Question

Question: How to engage young minds

that have no interest in being engaged?

We are trying to expand the horizons

of people whose life/ lives exist only

within the parameters of their snaps,

their tiktoks, the world as shown

by influencers. For whom reality

is wanting to be a superstar rather than

wanting to excel at a skill or talent. Who

desire fame for fame’s sake but grow

up in houses with blinds closed

to the outside world.

When children and their families’ minds

reside only within the confines of estates

and fun and sun holidays with beer

and egg and chips on the menu, how

do we hook them on learning? How

can we enrich their cultural capital? How

do we turn them on to the life that exists

outwith the walls of one small town?

I appreciate that this may come across as condescending. I know that a fun and sun holiday is better than no holiday at all for many and that travel is a privilege for those with greater means.  This poem is on closed-mindedness and the doors it closes to us. We may live in physically limiting circumstances but the mind is always free to live a more varied existence, to try something new off the menu instead of plumping for egg and chips.