Children's Poetry Competition 2011 - Animal Poems
I had grand ideas for a children's poetry competition this year requiring the composition of an alliteration, or perhaps even an onomatopoeia, poem. Thankfully my niece, Hannah, intervened and told me to keep it simple and encourage everyone to have a go. So simple it is. The theme for the competition, as suggested by Hannah, is animal poems.
Please Note The 2011 children's poetry competition is now closed, so you can't submit new entries, but you can enjoy reading the winning poems, the other nearly as brilliant poems or you can write an animal poem, just for fun.
Taking part in the competition
The competition has very few rules and they're really simple:
- You must write a poem which features a real (not imaginary) animal or animals
- You must be aged 16 or under at the time you write the poem
- You may submit a maximum of three poems to the competition
- The poem you submit must be your own, original work
- The poem can be in any style or form, but must have fewer than 16 lines
- The competition is open to young poets living anywhere in the world
- The last day for submission of competition entries is 16th November 2011
What sort of animals can I write about?
You can write about animals of any shape or size, from wild animals to pets, from the cute and cuddly to the seriously scary, from anacondas to zebras. We'll even allow you to write about insects, amphibians and reptiles, or extinct animals, such as dinosaurs and wooly mammoths.
The judging and prizes
The poems will be judged in three separate age categories:
- Poems by children aged 8 or under
- Poems by children aged 9 to 11
- Poems by children aged 12 to 16
There will be one prize of £50 awarded in each of the age categories to the author of the poem which is, in the view of the judges, the best poem of those submitted. The competition will be judged by an independent judge and the results announced in December 2011.
Sending in your poems
If you'd like to enter the competition, please email and make sure you include the following:
- The poem
The poem can either be included in the body of the email or sent as an attachment. - Your name, age and where you live
Please include your full name (first and last names) and your age when you wrote the poem. You should also include the town, city, county or country where you live (but not your full address). When we publish your poem, we'll only include your first name, age and details of where you live e.g. written by Timmy, aged 12 from Nottinghamshire. - Why you wrote the poem
Please tell us what inspired you to write the poem, why you chose the particular animal(s) featured in your poem and whether you enjoyed writing the poem (or were forced to write it by your school teacher).
We'll put as many of the poems as we can up on the website to share with all our readers. I can't guarantee that it will be your first step on the road to poetic fame and fortune, but entries in previous competitions have been published, read on local radio and set to music to be sung by Arcady, Canada's premier youth choir. So who knows?
