2018 Bonus Post -- Reckoning With Enemies

Thanks for following along with Go Poems this year.  Enjoy using the 30 new ideas (and 30 ideas from 2017) in your classroom, and look for new posts coming in March of 2019.  If you are interested in writing a post for Go Poems, please contact me on Twitter @theVogelman, as it is never too early to start planning posts for next year. 

For now, enjoy this special bonus post from Carol Jago to conclude our project this year, and help your students reckon with "enemies."



by Carol Jago

Public discourse has become brutally contentious. We seem to be losing the ability to consider those who think differently from us with any equanimity.

In his poem “Enemies” Wendell Berry reflects on this dilemma.

1. Before reading the poem, ask students to write for a few minutes about whether they think one should forgive one’s enemies.

2. Read the poem aloud and then have students read the poem once more silently. Invite them to talk with a partner about the apparent contradiction expressed in the first two stanzas.

3. How is forgiveness like “sunlight / on a green branch”?

4. What would it mean to think of enemies “as monsters like yourself”?

Further Reading: 

Carol Jago has taught middle and high school in Santa Monica, CA for many years and served as president of the National Council of Teachers of English. The Poetry Foundation website is her “go to” source in April and always.

2018 Poem #30 -- Mythology Goes To the Hairdresser

by Kate Baker

Jehanne Dubrow’s “Penelope Considers a New Do,” published in her compilation Stateside, is one of my favorite poems to read with students who are studying Homer’s Odyssey as it puts a modern and alternative perspective on the mythology of circumspect Penelope, Odysseus’ long enduring wife. Dubrow’s poem is rich in symbolism and allusion as she channels Penelope’s tale, weaving it into her own story of being a military wife who is home while the husband is deployed overseas. There is even an audio version available, read by the poet.

Students can begin by close reading the poem, identifying the modern and mythical allusions, enjambed and end-stopped lines, and examples of alliteration as they discuss the implications of trying to change one’s hairstyle in attempt to better one’s life: how does one’s appearances dictate one’s mindset and perspective on life? Can cutting one’s hair really result in an improved outlook? Will magazines and hairstylists realistically offer solutions to one’s plights in life? Students can consider how Penelope has coped with Odysseus’ absence and compare/contrast her coping strategies to their own understandings of waiting and identity.

But the beauty of Dubrow’s poem is found in the structure: four stanzas of four lines each with each line indented so as to give the poem its shape -- anyone who has cut his/her bangs will recognize that the stanzas look like sections of hair that have been snipped on an angle. To extend the lesson, students can work in groups or individually to write or find other poems that are written in basic block format and rearrange the text so as to give it a symbolic shape or visual design. The rearranged and original poems can be presented to the class and students can discuss the artistic choices made in the arrangement. 

Further Reading:

English teacher, coach, and author Kate Baker is on the executive boards of the Flipped Learning Network and the New Jersey Council of Teachers of English. Adept at integrating technology in her classes using flipped-blended learning strategies, Kate has been recognized as a CEL’s TEacher Leader of Excellence for 2017, a PBS LearningMedia Digital Innovator, and an Edmodo Certified Trainer. Twitter: @KtBkr4 Blog: Baker's BYOD

2018 Poem #29 -- Bringing History Into the English Classroom

“Propaganda informed him that it was only a matter of time before a plague of Jewish tailors showed up and stole his customers” (Zusak 59).

While reading Markus Zusak’s The Book Thief with my ninth-grade Honors English classes, one question continually arises: How could people let the atrocities of the Holocaust happen? In order to help students better understand the power that Adolf Hitler held over Nazi Germany, I lead them in an exploration of propaganda, beginning with a poem written by Austrian children in the 1930s. Students are horrified to see “Thoughts on the Führer” elevate Hitler to a deity with the authority to lead—and cleanse—the people. I pose two questions to students as they consider the poem: How do the young people writing this poem feel about Hitler? How do you think they were stirred to feel so strongly?

Every class begins with Poem of the Day, which quickly engages students and directs their thinking to the day’s content, but this poem particularly sparks student interest. As the lesson progresses, I show pictures of propaganda in society today and in Nazi Germany, and students analyze the emotional impact of each example. The New York Times documentary  “From North Korea, with Dread” even includes an example of contemporary students singing a tribute that resonates eerily with this poem. I also include primary source images of indoctrination in German classrooms and Hitler Youth, bringing to life the experiences of main characters from The Book Thief, Liesel and Rudy. Students then apply their knowledge of propaganda to The Book Thief, combing the novel for evidence of how Nazi propaganda influences characters’ actions.

When studying a historical fiction work such as The Book Thief, poetry proves to be an insightful window into the past that simultaneously facilitates student understanding of history and stretches their thinking.

Further Reading:

Amanda Kloth is an English Language Arts student teacher and history enthusiast from southeastern PA.

2018 Poem #28 -- Introducing Students to Poetry Through "Introduction to Poetry"

by Will Melvin

Quite often when I “teach” poetry, students want to drive down to the root question: what does it mean? I sometimes struggled to show students that oftentimes poetry doesn’t have to mean anything. That an emotion, an idea, a moment can be just that, and that a poem can scoop up that emotion, idea, or moment and serve it to you in a delightful way without asking anything in return. Students struggle with that—heck, adults struggle with that!—and Billy Collins’s “Introduction to Poetry” helps me work through this struggle with them.

I usually begin by asking students to generate subjects about which they care a great deal. I ask them to think about things that people “get wrong” about their subject. I discuss teaching and some of my pet peeves concerning the work we do as educators and how some things that other teachers do can pick at me a bit. The students generate their topics and their small frustrations, and we read “Introduction to Poetry.”

Collins’s poem is delightful in its simplicity. We read it a few times together in class and really discuss the poem’s form: how Collins uses personification and metaphor to talk to us about how he wants us to read poetry. We notice the severe shift in the poem’s finale, how Collins turns the tone through his final use of metaphor:

But all they want to do
is tie the poem to a chair with rope
and torture a confession out of it.

They begin beating it with a hose
to find out what it really means.


Those two stanzas provide a touchstone for our work with poetry for the remainder of the year: poetry just is; it needn’t be anything beyond that. And that lesson can be a powerful reminder for students.

Once we have unpacked the form and the use of metaphor, the poem provides an opportunity for us to write alongside Collins. We go back to our opening freewrite, and I sketch out my “Introduction to Teaching” while students compose their own “Introduction to ____” poems.

This exercise is a blast for three reasons. First, students toy with voice, metaphor, and imagery in personal ways. Second, they thematically practice what Collins preached, again in personal ways. And third, I get to know more about my students through this exercise. They introduce me to video games, traveling, important places, “letting go,” growing up, and on and on. Their topics inform me about their lives in ways only poetry can.

And that is always a nice reminder of the power of introducing students to poetry.

Further Reading: 

Will Melvin teaches tenth and eleventh-grade English at CB South High School in Warrington, PA. Follow him on Twitter (@CB_Melvin10).

2018 Poem #27 -- Over Our Heads On Purpose

by Brett Vogelsinger

Teens have an complicated relationship with poetry.  On one hand, we have some students pouring their hearts out in private, personal journals or publicly alongside the Instapoets without even an invitation from a teacher; on the other hand, we have students who perceive the genre as pretentious and irrelevant, who roll their eyes the first time a teacher mentions the word "poem."  How do we bridge that gap and invite students from both ends of this spectrum to learn something new with us? 

One trick is finding a poem with just the right level of challenge. 

As teachers we are sometimes told to "pitch it where they can hit it," encouraged to give students reading and materials that allow them to experience success.  We are also told to "scaffold" so that students can grasp challenging texts and tasks as we gradually reduce our level of intervention and support.  

Students can also benefit by pitching a poem where they cannot hit it yet, as long as the poem is a brief one.  We can then challenge them to join us in building a scaffold. 

One such poem is "Landscape" by Robin Coste Lewis. The poem is approachable in that it is short and none of the words are, in isolation, unfamiliar or intimidating.  The poem itself, however, is not completely understandable on the first read.  Invite students to ask questions of the poem and determine how they might unlock more meaning. 

For example, one of the first questions that arises with this poem for me and my students:  Who or what is "Mamere?' Why the references to borders and fires? Is this a poem about an individual or history or a conflict?  How might the copyright date of 2018 be significant? How might we find answers to these questions? 

We talk about how we might research the meaning of "Mamere" and how the poet's background and biography might influence our reading of the poem.  How might we connect this to something else we have read? How can we reach the poet to ask a question?  Where is the poet being intentionally ambiguous? Where does she want us to be a little confused? 

I will not share my own interpretation or research on the poem here.  I invite you instead to explore it with your students and model with your students what it looks like to be a little bemused and perplexed in your reading and the joy of finding your way out of a more challenging poem.  Both the natural poets and the skeptics may find this approach engaging in your classroom, especially when your own 

Further Reading:

Brett Vogelsinger is a ninth-grade English teacher at Holicong Middle School in Bucks County, PA.  He is the faculty adviser for the school literary magazine, Sevenatenine.  Besides his annual blogging adventure on this site, he has published work on Nerdy Book Club, The New York Times Learning Network, and Edutopia and you can follow him on Twitter (@theVogelman).

2018 Post #26 -- Take a Bite Out of Poetry

by Lauren Heimlich Foley

During a summer graduate class, I found myself re-inspired while participating in a poetry lesson modeled after Nancie Atwell’s writing-reading workshop. That afternoon, I dusted off Naming the World, making a promise to include more poetry the following school year.

Weeks later, I started a September class period with a poem by Ronald Wallace. To engage my students, I projected “You Can’t Write a Poem about McDonald’s” on the board and asked them what they thought.

Some groups, wanting to disprove the statement, created their own poems. Other tables believed McDonald’s was not an appropriate topic for a poem or would not make a strong writing piece. Still, others wondered if the clause was in fact a poem since quotation marks flanked both sides of it.

Once table groups shared their theories, I revealed that “You Can’t Write a Poem about McDonald’s” was indeed a poem. Students exclaimed phrases such as, “No way!” or “I told you so!” or “Really?” Intrigued by their enthusiasm, I wondered what their responses would be to the actual text.

After reading the poem and inviting students to share their highlighted lines, our room erupted with meaningful conversations. My nervous-unsure-second-week-of-school seventh graders transformed into investigators and analyzers. As I moved between groups, listening in on their discussions and asking questions to push their thoughts further, their commentary on diction, personification, imagery, similes, and symbolism led to dialogues on larger issues of consumerism, waste, world hunger, food accessibility, and the fast-food industry.

Additionally, we revisited “You Can’t Write a Poem about McDonald’s” during a later class period to discuss effective titles since my students’ initial reactions were so intense.

This poem’s ability to challenge my students’ beliefs of acceptable poetry topics while inviting them to take a platform through their own writing has made it one of my favorites.

Further Reading:

Lauren Heimlich Foley teaches seventh-grade English Language Arts at Holicong Middle School in Doylestown, PA.

2018 Poem #25 -- Reclaiming Identity

by Kelsey Hughes

Gwendolyn Brooks’s poem, “We Real Cool” is a perfect choice for the classroom for many reasons—its brevity (which is, of course, appealing to students at first glance) allows for deep-digging into a small space; the speaker’s voice is palpable and relevant to many teens; and the possibilities for connecting the poem’s themes and tone to a class novel are endless.

This year, I used “We Real Cool” when teaching S.E. Hinton’s The Outsiders. I presented the poem to students at the beginning of class and let Brooks read the poem herself (Listen here). Her introduction provides a good backstory before reading the poem, and by listening to Brooks read aloud, the students are able to benefit from hearing her rhythm and her voice as she reads the poem beautifully. The students then re-read the poem multiple times on their own, marking up the text each time through a new layer--be it through line-by-line extractions of meaning, notes about repetition and figurative language, or even insights into the poem’s progression. After ample time with the text, we “tear apart” and discuss the poem together on the SmartBoard.

After making sense of the poem in isolation, I then ask the students to make a connection between this poem and The Outsiders. I intentionally leave the question, “How does this poem connect to The Outsiders?” open-ended, as the connections range from connections of theme to tone and form. Students surprise me with the amount of meaningful connections they can make with this poem.

After discussing their connections, I then had them look at the definition of “reclaim”* and ask how the speaker here is reclaiming his identity. I then take them to the moment in The Outsiders where the Greasers are almost pronouncing their own “manifesto” before the big rumble; here, we closely read this excerpt and discuss how Greasers are “reclaiming” their identities and why they might need to do this.

A creative writing option would be to have students write a poem in which they reclaim their own identities. This could be a pastiche poem, where students utilize the form and the repetition of “We” or “I” to create their own manifesto. An added challenge would be to require the students to incorporate gradual shift in tone that Brooks creates in “We Real Cool.”

Further Reading:

Kelsey R. Hughes is a writer and English Teacher at Lenape and Holicong Middle Schools in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. Her published and unpublished works can be found at www.kelseyrhughes.weebly.com.


*reclaim: retrieve or recover (something previously lost, given, or paid); obtain the return of.

2018 Post #24 -- Line by Line

by Allison Marchetti

There are poems that resonate deeply, and then there are poems that literally take the breath inside of us away. One such poem is “The Portrait” by Stanley Kunitz, about a mother who cannot bring herself to talk to her son about his dead father.

One thing that gives this poem its emotional power is the line breaks. Take, first instance, the first line:

My mother never forgave my father

The enjambed line begs the question, for what? For leaving her? Infidelity? Money problems?

The first time I ever read this poem (in high school) I could almost feel my heart stop when I came to the second line:

for killing himself.


When I first introduce my students to this poem, I let them know that it explores very emotionally sensitive material, and I give them the option to leave the room during our examination of it. Then I turn off the lights and let the poem “play,” -- that is, I run a PowerPoint into which I’ve typed up the poem, one line per slide. I put a timer on so each slide advances after 2 to 3 seconds. The poem unfolds slowly and painfully, and the surprise that originally registers on my students’ faces turns to horror.

The students are eager and shy to discuss this poem. We start with something technical -- the line breaks -- to ease our way in. What is the effect of breaking the first line after the word “father”? What is the significance of ending lines on words like “spring” and “born”? How do the line breaks in lines three through six affect the story? What else do you notice about the line breaks?

To expand this idea into a writer's workshop lesson, invite students to work in their notebooks. We write new lines or borrow old ones and play around with enjambment to create lines that shock or surprise.

Students love to type up their lines, print them, cut them up and arrange them in different ways on their desks. They use their phones to snap photos of the different stanzas and read them aloud to each other for feedback.

I love watching their faces light up and shift and change as they listen to the different versions of one another’s poems.

Further Reading:

Allison Marchetti is coauthor—with Rebekah O'Dell—of Writing with Mentors and Beyond Literary Analysis. Their popular blog Moving Writers focuses on writing instruction in middle and high school classrooms with an emphasis on voice and authenticity.

2018 Poem #23 -- All Things Big and Small

by Zachary Sibel

In the world of spoken word poetry, it is hard to beat the work of Rudy Fancisco. His work is powerful, brilliant, and highly entertaining. While his videos are incredible -- and I suggest you use as many as you can -- his recently published anthology, Helium, presents a number of written texts that fit well as a warm-up in any class.

One text that I have used recently is a poem he first published via social media and later used in his book.

Find this poem in Rudy Fransisco's book, Helium, or in the original tweet.  

This poem is simple and presents an abundance of opportunities to talk about language and narrative.

Before introducing this poem, I talk to students about some fears that I have, things like flying and heights. I ask students if they have any fears and discuss whether they are rational or not. I end the brief discussion with what seems to be a surprising statement for some students: that I am terrified of spiders. I then show them this poem on my screen. I read the poem aloud and ask for a student reading.

The discussion can go a number of ways. Focus on the first half: "How does the poet react when asked to kill a spider, a task we all have probably done without giving it much thought?” Or focus on the second half of the poem: “What profound statement is made about the refusal of a simple task, killing a spider”.

I start with these questions but also allow student to just talk about the poem and what they got out of it. I close the discussion with the fact that since reading this poem a year ago, I haven’t killed a spider. Because of the way Fancisco addresses the idea of being “caught in the wrong place/at the wrong time, just being alive” I have tried to treat all things with a greater sense of kindness and mercy. Poetry can change us.

A suggested pairing: Read this text alongside William Blake's "The Fly"  and allow students to analyze “How does poetry allow us to see large concepts in the smallest of creatures?”

Further Reading:

Zachary Sibel is a hip-hop fan and an eighth-grade English teacher at Tohickon Middle School in Bucks County, PA. 

2018 Poem #22 -- Poetry Imitations

by Oona Marie Abrams

Poem imitations are gateway writing experiences, in which student poets borrow the bones of a poem’s structure, but put on flesh of their own. First, I like to share an imitation, drawn from a poem that we have already studied.  In this, I embed links to the original texts and credit the original poets. “My Brother’s Nails” is an imitation of Stanley Plumly’s “My Mother’s Feet.” By this point in the year, my students know I have a younger brother on the autism spectrum, but I share with them that poetry is my genre of choice when writing about him. Depending on the class, I might not use that imitation, but I have others!  Imitating “Hanging Fire” by Audre Lorde planted me firmly back in my days as a heartbroken college student. And imitating “The Writer” by Richard Wilbur captured a precious snapshot of my own child. Find time to share one imitation of your own prior to introducing this activity to the students. If you feel vulnerable doing so, good! Now you know how your students feel every time they share their writing with you.

Natasha Trethewey’s poem “History Lesson” is ideal, since it provides both accessibility and challenge. Students can draft an imitation of one or more stanzas of the poem in ten minutes. Here is an example of one imitation from a student, adhering strictly to Trethewey’s original form. Another example is written by a student over a longer period of time. He used the poem more as “training wheels,” which then launched him on a longer poem. It’s worth mentioning that the two student poets above are both introverted. All the more reason why they should be given opportunities to discover (and quietly celebrate!) their own unique writing voices.

Further Reading:

Oona Marie Abrams (@oonziela) is one of the co-organizers of NerdCampNJ. She lives and teaches in northern New Jersey.

2018 Poem #21 -- Comfort Food

by Brett Vogelsinger

Everybody has their favorite comfort food. An omelette with bacon, macaroni and cheese, wonton soup, chocolate cake with vanilla icing, and a full box of Triscuits -- these are a few of my personal favorites.  

In the poem "Everybody Made Soups," poet Lisa Coffman takes an artistic eye to a favorite winter comfort food, and since winter does  not seem to want to let go of us here in Pennsylvania this year, it seems strangely apropos right now.  After a first read of the poem, I ask students to answer a single question.  What words or phrases do you find here that are most surprising to find in a poem about soup?


Everybody Made Soups
by Lisa Coffman

After it all, the events of the holidays,
the dinner tables passing like great ships,
everybody made soups for a while.
Cooked and cooked until the broth kept
the story of the onion, the weeping meat.
It was over, the year was spent, the new one
had yet to make its demands on us,
each day lay in the dark like a folded letter.
Then out of it all we made one final thing
out of the bounty that had not always filled us,
out of the ruined cathedral carcass of the turkey,
the limp celery chopped back into plenty,
the fish head, the spine. Out of the rejected,
the passed over, never the object of love.
It was as if all the pageantry had been for this:
the quiet after, the simmered light,
the soothing shapes our mouths made as we tasted.

Words and phrases like "great ships," "the story of the onion," "weeping," "cathedral," and "pageantry" consistently surprise my students.  We often end up discussing the fun choice of ending the poem with the image of "the soothing shapes our mouths made as we tasted."  I even ask them to pantomime what it looks like to eat a spoonful of soup. 

A follow-up question can help us go deeper and inspire writing: Why does the writer use words that seem almost too profound or intense for the topic?  How does this help strengthen the poem? 

For five minutes, students can write in their notebooks about a favorite comfort food, perhaps even using language that is a bit over-the-top to intensify the effect on readers.  Writing with them in my notebook under the document camera, I might zoom in on the "lava flows" when I slice open my omelette or capture the feeling of "base jumping" off the "cliff" of a three-layered chocolate cake slice.  These subtle hyperboles can make the mundane become extraordinary, and often that is the ambition of a poem in the first place. 

Further Reading: 

Brett Vogelsinger is a ninth-grade English teacher at Holicong Middle School in Bucks County, PA.  He has been starting class with a poem each day for the past ten years. He is the creator of the Go Poems blog and the author of Poetry Pauses: Teaching With Poems to Elevate Writing in All Genres.   Find him on Twitter @theVogelman.

2018 Poem #20 -- Pairing Poems

by Michelle Ambrosini

When I have paired a poem with another poem or with an image, my seventh grade students have shared prolific responses. Pairing “Always” and “Hope is the thing with feathers” allows students to enter the discussion of a big idea using both modern and classic text. By inviting students to sketch Dickinson’s “thing with feathers,” I ask students to make meaning through drawing as well as discussion.

Always

There will always be the waves

rushing in, tumbling out; 

the moon, the fog, the orange

of the morning sun. 

Sadness is not forever.

But let hope be. 

Let it sit by seaside towns,

drift among villages, 

wander in cities. Let it linger

in schools and shipyards

and factories. 

Let it call to you with the scent 

of cinnamon, the taste of mint,

the faraway chant, the chime 

of the clock.

There will always be the babble

of streams, birdsong, 

the whisper of wind. 

Sadness is not forever. 

But let hope be. 

Rebecca Kai Dotlich

Hope is the thing with feathers

Hope is the thing with feathers -
That perches in the soul -
And sings the tune without the words -
And never stops - at all -

And sweetest - in the Gale - is heard -
And sore must be the storm -
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm -

I’ve heard it in the chillest land -
And on the strangest Sea -
Yet - never - in Extremity,
It asked a crumb - of me.

Emily Dickinson

First, students read aloud “Always” by Rebecca Kai Dotlich in pairs -- alternating stanzas or one as the first reader. (I have not yet shared Emily Dickinson’s poem “Hope is the thing with feathers”.) The first question I ask is “What do you notice?”

Students turn and talk and then we share our observations as a whole group.

Students notice the poet’s use of repetition of words: the first and fourth stanzas end with “Sadness is not forever. But let hope be.” They notice the pattern the poet employs in various lines. “There will always be …” starts the first and fourth stanzas. “Let it …” is repeated in the second and third stanzas. Another pattern students notice is the listing of three words or phrases: “the moon, the fog, the orange”; “sit by seaside towns, drift among villages, wander in cities”; “schools and shipyards and factories”; "babble of streams, birdsong, the whisper of wind”. The rhythm the poet creates using repetition demonstrates how rhyming is not needed to create poetry’s mellifluous sounds.

Next, we discuss the poem’s message. If students need prompting, I ask them to consider the title and the repetition. Thanks to the repetition of the final lines of the first and fourth stanzas, students recognize that the poet is contrasting sadness from hope, urging readers to stay hopeful. When students consider the title, they connect this message to the poet’s imploring that remaining hopeful happen “always.” Moreover, as the second and third stanzas describe, staying hopeful happens everywhere and in everything--“by seaside towns... among villages...in cities...schools and shipyards and factories” and “with the scent of cinnamon, the taste of mint, the faraway chant, the chime of the clock.”

Now, I share Dickinson’s ““Hope is the thing with feathers.” Students read it aloud in pairs. Again, I ask students to point out what they notice. Given our recent discussion of Dotlich’s poem, students focus primarily on Dickinson’s metaphor for hope: “the thing with feathers.” They point out the lines that extend the metaphor: “perches,” “sings the tune,” “never stops,” “sweetest… That kept so many warm.” Then, I purposely ask students to sketch a bird in the margins of their paper, thinking about the parallels between a bird and hope as Dickinson describes.

The conversation grows to encompass Dickinson’s message about hope. Students notice the connections between Dotlich’s and Dickinson’s messages. Both promote the beauty of hope and highlight its ubiquity. I introduce the words ubiquity and ubiquitous because both poets show the sentiment that hope is ubiquitous. Dotlich shows this through repetition and pattern and Dickinson shows this through the extended metaphor. Students notice slight differences between the poets’ messages, too. While Dotlich urges readers to remain hopeful despite sadness as “advice” (according to one student), Dickinson “testifies” (again, a student’s observation) that hope is pervasive--in the “chillest land” and “strangest Sea.”

Since students have recently read Pandora’s Box during the Greek mythology unit, they draw connections to the ancient Greeks’ story and how hope remains in the box despite the release of all the world’s evils. We had discussed Greek myths as ancient people’s way of making sense of circumstances they did not understand. Both Dotlich and Dickinson share their understanding of hope in their poems. During a quick write session, I ask students to write about hope--a sketch, a poem, a memory. Students respond in a variety of ways--describing a time they felt hopeful or hopeless, drawing their own metaphor for hope, creating a character who brims with hope. 

Further Reading:

Michelle Ambrosini teaches seventh-grade English at Holicong Middle School in Doylestown, PA.

2018 Poem #19 -- Student-Led Observation and Conversation

by Rose Birkhead

Hanging Fire by Audre Lorde is a perfect fit for a fourteen-year-old adolescent student!

On the day I shared this poem with my students, I rearranged the desks to form a circle. The students knew from the beginning of class that today was going to be different, and it brought a new energy to the classroom. I highly recommend rearranging the furniture to promote conversation!

I used the text rendering experience to work through this poem, and also had students write a short comment to connect with the poem, an idea in their head, or an emotion on their heart, the Book-Head-Heart from Kylene Beers & Robert Probst.

First, I read the poem aloud to the students and had the students close their eyes, or put their heads down so they could take in the poem. On second read, I passed around copies of the poem for each student, and displayed it on the board. During the second read, I asked students to underline a sentence that stuck out to them. I read the poem aloud again, and asked them to box a phrase. Finally, I had the students read the poem to themselves, and asked them to circle one word that stood out to them. We shared our sentences, phrases, and words in the traditional text rendering protocol; then I had the students have a full class discussion about the poem for five minutes. After the discussion, students wrote down a new learning from the whole class discussion.

This activity probably takes 15 minutes. The poem has so many layers of meaning, and I was impressed with how the text rendering helped students naturally make connections with the poem. During our whole-group conversation, I held back my thoughts and let the students run the conversation. Their discussion was rich and powerful. The short write after the conversation allowed students to go back and see how/if their thinking changed, and their writing was expressive and personal. Enjoy this age-appropriate poem about being an adolescent.

Further Reading:

Rose Birkhead is a Reading Specialist in Holland, PA. She teaches 7th and 8th grade literacy classes and strives to create a positive learning environment where her students feel successful on a daily basis.

2018 Poem #18 -- Through New Eyes

by Jason Stephenson

I read Cynthia Rylant’s picture book When I Was Young in the Mountains to my creative writing students during our memoir unit. I smile at the fact that the book was published in 1982, the same year I was born. As I teach high school, I am fairly unfamiliar with children’s book authors, so I was surprised to find another Rylant book on vacation in Houston one recent summer. The slim poetry collection, published in 2003, was titled God Went to Beauty School. In 23 poems over 56 pages, Rylant portrays God as a regular human with titles such as “God Got a Dog,” “God Made Spaghetti,” and “God Went to India.”

The titular poem, “God Went to Beauty School” opens the book. It is one long stanza with short line breaks, a dash of humor, and one simile. I read the poem aloud to my students and give them time to discuss it with an elbow partner. My Creative Writing 2 students rarely need prompting, but possible questions include:

• What is so powerful about a human hand? 
• How do you respond to God being described as a human? 
• Was this poem blasphemous?

As a class, we discuss how the poem begins with short sentences but ends with one long, complicated sentence. The discussion of hands might lead us to the Michelangelo painting of the Creation of Adam, with God’s and Adam’s hands stretched out to one another. Even in the Bible Belt, most of my students are entertained and not offended by this poem.

My students write their own God-as-human poems in response: “God Got a Speeding Ticket,” “God Plays Golf,” and “God Bought a Gun,” just to name a few. We focus on emulating Rylant’s straightforward style, crisp line breaks, and deep insight.

Further Reading:

Jason Stephenson teaches creative writing at Deer Creek High School in Edmond, Oklahoma. He blogs infrequently at dcjason.wordpress.com.

2018 Poem #17 -- Save Favorite Words

by Amy Ludwig VanDerwater

I collect words.  And I keep lists of these collections in my notebooks. When I listen to people speak, read books, or think, I pause to consider the sounds and meanings of lovable and interesting words.  Just this week I've been enchanted by Albuquerque and resonant.  Last week I fell in love with seagull and periwinkle.  

We are changed when we pay attention to words, and while collecting words focuses our attention on language-music, word collections also offer writing ideas. 

Begin a list of favorite words in your own notebook.  Think about words you loved as a little child, words that call up fabric names and kitchen words.  Consider nature words or magical words.  Write these down. 

A sample favorite word list with connections.

Once you have a list, consider connecting pairs of words in surprising ways by drawing random lines between them.  If you desire, share your list with friends or colleagues, each of you saving each other's favorite words as you wish. Or simply choose one word, place it atop a page, and write from it.  You may find that the lines you have drawn will invite a curious connection that brings you somewhere new, as I did in the poem "Word Collection." 

"Word Collection" by Amy Ludwig VanDerwater

Allow yourself to be surprised.

Collect words always.  Words are the bricks of writing. 

I am grateful to Rebecca Kai Dotlich for teaching me to make and share my favorite word lists as she learned from Myra Cohn Livingston.  Pass it on.  Pass it on. 

Buy Amy's book Read! Read! Read! here

Amy Ludwig VanDerwater is author of books including FOREST HAS A SONG, EVERY DAY BIRDS, READ! READ! READ!, DREAMING OF YOU, WITH MY HANDS, and POEMS ARE TEACHERS.  Amy lives in Holland, NY with her family, blogs for young writers at The Poem Farm and Sharing Our Notebooks and posts on Twitter and Instagram as @amylvpoemfarm. 

Enter our giveaway to win a free copy of Amy's book Read! Read! Read! by leaving a comment on any 2018 Go Poems post by 8:30AM on Saturday, April 6.  Many thanks to Boyds Mills Press for sponsoring this giveaway.  

2018 Poem #16 -- Powers of Observation

by Molly Rickert

Part of what make's Ada Limon's poem "The Conditional" exceptional is its use of figurative language, and I would like my students to become more comfortable with figurative language as a writing skill.

When we discuss the beauty and unique style of writing with figurative language, I have students write observation poems. The first goal is to make literal observations three times in a row: 1. Look up and write 2. Look around and write. 3. Look down and write.

Below is an example of the first stanza of a literal observation poem based on 1) the details of the ceiling tiles 2) what was nearby on a desk and 3) what was on the floor.

Students can repeat this process up to 3 times if they’d like (look up, look around, look down).

Then, I have students go through the same process, but this time, making only figurative observations. Below is an example of the first stanza of a figurative observation poem based on the same observations above 1) the details of the ceiling tiles 2) what was nearby on a desk and 3) what was on the floor.

For as many literal observations as the students made, I have them make the same amount of figurative observations.

After students draft their literal and figurative observations poems, we focus on students’ figurative observations, taking note of the unique comparisons, imaginative descriptions, and humorous interpretations. This often leads to a discussion of the power of figurative language and the freedom and creativity that can be used to enhance a point. We compare the literal observation poem with the figurative observation poem and discuss impact figurative language can have in writing.

Further Reading:

Molly Rickert is a seventh grade English teacher at Holicong Middle School. This idea was inspired by a class she took through the West Chester Writing Institute (PAWLP).  Follow her on Twitter (@itsklinemk).

2018 Poem #15 -- Personfication In Song

by Rita Kenefic

Many students have difficulty identifying  the various figures of speech. The lyrics to the song, "April, Come She Will" by Simon and Garfunkel are a wonderful example of personification  and can serve as a great way to reinforce this particular figure of speech. Additionally, I’ve found that students often don’t realize that song lyrics are actually poems. Once they understand this, it is likely to pique their interest in poetry.

First, copy the lyrics to "April, Come She Will" and distribute to students. Let students follow the lyrics, as you play the song.

Discuss how the lyrics personify the various months. Solicit students’ opinions of the effect the use of personification has on the poem.

Next, either suggest or have students brainstorm other categories that lend themselves to this kind of personification. Some examples are:  days of the week, holidays, seasons, decades of our life, etc.

Working either individually or in pairs, have students  pick a topic and write examples of personification in their writer's notebooks, using the song lyrics as a mentor text.

To follow up, you might encourage students to work on and complete their poems during independent writing time and share completed poems in some manner. Or you might choose to invite students to look at song lyrics as poems by identifying and sharing a song lyric that speaks to them.

Further Reading:

Rita Kenefic recently retired from position as a reading specialist in Central Bucks School District. Passionate about reading, writing and fostering literacy in the home.  Blogs at “Nurturing Literacy” http://www.helpurchildread.com/

2018 Poem #14 -- Voice of the Past

by Brett Vogelsinger

There is always something special about hearing a poet read his or her own words, and perhaps something extra special about hearing a recorded poet read these words posthumously.  This act reminds us that even the poems that end up commonly anthologized and in the canon are meant to be heard aloud, that they speak from the past most eloquently when we breathe life into them.

Langston Hughes poems frequently surface in student anthologies.  In this video, students have the chance to hear Langston Hughes talk about the experience that led him to write "The Negro Speaks of Rivers" as a young man just out of high school, and then he reads the poem aloud.

An intriguing video to pair with this: a contemporary high school student recites the same poem in the twenty-first century for the Poetry Out Loud competition: 

Three questions to discuss with students after sharing this poem:

• How does knowing the background of the poem and hearing it in the writer's own voice affect our experience with the poem?  
• How does listening to a poem written nearly one hundred years ago give voice to the past? 
• How does the content of the poem give voice to the poet's past? 

Further Reading:

Brett Vogelsinger is a ninth-grade English teacher at Holicong Middle School in Bucks County, PA.  He is the faculty adviser for the school literary magazine, Sevenatenine.  Besides his annual blogging adventure on this site, he has published work on Nerdy Book Club, The New York Times Learning Network, and Edutopia and you can follow him on Twitter (@theVogelman).

2018 Poem #13 -- Wait, Rappers Are Poets?

by Zachary Sibel

This year I wanted to try something new when it came to teaching poetry, so I made a strange connection. I thought about what I like to eat when I go out. I realized that most the time my favorite items to order are appetizers; they are smaller portions, you get a variety of choices, and when you put the right combination together, you are rewarded with an experience that is filling. 

I decided to present poetry from various classes and movements to my students in the same way. I used three to five poems from the Romantic, Victorian, Modern, Postmodern, and Contemporary eras of poetry. I found that my students were more engaged when they got to read through and pick the one that stood out to them, rather than sit down and talk about them all.

One poem that really topped them all when it came to student engagement was Tupac’s "A Rose That Grew From Concrete." I present this poem with no context of who Tupac was (or still is, that is up for debate) and just focus on language and the use of metaphor. After reading the poem aloud twice, I ask students to dig into the imagery and symbolism of this poem. The beauty of this poem is it impacts students of all backgrounds and upbringings. 

This year I had a number of students connect with it, one of whom discussed the idea that, “the only person who needs to believe in you is you, " a rather sophisticated reflection for a middle school student to have. I let the students carry the discussion, and when I see it fit, I end with providing a little background as to who Tupac was, the idea of West Coast rap, and how language can be used to examine various social issues.

Additional fun: I focus a lot on the questions, “Is all music poetry? Is all poetry musical?" With Bob Dylan winning a Nobel Prize for literature, the question begs to be answered or at least discussed. After showing students "A Rose That Grew From Concrete," we play a little Kahoot game that requires students to read a line of verse/lyric and determine if it is poetry or hip-hop. Students find themselves recognizing some of the lyrics but not all. They realize that the distinction between hip-hop and poetry is more complex than we may originally think.

Further Reading:

Zachary Sibel is a hip-hop fan, English teacher, and department chair at Central Bucks West High School in Bucks County, PA.