The Eurochild project gets children away from technology and back to pen and paintbrush - and they're enjoying it, reports Fiona McCann.

'It makes me feel really happy," said 11-year-old Caroline Dowling. Shane Smith (13) was equally enthusiastic. "It helps people get rid of their emotions and stuff," he explained.

Football? Chocolate? Wii? Believe it or not, they were talking about poetry, and their enthusiasm was as sincere as it was infectious as they read their work at last month's Dublin launch of the 2007 Eurochild Anthology of Poetry and Art.

It's not often that a roomful of poets buzzes with such audible glee, but as they took their seats in the National Library on Pearse Street, this gaggle of proud writers, all under the age of 13, found it hard to sit still. Some of the 700 children whose poems were published in the book lined up to read their work against the backdrop of a slide show of the anthology's illustrations, drawn by their peers. There were proud grins, foot-shuffling and a palpable skittish excitement that most would associate more with a new Harry Potter movie release than with poetry.

But the Eurochild Anthology has given poetry a new cachet among schoolchildren in Ireland. The book is the annual product of a project run from Cork's Tigh Filí arts centre, an initiative that has battled for 12 years against modern technological distractions to bring children back to the pen and paintbrush. And it seems, if its series of launches and readings are anything to go by, to be winning. Now known as Eurochild, a project that began with poetry workshops for children has expanded over the years to include the annual publication of the Eurochild Anthology, as well as a children's festival and a variety of exchanges and events.

Poet Maura Bradshaw, director of Tigh Filí, has been involved from Eurochild's inception. "It was the children's idea," she explains. Back in 1994, the centre was bringing out adult poetry in book form but printing children's poems on posters. "The children asked: 'Why are you bringing out the adults in book form? We'd like to have a book!' " says Bradshaw.

Galvanised by their enthusiasm, the project's first book, A Child's Famine, was published in 1995. "We thought all the children would write about the Irish Famine, but they wrote about famine all over the world," says Bradshaw. "Then we realised that we were dealing with something much bigger."

It became bigger again when Tigh Filí teamed up with the Euroecole Children's Festival in Nantes. The initiative's European dimension was established and, as the project grew, Leslie Ryan came on board as project manager and began to cultivate relationships with cultural centres in Europe and further afield, to add to the existing school partnerships and exchange programmes.

"We work closely with a children's cultural centre in Serbia; in Finland. We even receive work now from the Palestinian child's art centre," says Ryan. "One very strong part of it is promoting integration through arts education. The project is certainly very intercultural and does a lot to develop children's cultural literacy around customs, around languages, around experiences of kids across Europe."

The anthology is testimony to this, gathering together as it does the poems of children from more than 23 countries, all written in their native languages.

"We encourage the children to write in their own language, the language of the soul," says Bradshaw.

Apart from the cultural and linguistic variety contained in this colourful volume, marketed as being "by kids for kids", the wide range of themes tackled reveals a spectrum of concerns and inspirations. It is also a heartening indication that children have remained fundamentally unchanged despite their changing world. Although many poems tackle subjects such as George Bush, climate change and terrorism, they sit alongside odes to parents, nature sonnets and rhymes about love and friendship.

These are age-old themes, but, according to Bradshaw, the content of the book has shifted dramatically since the project began in 1995.

"Now children have a lot of problems, and they write about the problems," she says, citing divorce as one of the issues a growing number of 21st-century Irish children have to grapple with. She recalls an incident when Micheál Martin TD was asked to read a poem from the book at one of its launches. "He just opened the book and [the first poem] was 'Dad in bed with another' and a picture next to it of a curly-headed woman. Obviously the kids were just going through a divorce or whatever, but I think it's very good to write about it because things are out in the open."

The breaking of taboos and the opportunity Eurochild provides for self-expression are among the things that have made the project a success. But, for Bradshaw, the real aim is to introduce young children to the joy of the written word, a pleasure she hopes will stay with them through to adulthood.

"If they're not going to grow up being a poet or writing poetry, they're certainly going to love it and they're going to buy the books," says Bradshaw.

Now, 12 years on, people who were involved in the Eurochild project as children are returning to Tigh Filí as adults.

"We have guys of 25 coming back into Tigh Filí, and now some of them are poets and some of them just like to come to the readings," Bradshaw says, her delight at having passed on her own love of poetry lighting up her eyes. "The biggest thing is to love poetry, so the love will stay with them all their lives."

She would have been pleased then to hear Andrew Mullen (10) mention that he has enjoyed writing so much he may even consider becoming a poet when he grows up. "I wrote about friendship," he says enthusiastically about his own entry in the anthology. "I saw my friends and I felt happy because I had loads of friends, and I felt sad for the people who didn't."

For 11-year-old Alison Kinlan, the subject closest to her heart was the loss of her father. "My dad died when I was seven, so I did it about him. It was kind of hard," she admits. Alison, who read at the Eurochild Anthology's Dublin launch - "I thought I was going to cry" - also attended a poetry workshop given by poet Mark Granier beforehand, and is eager to continue writing about the things that move her. "I definitely think I'll write more poems in the future. I don't know if I'm going to be a poet when I grow up, but I'm definitely going to write more poems," she says.

As Melanie Smith, from Longford's Sacred Heart National School, wrote in her entry in this year's Eurochild book: "The music in me/ Is dying to come out." Through Eurochild, it's getting a chance to do so.

The Eurochild Anthology of Poetry and Art is published by Bradshaw Books and is available in bookshops around Ireland