A Writer’s Road: Kids Need Art

My work with Writing Through has taught me many things. But there is one thing which I always believed in my bones, and now have had confirmed through real life experience. Kids need art. They need to have the experience of listening to poems and stories. They need to learn the joy of writing their own poems and stories, creating their own worlds with words. The children who are allowed these experiences become better students, more imaginative adults, more creative citizens. But maybe you don’t want to believe me? Well then, believe Philip Pullman. “Children need art and stories and poems and music as much as they need love and food and fresh air and play. “

Here is the remainder of the text of the speech he gave for the tenth anniversary of the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award in 2012. Very much worth a read……