Gary Snapper

A crucial aspect in developing students’ response to poetry is to increase their sensitivity to the idea that a poem is more than just a meaning. Poems are not crossword puzzles to be solved, or simple messages to be ‘delivered’. They are aesthetic experiences which are about feeling as well as meaning: their sound and shape and mood are often a major part of this experience and can contribute to the poem’s meaning. This is a point that examiners often make in response to GCSE and A-level exams.

Following hot on the heels of NATE’s 60th anniversary (1963–2023) and marking the 60th anniversary of English in Education (which began in 1964 as NATE Bulletin), this issue of the journal focuses on English subject associations – special interest groups perhaps somewhat under-represented in the academic literature, despite their historically important role in formulating the ways in which the subject manifests itself in schools, colleges and universities.

For forty years or more, much of the discourse about poetry in education has constructed poetry teaching and learning as an especially difficult professional problem to be solved.