Does your child love poetry? Does your child enjoy writing in English? Then you will be interested in the Old Possum's Children's Poetry Competition which we are running in partnership with the Children's Poetry Bookshelf.

Children aged between 7-11 years old who live outside the United Kingdom and who are learning English as a second or foreign language will be able to enter the international category of the competition. Judging for the competition will be chaired by the UK's Children's Laureate Michael Rosen. The winning poems will be published on the LearnEnglish Kids and Children's Poetry Bookshelf websites, and all winners will receive audiobooks. Read on for more details about the competition.

THE COMPETITION
The topic of this year's competition is 'work'. Work is something all of us do: adults, children, animals, nature and machines. Here are a few examples:

			Bakers get up very early to make bread – all of us can use our hands to knead dough and make bread. Many professional bakers now use machines to help them produce larger quantities of bread.
			Bees work very hard to produce honey - which of course many of us enjoy spreading on our bread.
			Many people now use computers or machines to help them work faster or more easily. For instance, do you wash your clothes by hand or do you have a machine at home or at the launderette which does it for you?

Poems must be:

			about the theme of work
			no longer than 25 lines
			written in English
			the writer's own work

Please remember that the writer must be aged between 7 and 11 years old when they send in their entry.

CLOSING DATE: MONDAY 20 OCTOBER 2008

Entries to the competition can be submitted online on the Children's Poetry Bookshelf website:
Click here to submit your entry online

Or by post with an entry form to the following address:
Old Possum’s Children’s Poetry Competition
P.O. Box 24
Winkleigh
EX19 8WU
Devon
United Kingdom

You can download entry forms on this page of the Children's Poetry bookshelf website:
Click here to download an entry form

The winning poems will be published on the LearnEnglish Kids and Children's Poetry Bookshelf websites, and the writers will receive books and audiobooks.

The other judges joining Michael Rosen on the panel are Gaby Morgan, anthologist and Editorial Director in charge of the poetry list at Macmillan Children’s Books; Rosemary Stones, Editor of Books for Keeps; Fiona Waters, Editorial Director of Troubadour and poetry anthologist; and Cliff Yates, poet and Deputy Head of Maharishi School.

Find more information about the competition terms and conditions here.