House Poetry Slam 2020
On 20th October 2020 Headington school enjoyed the culmination of this year’s National Poetry Day 2020 celebrations with the eagerly-anticipated House Poetry Slam.
Always a highlight of the Autumn term, this event is normally held in the Lea Library, with each competitive house offering a live performance of a poem they have written. This year, the competition had to move online, with each house tasked with producing a video performance of an original poem about ‘vision’ (the theme of this year’s National Poetry Day), and the talented pupils rose to the challenge brilliantly with ten fantastic poems on topics ranging from memories to daydreams to eyesight to apocalyptic visions of the future. Some poems felt particularly topical as they responded directly to the current Covid-19 pandemic.
The impossible task of choosing a winner was allotted to the guest adjudicator, Tina Sederholm. Tina Sederholm is an award-winning writer, poet and theatre-maker, and has won over twenty poetry slams; she is also a Headingtonian, and so was a fantastic role model for the budding young poets! After performing a poem of her own, Tina offered her thoughts on all ten poems, before ultimately announcing the winning house as Ford, for a wonderful poem entitled ‘Moments’ by Katerina in L6. Congratulations to Katerina and to all the poets and performers!
