On the fear of poetry - and the bounty we are denying our children

Description

[. . . ] The importance of teaching poetry to primary-aged children, according to associate professor Paul Magee of the University of Canberra, is that they do not yet feel fear of the many-sided, multi-faceted nature of language.

“The fact, for instance, that sometimes we choose words simply because they sound good, or that our words can have additional meanings that we might not have even intended,” Magee says. “Children are able to take pleasure in rhyme, alliteration, kooky-sounding words or even words they don’t understand, without all the ‘irritable reaching after fact and reason’ that John Keats decried.′′ [. . . ]

https://www.smh.com.au/national/on-the-fear-of-poetry-and-the-bounty-we-are-denying-our-children-20220715-p5b1y4.html

Subject

In this opinion piece in the Sydney Morning Herald by Gabrielle Carey, Paul Magee is quoted extensively on the fear of poetry, that children lack, and on the virtues of by-heart recital.