Sally Crabtree - Writing
Sally
Crabtree
AIM High Writing
Summary
Age range Primary
Books Yes
DBS Checked Yes
Booking
Contact Keeley
+44 (0)1535 656015
aimhigh@caboodlebooks.co.uk
Sally Crabtree started out as a gymnast. Since then she has been turning the literary world upside down with her cartwheeling poems and colourful, quirky performances.
About Sally
As well as books, Sally Crabtree loves creating interactive poetic installations such as the Phone a Poem phone box, Poetry Postie, Poems in a Tin, I’ll Eat My Words edible poetry and her copper Poetree which began life when she decided to hang some poems on a tree and busk, singing, wearing stilts and doing handstands in the splits. People put enough money in the hat for her to buy lobsters and fizz for lunch and she thought “This is the life for me!”
Sally then happened to send a poem to a publisher in the form of a quirky hand made card. The publisher ignored the poem but loved the design and asked her to create some novelty books. Sally was slightly bemused (she thought she was a poet!) but gave it a go – and thus began her career in writing and designing books in all shapes and sizes for major publishers. Some had sing a long CD’s in them, some were picture books and one even rolled across the floor like a ball! “It was great fun”said Sally “but I was always itching to get back to the words” and she spent time writing serious poetry that would get her invited to festivals all around the world. Now she has finally managed to combine all the things she loves and she delights in also inspiring others through creativity, showing them that words can carry in their arms one’s own amazing ideas and hand them like a present to others – not necessarily just in book form but perhaps as an object d’art, a song, a performance poem, an installation or even as the icing of an edible poetry cake!
Sally’s AIM High Writing Days
“Creativity is intelligence having fun!” Einstein
Being creative is what inspires Sally and aims to inspire this creativity in others throughout the day. She begins by introducing her work as a performance poet, songwriter and author and shows how she also writes and designs books in all different shapes and sizes – how some of her books have sing-a-long CD’s in them and how easy these are to write (the children have a go at a particular silly one to break the ice).
Sally explains why she loves words because they can do so many different things – they carry in their arms one’s own amazing ideas and hand them like a present to others – not necessarily just in book form but perhaps as lyrics, an objet d’art , a performance poem, an installation or even as the icing on an edible poetry cake!
The sessions start with an activity called ‘ Creativity brings out the wings in me‘ which involves writing an interactive song together inspired by the notion of what creativity is and how it can help you soar to places you didn’t even know existed in your writing. (The fun bit is in the chorus when everyone pretends they are flying and they discover how everyone does it differently. There are no rules as to how one should fly – everyone is original, and this reiterates the theme of the day – to discover what is original in each of us).
As an example of doing things differently Sally helps the children to create lines of edible poetry which they eat to become a walking poem. This is set to music as a performance and introduces the idea that poetry can have many different forms. They explore the other forms poetry might take and how it can be presented in many different ways.
They then use glass beads to design and create word games that results in poems, song, and a silent line of poetry (using dance moves instead of speech).
Before lunch Sally runs a Create-a-Book session where they all make a ball shaped book that is inspired by the circular aspect of the world – this can roll across the floor and they have a game of story skittles to inspire them with ideas they can think about over lunch.
After lunch, the glass pebbles are then turned into magic rings which can be used as inspiration for the imagination. This leads to the Poetree and all the objects on it – each object inspires a song, poem or story and they explore these and create their own ideas. The children have time to write their own poem or short story inspired either by the existing objects on the tree or ones in their imagination.
The day ends with the Word Birds – each child creates their own Word Bird book and in it writes a song which we celebrate as the last activity.
A Selection of Sally’s Books
Bookings
To book Sally Crabtree please contact Keeley
keeley@caboodlebooks.co.uk
Sally also offers visits to schools and other settings, click here for more information.