YCC in Islington 2007

Following our successful experiences with Young Cutural Creators at St Alban's School, we applied for funding to deliver four YCC projects in 2007.

This was a chance for BPMA to expand our experience of YCC. We would work with four secondary schools in the London Borough of Islington. We would also work with four Islington public libraries.

This time, we knew we would be working with an author rather than an artist. The focus would be squarely on creative writing.

The money for these projects came from the London Challenge, which aims to increase pupil attainment in the boroughs of Hackney, Islington, Haringey, Southwark and Lambeth. The projects were supported by Margaret Fraser, the YCC coordinator who works on behalf of MLA London.

Margaret worked incredibly hard to make the links between the libraries, the schools and the BPMA. She also got the author on board: Linda Newbery, winner of the Costa Children’s Book of the Year in 2006.

Picking a theme - The Post Office in the Second World War

Starting with Linda's own book Blitz Boys, we planned to use our archive collections to inspire writing about the Post Office and the Home Front in the Second World War. This linked to work we had already done in 2005 about How the Post Office Went to War. This meant we were confident that there would be good source material.

We found old newspaper articles, photographs of telegram messengers, and wonderful wartime posters telling people to 'post before lunchtime', or how to redirect their post if they were bombed out. 

One particular notice caught Linda's imagination: instructions in the event of an invasion, which asked postal workers to 'STAND FIRM, and CARRY ON'. Linda was excited by this simple call for fortitude and courage on the Home Front.

One project template, four schools

We spent December 2006 - January 2007 planning the projects. There was to be one template plan, which would be repeated with four schools and four libraries. The BPMA and Linda would work with everyone!

Two projects took place in spring term 2007, and two in the summer term. We expected to refine the template plan throughout the four projects.

However, because of Linda's schedule, in each term both author-led sessions took place on the same day, leaving little or no time for reflection between each one. We only got a chance to properly reflect after the first two projects, and we did make some changes for the summer term.

Pupils were in years 7 and 8. The four schools were:

• Highbury Fields School (girls), with Islington Central Reference Library
• Islington Arts & Media School (mixed), with N4 Library
• Highbury Grove School (mixed), with Islington Central Lending Library 
• Mount Carmel College (girls), with Archway Library

We held a twilight introduction session at the BPMA so as many partners as possible could meet. Communications were very important, as in all YCC projects. It helped the teachers and school librarians understand what was to happen during the project.

Getting started - Library sessions

The librarians prepared various secondary source books and researched websites about the Second World War. Because all the libraries were from Islington they could share ideas.

A question sheet was prepared for the pupils to answer questions about the Home Front. They found out about Anderson shelters, rationing, and air raids. Where possible, the librarians guided the pupils to this information within their local area.

Steve Gardam from the BPMA attended all the library sessions. This gave the pupils continuity for when they arrived at the BPMA for the next session. Steve spoke to the teachers at each library session to explain how important it was to follow up the workshops in class.

Archive workshop - Meeting Linda Newbery and getting creative

Pupils came to the BPMA about two weeks after the first library visit. There were back-to-back archive workshops, with two schools coming on the same day. This was a challenge for timing the sessions: they had to be over by a given hour so pupils could get back to school for either lunch or the end of the day. Linda felt that this squashed the time she had to work with the pupils.

Archives and Citizenship
As always, we started with a Q&A about 'what is an archive?'. This quickly reinforces the active citizenship of using archives, and the responsibility to treat the documents with great care.

We then asked 'what did you learn at the library?' to get them thinking again about life in the 1940s.

Aim of the session
Linda was introduced to the class, and she explained that the aim of the day was to write about life on the Home Front in the Second World War. This was not an entire story, but an episode or chapter, with a cliffhanger ending.

Historical background
Steve Gardam from the BPMA then explained more about the role of the Post Office in the Second World War.

• The huge numbers of postal workers who signed up to fight
• The incredible impact this had, with women and young people taking on postal jobs
• The difficulties and dangers of working during air raids

Steve and Linda focused on the telegram service: telegram messengers could be as young as 13 or 14 years old. They would have to deliver telegrams informing families of their fathers, brothers or sons being killed or missing in action. These messengers were only a couple of years older than the pupils in the class - how would they have felt?

We showed the class the documents we had found to help them capture the spirit of the time.

Asking and answering your own questions
Linda shared a very simple technique for creative writing: ask a question, and use your own knowledge and imagination to answer it. For example, ask:

Q 'What is my character's name/age/job?' 
A 'Billy Smith, 15, telegram messenger'.

Q 'Where is Billy now?'
A 'Amongst rubble in bombed London, delivering a telegram'

Q 'What happens next?'
A 'The air raid siren goes off!'

Q 'What does it sound like?'
A 'It sounds like fear and death...'

With the background knowledge from good research, a story can quickly take shape.

'Meet Billy Smith, telegram messenger'
In the summer term, we improved this part of the workshop. Steve took on the character of 'Billy Smith' and Linda - and the class - could directly ask him questions which he answered as if he was Billy. Pupil feedback proved that this was a popular way to engage the class - several said Billy was the most memorable part of the project!

Pupils worked on their own ideas with Linda's help. At the end of the workshop some pieces were read out.

Back at school - Polishing the work

Instead of returning to the library, for the follow-up workshop Linda went into the schools. This was easier for the teachers beause they did not have to organise another class trip.

Some objects from the Islington Schools Artefact Library were available: more wartime posters, ration books, telegrams, even a gas mask.

Linda talked more about the importance of pace in a story. She read examples from her own book Blitz Boys to show what she meant. Pupils then worked more on their stories and read them out at the end.

These follow-up workshops worked much better if the class had been given some time to build on their work from the archive visit. With the second two projects, Linda got the pupils to write something new rather than work on their story. This was a 'blurb', so the pupils had to think of an exciting way to sum up their story without giving all the plot away.

Learning lessons from YCC 2007

These four projects proved a very different experience from the work with St Albans Primary School. There were more people involved, which was fun but also hard work!

None of the libraries had done a YCC project before, and the librarians had different levels of experience of working with children. The BPMA had not worked on YCC as a creative writing project before, or with secondary schools.

What worked well?

• There was a definite improvement throughout the four projects: the libraries shared information and resources, and each workshop learned from the what had happened before.
• This also applied to Linda and Steve, who worked on all the projects. The introduction of 'Billy Smith' really improved the summer term workshops.
• Linda's idea to write a blurb was a fresh element in her summer term school workshops.
• Using material we had already research about the Post Office during the Second World War. Pupils learnt about an unexpected part of wartime history.

What didn't work so well?

• The quality of each project depended on the time teachers gave it between the workshops.
• Teachers reported that it was a lot of effort to organise the visits and take time away from the curriculum. They wanted to be more involved at the beginning.
• Pupil feedback was very negative on the amount of talking in the workshops.  They wanted more chance to speak themselves rather than have to listen.
• We used too many archive documents. Instead of the ten different ones we chose, Linda could have taken one or two similar documents and shown how she was directly inspired by them to start a story.

One of the main challenges with YCC is matching the author's published work to the collections of the archive. We chose the Second World War because of Linda's book Blitz Boys, but we should have consulted the schools about the topic for the projects. We could still have used Linda's writing skills even if she hadn't written a book on a particular theme.

Although it did not run completely smoothly, YCC in Islington 2007 was a success because we learned several valuable lessons. The experience of 2007 will make future YCC projects much better.

Find out more

Please email laura.dixon@postalheritage.org.uk or call 020 7239 2114 to find out more about YCC at the BPMA.