The Power of Spoken Word

Several weeks ago ASB hosted Sarah Kay and Phil Kaye who introduced our students to the power of spoken word poetry.  In the last week or so I've seen a spoken word YouTube movie doing the rounds of Twitter and Facebook.  This video, I Will Not Let An Exam Result Decide My Fate by Suli Breaks (Sulibreezy on YouTube), could be a great provocation for a staff meeting or a professional development session.   It's actually a response to another video by him called Why I Hate School But Love Education (which I'm also adding below).  However let me tell you something interesting: Suli Breaks is not a high school dropout - he is actually a graduate from Sheffield University who studied law, but who started doing spoken word performances in his last year of university!  Food for thought!

(For those who want to know a little more about Suli Breaks - he was brought up in Wood Green, a rough area of North London not far from where I grew up, and after graduating became an ambassador for Saving Our Streets,  an organization that focuses on reducing serious-street and gang-related violence.  Having grown up in London myself I was horrified to read the statistic that between 2001 and 2010 more people were killed in London by gun and knife violence than British service people killed in Afghanistan and Iraq.  Suli grew up surrounded by poverty, drugs and violence but believed that education was the avenue that would lead him to a brighter future.  He is passionate about making a difference through using spoken word poetry to educate, enlighten, engage and spread the message of non-violence. )