TEACH THIS POEM FREE
Yippee!įeel free to use this free poetry lesson plan that I wrote for the poem, "Columbus.We asked our Teacher Trailblazers for their top tips for teaching poetry. You may want to have students recite the poem in front of the class, or possibly at a recital where you invite parents or other students. This really helps to ingrain the poem in the child's mind. If you are teaching a long poem, break it into smaller chunks and assign doable sections for students to memorize.Įveryday, recite part of the poem as a group. You may say, "Does this poem remind you of any of the literature characters whom we have read about?" This is also a good time to make connections with other parts of the child's curriculum. You might say, "Describe an experience that you have had when you felt as carefree as the poet." I like asking students to support their answers using language or information from the poem.įor instance, if they say that the main character is bossy, they should be able to give examples from the poem of the main character actually being bossy.Īsk students to relate the poem to their lives. You may ask them to choose one word to describe the main character in the poem. This is the time to ask them key questions about the poem and the characters in it. It helps if you come to class with a prepared summary that the students can copy. But even with young students, it's important to know that they understand the general idea of the poem. This can be very helpful when you are teaching more complicated poems to older students. You might ask, "How does the author of this poem feel about flowers? How do you know?"įor this step, you will ask the students to summarize the poem in his/her own words. Listening to a poem a second time will help students to understand it.īefore you do this, you may want to ask students to listen for something in particular. You can either have a student look up the words in a dictionary, or you can have the definitions prepared ahead of time. Then, have the students write each word's definition on their sheet. Identify and define words the students do not know.Īsk the students for words that they are unfamiliar with. If it is a difficult poem, you may want to give them some background information before you begin.Ģ. Have students listen to you as you read the poem aloud. There are a few basic steps that you can follow which will help you be comfortable teaching kids poetry and will help the students get the most out of it. (I wasn't.) But, we can still enjoy teaching kids poetry and learning it ourselves! Many of us were not taught poetry when we were children. I know from firsthand experience that finding the right poetry for kids can be a difficult task.Īside from finding the right poem, the actual teaching may also be a bit daunting for you. You can use poetry to teach grammar and vocabulary.Poems offer a chance to build connections within multiple areas of a child's curriculum.Poems capture emotions and ideas in lyrical phrases that are often easy to remember.Poems give children an easy way to remember a lesson or value.Memorizing and reciting poetry builds confidence.Read on to discover why and to get the skinny on the eight steps to follow when teaching poetry!