State School Dreams
Between April 2024 and February 2025 I wrote a series of approximately 60 posts for a new blog called Flourish & Survive. Described by an acquaintence as ‘a sandbox dreamspace for a new school’, these posts became semi-imaginary spaces for the conjuring of ideas and imagery for a new kind of school. Part autobiographical, part metaphysical, they gave me a (much needed) opportunity to reflect on a decade leading a project-based learning curriculum at an inner city junior school in the UK. These posts were gathered together into two collections (State School Dreams and Interregnum) with a third (100 Voices - notes on a rebel curriculum) exploring the phases of the curriculum model through short, half page provocations.
I didn’t write a word between February and August this year, when a new poem quite literally tumbled out of me as I drove to the kennels to collect the dogs after a family holiday in Spain. Sick Trifle captures the moment pretty much verbatim, with a coda taken directly from a snippet of overheard conversation on La Rambla in Barcelona. These new dispatches represent a total departure and pivot towards themes that explore the dark heart of the moment. I have a working title of What am I supposed to tell my class? and you can find here and on Substack. As this collection takes shape, please feel free to download your copy of the original three collections and join me in the dreaming.
Pete