POETRY MONTH FUN :)

Happy Thursday!!

Its' Abbey from A Teacher Mom!

I hope some spring like weather is heading your way.  Up in the Northeast we are just starting to see the snow melt and the sun is warming things up!   We are finally  seeing temps in the 60’s!  Thank goodness!  I was starting to think spring was NEVER coming!!

As many of you know April is Poetry Month.  For many people poetry makes sense.  It is fun, enjoyable…the rhythm, the rhyme, the alliteration.  I will be honest…I am NOT that person.  I have been using poetry notebooks in my classroom for years where kids read and enjoy poems weekly.  Some even chose to write some poetry, but as a person who just never “got it”, I never went further. 

Well here I am 2015 and our district has given us a skeleton curriculum with the expectation that we teach a unit on poetry.  My team and I decided that April would be the perfect month to start!  After lots of Pinteresting and of course TPT searching I have a few resources to share with you if you are beginning some poetry study in your room!  

Introduction To Poetry
 After a quick into and chat about our new topic, I dove into having kids listen to some favorite poems.

Here is one video I used...

Next, I headed over to Poetry4Kids and had the kids listen to Ken Nesbitt read his poem "I Raised My Hand in Class".  

Then I allowed kids to pour through our poetry bins to check out some other poems.  

Rhythm
To introduce rhythm, I read the book Tanka, Tanka, Skunk by Steve Webb.  

The kids LOVED the book!  They got the idea of rhythm just from the book.  

Then I used the rhythm poems from Rebecca Reid's Introduction To Rhythm TPT pack!

The next day, we reviewed what we had done the day before and then moved on to reading a version of Jack and the Beanstalk (poem) from Mary Ann Hoberman's You Read To Me, I'll Read To You:  Very Short Fairy Tales To Read Together.  

This poem is read in two voices.  I split the class into two groups and they each took a part - practicing reading it in synch with each other and feeling/hearing the rhythm of the poem!

Rhyming and Repetition

To start this lesson we are going to be reading two poems that include rhyme and repetition.  We will also be watching this video of a favorite kids song...

Then I plan to send kiddos off to read some poetry and have them hunt for rhyme and repetition.  

On the second day, I combined two TPT packs.  

 Watermelon Rhymes

Take A Bite Out of Summer

I made copies of the watermelon seeds on black paper.  I also printed the watermelon words in color, so that the kids could choose the word they wanted to use.  Once kids chose a watermelon word they needed to write the word on one of the watermelon seeds.  On the remaining watermelon seeds kids then wrote words that rhymed with the watermelon word.  

The Watermelon Rhymes pack comes with an awesome recording sheet for kids to write their own rhyming poem.  I made this an option for my firsties, but since I knew this would be too hard for some friends, I also modified the lesson a bit.  

A few years ago, I bought this Watermelon craft from A Cupcake for the Teacher.  I used the templates for the watermelon (enlarged a bit to fit the seeds) and printed them on pink and green paper.  Then the kids were able to put together the watermelon with the seeds and show of their rhyming skills.  

Thanks for stopping by this month!  I would love to hear your poetry ideas – leave your ideas in the comments!!  I have more that I am in the planning stages for - alliteration, onomatopoeia, riddle poems, personification and more!!  Hop on over to my blog and follow me for the updates!