The Art of Learning Poetry by Heart Celebrated in Style

On Monday 6 July 2026, Poetry By Heart, the national poetry speaking competition, held its Grand Finale at Shakespeare’s Globe, London and crowned four young people National Champions. 

The competition invites young people to choose a poem, learn it by heart and perform it aloud. Set up in 2012 by then Poet Laureate, Sir Andrew Motion, Poetry By Heart is loved by teachers and young people, who recognise the joy, satisfaction and deep learning that comes from knowing a poem by heart. One in four state secondary schools and over 1,000 primary schools in England took part in Poetry By Heart this year and no less than 146,000 young people learned a poem by heart.

Forty young finalists were chosen to compete in the Classic competition, which celebrates outstanding achievement in speaking poems. 

In addition to the competitors in the Classic category, twelve sets of finalists travelled to London in the competition’s Freestyle category, which showcases creative, inclusive achievement in speaking a poem and includes group performances.

Ten teachers also dared to perform poems they had learned by heart in the All School Staff competition.

Three Special Awards were presented to schools that have adapted Poetry By Heart around the significant challenges they face, seeing them not as a barrier to participation but rather as an opportunity for innovation. Recipients were Kingfisher Academy, a hospital school providing education to children at Sheffield Children’s Hospital, who created a truly special group recitation, supporting children, many of whom could not leave their beds to take part. The result was a joyous, memorable performance. A collective of five Ministry of Defence schools based in Cyprus were recognised for the way they totally threw themselves into the challenge all while coping with ‘uncertainty and upheaval due to the current global climate’. Finally, St Nicholas Priory Primary School, Great Yarmouth, a school that claims to have ‘fallen in love with poetry’ was recognised for the way they have used Poetry By Heart to transform the way that their children see themselves.  

The four National Poetry By Heart Champions chosen by judges, poets Patience Agbabi, Liz Berry, Valerie Bloom, Glyn Maxwell, Paul Munden and Jean Sprackland are:

Ten-year-old Oliver Daniels of Muschamp Primary School and Language Opportunity Base, Carshalton is Champion in the Classic KS2 Competition. Oliver recited Roald Dahl’s Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf, in a beautifully measured performance. 

Albie Costain of Shaftesbury School, Dorset is Champion in the Classic KS3 Competition. This is Albie’s second consecutive year as winner! This year’s winning performance was of T.S. Eliot’s The Journey of the Magi, a very difficult poem according to the judges, and he held the audience spellbound.

Fourteen-year-old Adam Hawkesworth of South Bromsgrove High School, Worcestershire is Champion in the Classic KS4 Competition. Adam’s performance of Simon Armitage’s poem Remains, a poem that responds to a dramatic interpretation, was truly moving.

Seventeen-year-old Daniella Amaebtie of Durham Sixth Form Centre, County Durham is Champion in the Classic KS5 category for her performance of Peach by D H Lawrence which stood out for its clarity, confidence and charisma.

An enthusiastic audience at The Globe, which included VIP guest poets Alice Oswald, Matt Goodfellow and Kate Wakeling, watched twelve superb Freestyle performances, accomplished performances that as a whole showcased the wonderful breadth of how poems can be shared. Of these they selected nine-year-old Zidaan Aslam of The Blue Coat School, Birmingham, whose performance of There Was An Old Lady Who Swallowed A Fly was bursting with energy and delivered with a marvellous sense of drama, according to poet Kate Wakeling who watched them all. Alongside Zidaan, fifteen-year-old Kairo Blumenthal of Barton Court Grammar School, Kent was chosen as their winner. Congratulating Kairo on his performance of Remains by Simon Armitage, poet Kate Wakeling said: ‘Kairo drew us into the narrative of the poem through his poised and deeply sensitive account, making for something very special indeed.’

Teacher Pip Holmes from Fernwood School, Nottinghamshire won the All School Staff category for her performance of Poetry by Marianne Moore.

Congratulating the winners and all the performers, Dr Julie Blake, co-founder and co-director of Poetry By Heart said: ‘Poetry By Heart has an incredible ripple effect. Every child and young person who took part in this year’s competition has dropped a pebble of a poem into the water and watched its waves spread out, amongst their friends, families, schools, communities and here today with an audience of over 800 people. There is such positive energy and dynamic movement when poetry and young people come together in this way.’