There was silence in the classroom, save the odd snort of laughter as they changed for PE. Harrison had decided we needed a poem instead of the countdown timer and it had become a fixed routine. We were watching Benjamin Zephaniah perform Talking Turkeys (which drew nearly as much laughter as Michael Rosen’s Chocolate Cake but provided less time for wriggling out of tights and lacing trainers).

Poetry in schools is back in fashion. You see it in those uber-strict secondaries where children stand in line and beat their breasts while reciting If or Invictus (why is it never On the Ning Nang Nong?). War poetry proliferated this autumn, and nearly every primary I know has an annual poetry recital event.

I love teaching poetry. I rarely go a day without reading a poem with my class. Put me in charge of the curriculum, and I’d plonk poetry firmly at the epicentre. In my experience, primary-aged children love it.

Primary children need to hear Revolting Rhymes, meet “the best rapping Gran this world’s ever seen” and enter the world of Jabberwocky. They need to live and die with The Highwayman, write their own Commentator poem in the style of Gareth Owen, surf in Kit Wright’s Magic Box and relive their First Day at School with Roger McGough.

Jo Brighouse is a pseudonym for a teacher in the Midlands