Michael Rosen joining us on Mumsnet on Friday 7th May from 12 - 1pm

[RachelMumsnet]

We're delighted that former Children's Laureate, Michael Rosen will be joining us for a live chat on Friday at midday. It's a topical webchat as Michael is supporting the SATS boycott and has set up the campaign, Authors Against SATS. Please post advance questions to Michael on this thread and join us here for the live chat on Friday.

[BessieBoots]

Hello Mr Rosen!

Do you think that people who write for children are given less prestige than those who write for children, and why?

[RachelMumsnet]

He's early ! Tea's up and Michael is here to answer your questions. Welcome to MNHQ Michael Rosen...

[MichaelRosen]

That's true. I am here. Hello.

[southeastastra]

hello!

[dignan]

Hi Michael

Your work features very heavily on our bookshelves at home - both my children love your books and poems.

I'm interested to know your views regarding the governments thinking that literacy levels can be raised simply by teaching children to read from an earlier age even if they are not developmentally ready for it. My DS has been pushed to learn to read from the age of 4 and it has been a total disaster. He's 6 now and can't read very well and his confidence is at an all time low. He adores being read to at home and school and always has lots of questions and makes really great observations but he completely refuses to do any reading at home. I don't see how i can make him read when he gets so distressed about it. I fear he has been turned off reading and i'm desperate to turn the situation around but i don't know how. It's frustrating because i know he is is a bright boy who would be a total book worm if only he didn't fear it so much. Can you offer any advice please?

[MichaelRosen]

Hello Bessie, I think you mean more prestige for writers for adults? In a way, yes. The big cheese review mags don't bother with us!

[DontCallMeBaby]

Michael, could you share any thoughts you might have on my daughter's class presenting a dramatisation of Little Rabbit Foo Foo alongside the biblical story of Jonah to illustrate the theme of 'learning your lesson'? It might just be me, but that goonie at the end doesn't look in the least bit sorry ...

(also is it okay if we write a sequel in which the goonie scoops up the politicians and bops them on the head?)

[MichaelRosen]

Hi Hassled, it's precisely this sort of rant that is both typical and necessary that we all hear it. The SATs are a burden for everyone and full of potential prat-falls like this.

[MichaelRosen]

Hello dignan, your story is only too familiar. If we surround children with anxiety and pressure, it will frequently result in panic and freeze-up. I once had to go into school and ask the teacher to stop teaching my child how to read! I said that at home we would just read to her and as and when she wanted to start to 'learn' she would. It worked.

[MichaelRosen]

Hello purepurple. I'm not against an Early Years Curriculum per se, but I don't think it should be more than a set of guidelines and suggestions based on discussion and research on 'how children learn'. We have neglected cognition to a point that we have politicians talking about schools as if we all know how children learn. Do we? Do they? Central to learning is the learner. The learner is the one who makes the meanings, so the question is what environment can we create in which they can best make meaning? It's through discovery, investigation and invention. What is see are diktats, instructions from Central Government directed at practitioners. That's counter-productive.

[BessieBoots]

Oooh, oooh, Michael Rosen answered my question!

[becaroo]

Mr Rosen,

At my sons old school ks1 (year 2) children are sitting SATS now.

Very sad [sad and one of the reasons he is now home schooled.

[MichaelRosen]

Hello Ramona, There are two magazines aimed at teachers, librarians and parents: Carousel and Books for Keeps. If you go to their websites, you can find out a good deal and then decide if you want to subscribe. There is also the Federation of Children's Book Groups. Perhaps they have a branch near you? There are also guides for parents that keep coming out. A recent one is by Julia Eccleshare and I think it's called 1001 Books.

[MichaelRosen]

Hi Coupleofkooks, that boy is me! If you were sitting in front of me now, I would show you my broken front tooth to prove it. Somewhere on my website, there's a bit of film of me standing in the road where it all happened, Moss Lane, Pinner. Look for 'Reading Challenge'...

[MichaelRosen]

Hi Gettintrimmer, I think we are obsessed by giving kids scores, measuring them, producing research that's based on statistics. This 'biometric' approach to human behaviour is to my mind corrupting. It tries to reduce the variability in human behaviour, reduce its complexity. A good deal of it is based on a false methods: that's to say, that you can measure human beings as you would measure the performance of a machine. The difference between humans and machines is that with machines you can keep all the variable things in your test constant, while you vary one thing eg durability of metal, while you keep temperature, pressure etc constant. You can't do that with human beings. So most tests on humans are to my mind invalid because you can't keep humans' variables constant. This is an agelong dispute between the 'humanists' (like me) and the 'biometrists'. If any of this interests you, you would like Stephen Jay Gould's 'The Mismeasurement of Man' (I hope I've got the title right!)

[MichaelRosen]

STarlight, yes

[Nettiespagetti]

Hi michael at work so will read your webchat fully tonight once DC in bed!

Just wanted to say we are early on in our Reading 3.5 and 1.5 but we love "we are going on a bear hunt" "little rabbit foo foo" I remember my mum teaching us. And the adorable "bear in a cave" that book got us through nightmares DS had after first reading we are going on a bear hunt. It was just the bear in a cave wanting to explore!

Can't wait to explore some of your other books in the future. Thanks

[MichaelRosen]

To tell the truth, spudmasher, the language curriculum in primary schools is up in the air. It's been officially scrapped as from September, and it's waiting for clarification etc . As you may have noticed an election has happened! In the meantime, some local authorities are creating their own literacy strategies rather than wait for govt to tell them eg Sheffield. The Rose Independent Review was nothing more than that - a review.

[MichaelRosen]

Hello TheDailyWail
Fascinating question. Generally I would say go with the flow of the poem, don't overdo it (though plenty of people say that I overdo it when I perform mine!) The problem with sing-song, as you say, is that you are over emphasizing the hidden music of the poem, and sacrificing the non-hidden meaning. The trick is to let your body, or part of your body take the rhythm, while your voice expresses the poem like speech. If you listen to a great blues singer, or Frank Sinatra or Billie Holliday, you'll hear that they let the rhythm get on and do its stuff, while they use speech rhythms over the top. Enjoy!

[MichaelRosen]

Fruitpastille, I'm glad your children like the YouTube stuff. If you go to my website, you'll see that I've put up two new shows which Scottish Booktrust and BBC Scotland filmed. You can access those in schools where youtube is filtered out.

Sorry you felt you had to leave education.

[MichaelRosen]

MrsMalcolmTucker (same kind of sweary stuff round your place?) - Yes, I do still think that children's imagination, and rights to having an education based on discovery, investigation and invention need championing. I never mind who does that but it is something that I think of as part of my job. Thanks for your kind words.

[MichaelRosen]

Hi Wilfsell - for the last fifteen twenty years or so, education has been taken over by 'the business model'. I'm not against modern accounting methods being used to run the school buildiings and budgets. What I object to is treating teachers and children as 'units' of 'productivity' with input, output, target, monitoring systems in place. Children are being tested and graded and streamed and setted more than ever before (ie being treated as more or less able units) and the obsessive reporting is part of all this.

[loumum3]

Hi

We love your stuff ! My son (10) writes loads of stories and they go on forever....at school he was told stories must be short to be interesting-what do you think ?

Thanks

[superkat]

I just want to say that when you visited my school it was inspirational and I remamber it fondly some twenty or more years on. Thank you for continuing to push for change for our children. Kat Molesworth