In Term 2, students in Years 3 to 6 participated in the Dorothea Mackellar Poetry Competition. This is Australia’s oldest and best known annual poetry writing competition for school children.
The optional theme for this year was ‘All Over the World’. Students could use this theme to inspire their writing but also had the option of drawing inspiration from elsewhere. Many of our students took up the challenge and put their poetry writing skills into practice, entering their poems into the competition.
The winners of the competition were announced last Friday. One of our students, Mila Milanovic in 3S, was the winner of the lower primary section for her poem titled The Night Witch. She and her family attended the national presentation ceremony in Gunnedah. Mila received a cash prize, trophy, a collection of books and promotion of her poem nationally.
During the presentation ceremony, Mila had the opportunity to recite her poem and met others winners.
This is what the judges said about her poem:
A poem that combines a strong narrative, successful characterisation, good rhyming and sophisticated poetic techniques such as an enjambment and imagery.
The Night Witch
The witch on the broom with the tall pointy hat,
flew through the mist with her shaggy brown cat.
Together they flew, they would dip and then dive,
creating patterns in the mist under the moonlit sky.
The children below her lay tucked in their beds,
unaware of the witch that flew over their heads.
As they lay dreaming of everything nice
the wicked old witch, who was colder than ice
mumbled a spell with words of this and of that,
to suck up their dreams straight into her hat.
Once they were there without even a care,
she would replace the sweet dreams with a horrible nightmare!
Home she would fly back through the night sky
mysteriously cackling as she flew by.
