Word Weaving

A collection of the best entries for the Cheshire Prize for Literature 2005, which was for an original and previously unpublished piece of writing for children. The 18 stories and 2 poems in the anthology include the eventual prize winners. The First Prize was won by David Whitley and the Runner-Up Prizes by Tricia Durdey and Sheila Powell, while John Mead won the Prize awarded for the entry that most impressed an advisory panel of young readers. The book also contains an introduction by the former Children's Laureate, Michael Morpurgo, who contributed to the final stages of the judging.

"Through an analysis of specific weaving stories, the difference between a text and a textile becomes blurred. Such stories portray women weavers transforming their domestic activity of making textiles into one of making texts by inscribing their cloth with both personal and political messages."--BOOK JACKET.

Collection of Indo-European nursery tales and stories of black English, Ladino and Latin American origin, including storytelling techniques for the professional, the teacher, and the parent.

A textbook introducing the essential nature of poetry and providing sample poems and suggestions for the writing of poetry.

References to weaving and binding are ubiquitous in Anglo-Saxon literature. Several hundred instances of such imagery occur in the poetic corpus, invoked in connection with objects, people, elemental forces, and complex abstract concepts. Weaving Words and Binding Bodies presents the first comprehensive study of weaving and binding imagery through intertextual analysis and close readings of Beowulf, riddles, the poetry of Cynewulf, and other key texts. Megan Cavell highlights the prominent use of weaving and binding in previously unrecognized formulas, collocations, and type-scenes, shedding light on important tropes such as the lord-retainer “bond” and the gendered role of “peace-weaving” in Anglo-Saxon society. Through the analysis of metrical, rhetorical, and linguistic features and canonical and neglected texts in a wide range of genres, Weaving Words and Binding Bodies makes an important contribution to the ongoing study of Anglo-Saxon poetics.

Weaving Words raises important questions about the impact of 21st century practices of education upon human creativity and joy in making meaning through writing. It questions how writing is experienced and valued as a process and product of research; as a means for personal and professional learning; and how it is taught and experienced in the classroom and in teacher education. Weaving Words brings together a range of critical perspectives upon writing within global agendas for education and research, and considers the capacity for writing and reflection to disrupt and transform personal and professional understandings. The parallel traditions of spinning and weaving and the sharing of stories through the spoken and written word shape the structure of this book: its warp is constituted by chapters written by researchers in education; its weft by the poems, plays, short stories and reflections of pre-service teachers. Both researchers and pre-service teachers consider the challenges of becoming writers, and the contradictions they encounter in transferring their understandings of being a writer to the teaching of writing with younger authors, and in conducting research as writing. Weaving Words engages with emerging debates around what forms of writing are valued and supported within 21st century teaching and research; it demonstrates the power of writing for personal expression, suggesting that writing that is creative opens spaces for making meaning and for constructing the world that are important for practices of education and for research.

Through conversations and connections Joy Mead explores the true meaning of community - beyond the jargon of 'community cohesion' and the 'Big Society'. Includes conversations with Satish Kumar, Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, Lesley Saunders, Julia Ponsonby, Stephen Raw and others.