.

4,000 years of peace broken by

Victorian shovels

a strange world

quiet

peaceful

no traffic noise

no fumes

no smells at all

Purple, green and grey

Line and layers of stone,

Sideways ripples across a boulder,

Folds become faces,

A skull caught forever in 

Hanging stone

deep, mysterious

time caught in the dripping echoes 

stone-time not our time

we are here and gone again

the stone lasts

changing all the time but still here

One lump of rock becomes

A bear, a beast, a lion, a gorilla,

A chenille blanket.

A thousand years of dripping 

To grow a dragon's eye,

A cave jellyfish,

A weeping swelling 

On the cave floor.

A cauliflower,

A marshmallow for trolls,

Miniature rice paddies,

Deceptively hard,

Hard as stone and

Wet

Tree roots and a picnic bench

Up there somewhere.

Now

We are hidden,

Secrets in the limestone hills,

Now 

We are the mystery

There are stories here,

Here in the cold and the dark

Stories waiting to be told

Voices like grating rocks and dripping water

A convocation of stalemites*

An amphitheatre of stalagmites,

Watchful, listening, patient

Waiting for the dark to return when we go away,

Poised on the edge,

Guarding their own,

Still,

Peaceful,

Hidden,

World.

This parliament of stones

Ancient but still alive,

Ancient and never stagnant

*I know this should be stalactite or stalagmite but I thought stal-e-mite was such a good word we should keep it!

Lowry in a carnival?

The end of term approaches but, 

LSLowry in a carnival?

At Whitefield Infant School and Nursery unit, this end of term approached with extra weight as this July sees the move from the buildings the school has been in for 110 years to a shiny new building just over the canal. So our end of term Carnival included such excitements as a procession to the new school, a new school song, a performing canal (or maybe a canal performance) and puppets inspired by the art of L S Lowry.

To mark the years of school life, the Year 2 pupils and I called out of the memory of the buildings, the voices of Mr Eckroyd: who gave the land and raised the money for the school to be built, of Miss Preston (our sort-of first teacher) and of Oliver (our sort-of first boy through the gates). We drew on Lowry’s work for inspiration as we made three tall puppets, each one decorated with children’s own favourite moments from Lowry paintings. 

The sun shone (just as well as there is nowhere indoors where we could all fit) so we filled the playground and sang, and danced, rippled a canal and paraded giant puppets and all got very emotional....

My name is Mr Eckroyd,

I’m the owner of the Mill,

I helped to build this school,

And I’m pleased it is here still.

100 years of learning,

Something new every day.

Teachers once were very strict,

But now they let you play.

100 years of teaching,

In this place on Howard St,

But now you’re moving school,

To wonderful Every Street

We say goodbye to Year 2s,

They’re moving school as well.

Lomeshaye Juniors is ready,

New teachers and a new school bell!

The waters of the loch

The waters of the loch

Calm waves, tranquil water.

Children stand and watch the sea,

The waves sigh onto the shore.

A ship sails on a gentle sea,

A boat glides over the loch.

A deep blue sea.

Dolphins swim,

Seals splash in the water,

Bubbles blow where animals live.

Calm waves, tranquil water,

Above the seaweed that,

Waves over the sunken ship,

Where fish keep watch through the portholes.

John Dory

Calm waves, tranquil water

It all looks still,

Until you look under the

Deep sea waving,

Still mysteries 

Still waiting to be solved.

 cheerful blue whale

Calm waves, tranquil water

Gloomy dark water

Glowing green seaweed,

Tough seaweed in the deep, 

Hard to find

Pink sad starfish,

Anglerfish, mackerel and John Dory

Swim through the blue and the green and the grey

Mackerel

The loch grows dark and murky,

Waves thrash against the rocks

Seals pull out onto the shore,

Dolphins hide,

Orca withdraw,

Scary, scaly fish rising up from the darkness

Would make the biggest catch in the world

If anyone could net them,

But

A two-headed shark eats two divers

In one mouthful,

Grey sharks gather, and bull and mako

A ray ripples over the floor of the sea

a ray in preparation

The storm throws the waves at the shore,,

The spray soaks the children on the beach,

Run and hide, run and hide!

And don’t see the whales that hum and sing in the storm

Miss the monsters of the sea’s abyss

with thanks to the children and teachers of 

Badcaul and Scoraig Primary Schools 

for their imaginations, poems and wild stories!

(words and creations by the children)

The Hatching 5: fish as fast as arrows

Singing the fish: trout brown as shadows

The rivers continue to run....but it looks like some of our images and poems have got jumbled up (what can we expect when we try to control water!) If you are one of the pupils, parents or teachers from these schools, do get in touch if pictures and words are creditted to the wrong school!

This is a silver stream, so cool and fresh as can be

Fish eggs like little beads

Eels as big as santa’s bag of treats

The robins sing in such harmony

Freezing through the splashing, popping,

Water rushing stones

Water bubbles

Huge strong rocks blocking the icy flow

Water smashing over rocks

Splashing people,

Water thrashing,

Water crashing,

Soaking the grass,

Slowing down, running wider, 

The river slips into a pool, 

Dark ice-cold water

Deep water, calm water, ripples meandering, 

Slow carp in deep pools,

Grasping weeds to pull you down, 

Down to the stones where the eels live,

Small fish, silver fish, white fish darting, 

Fast as arrows, lightning flickers

Kingfishers dive, chasing fish 

Graceful swans glide across the pool, 

Carp sneak like ghosts through weeds and water

Trout blend in brown as sand, as stone, as shadows

Moss everywhere, under water, on the bank, over the stones, up the trees, 

On the stepping stones where you wobble across the pool

Otters waiting

Big trout hunting

Deep dark, cold as ice

Yellow lightning flashes,

Thunder crashes!

Rain comes splashing down!

Every raindrop feeds the flood.

The river overloaded, bursting, flowing to the sea

A soggy disaster, dirty, nasty mess

Huge, wet, destroying, damaging, 

We are left disgusted, exhausted, vulnerable

But now the river escapes to the sea.

Stoneyholme Primary School