In the early autumn term of this year of 2017 we held another Poetry Competition for youngsters of the six Primary Schools in our District (Aston-le-Walls, Boddington, Byfield, Chipping Warden, Culworth & Woodford Halse). Five of those six schools entered, unfortunately other pressures did not allow the sixth school to participate.

Thanks to all the Schools for your children's enthusiasm for this event.

Presided over by our Chairman Russ, our three judges, Chris, a local education stalwart, The Rev. Stevie, our Anglican Minister and Branch Padre, and Alan, our own poetry buff deliberated for several hours on Wednesday 1st Nov. reading and re-reading all the entries. Eventually they selected a poem from each school, as being those that best met the agreed standards; two of those poems were thought to be the best of all.

The criteria they used included adherence to the "Remembrance" theme, the thought behind the verse that came through from the words, and how well the entries had been composed.

In alphabetical order by village, these were the winners of the Byfield & District Royal British Legion’s 2017 Poetry Competition…

St. Mary’s Catholic Primary School, Aston Le Walls: Chloe Grace Olyvia Paynton’s “My Poppy”

Boddington C of E Primary Academy: Isaac Samuel Kirby’s “Beginning to End”

Byfield School: Dan Clayton’s “Brother” (also judged jointly to be one of the “best of the best” poems)

Culworth Primary Academy: Maggie Gosling (a.k.a. Peggy)’s “Memories” (also judged jointly to be one of the “best of the best” poems)

Woodford C of E Primary Academy: Mason Pitch’s “Soldier”

Although we hadn’t asked for this, two of our District’s schools provided entries with a demarcation by “year” and some of those children were in the first years of their education. We have therefore decided to add a special prize for the best of those too.

Those additional winners were from St. Mary’s Catholic Primary School, Aston Le Walls, Alex Bogdon’s “A Little Poppy” & Kiya Tustain’s “Remembrance” and from Woodford C of E Primary Academy, Victoria Orszulak’s “POPPY” & Amelia Wilk’s “I’m really sad” You'll need to scroll-down those pages to see those entries.

Each of the winners received a book covering their particular interests, with the two overall winners receiving two books each. It was particularly encouraging for us to note that the youngster’s stated interests seemed to cover pretty much everything, from crime detection, mystery and justice to art, from both fantasy and real action and adventure to science and engineering.

Each winner had a certificate inserted into their prize book, see example below...  

Prizes were presented at school assemblies before the end of November 2017 and all the poems mentioned above are published here; those can be found on this Web page's sub-pages designated by village.

The committment the youngsters made to this and the assistance of school staff in its organisation is commendable.

ANOTHER RBL POETRY COMPETITION...

In cooperation with the NeverSuchInnocence.com organisation, the RBL have been running a national poetry and artwork competition for 9-16 year olds these past three years.