Poetry Joe visits Steyning on Library Marathon tour of UK

The award-winning author visited Steyning Library and Steyning CE Primary School on Monday, January 20.

He spent the morning at the school running a poetry workshop, before going to Steyning Library to register and meet with some of the children’s families.

Bev Kinahan, families and wellbeing librarian, said: “It was wonderful to welcome the families of Steyning Primary to the library for this special event and become the 139th library Joseph has visited as part of his library marathon.”

Poetry Joe, as he is affectionately known, hosted an assembly and worked with a group of children to create their own poetry masterpieces, which they later shared with their parents at the library.

He said: “I was so impressed by the quality of work created by the Steyning students. Their poems included worlds of sparkling jewels and places that rain golf balls.”

Leia Sands, Steyning Primary librarian, said the school looked forward to collaborating on future projects with the library.

She said: “The children had such a wonderful day. Joseph has sparked their creativity and they have produced interesting and imaginative poems with him.

“It was great to be able to share some of Joseph’s poems and talk about the work we have done with their families in the public library at the end of the day.”