Stirring students to speak to history
South Australia’s History Festival Poetry Takeover gives young people a voice in museum spaces by encouraging them to interpret collections in new and creative ways.
During May 2021, we invite young people to take inspiration from the collections that the History Trust and other museums and galleries hold on behalf of the state of South Australia. We encourage you to engage with objects, think creatively, connect those thoughts to the theme ‘transformation’ and then develop a poem of any kind.
- What does local history mean to you?
- Why are objects important and why should we care?
- Why would a museum have that particular object on display
- What’s the story?
The Poetry Takeover Challenge is open to all students in Years 4 through 9 across South Australia. Parents, caregivers and/or teachers can provide support. The poems will be inspired by museum objects discovered by visiting and exploring museums and galleries across South Australia or by the collections linked on this site.
Participants can create poems in any form: haiku, stanza, limerick, sonnet or slam, either written or recorded. Whatever form is most interesting to you.
Submit your poem in writing, or as an audio or video file, along with a picture of the object that inspired you. The History Trust will share the poems on our Poetry Gallery page and on the History Festival Facebook account. Be sure to tell your family and friends to read your poem online and get in on the People’s Choice voting later in May.