Caitlin Bowring, Director of Curriculum and Instruction
- Apr 4, 2019

Diving into Poetry with Lower Elementary

April is National Poetry Month! It’s always a favorite time of year for Lower Elementary students, who are currently exploring the many types of poetry and poetic devices by reading and writing poems of their own. We asked students to share some of their ideas about poetry as well as some of their poems!

What is poetry?

“Poetry explains something in a rhyme or a different kind of way. It’s not telling a story, it’s sending a message.”
“It’s written to make people feel a certain way—to connect to people’s emotions or be humorous.”
“Poetry is lots of things—there are so many different types of poems and tools you can use to make a poem, like onomatopoeia, repetition, or rhyming!”
“It’s calming, and people write poetry when they want to share their feelings or tell a story or send a message.”

Star

by Ronan

Star

Hot, dark

Burning, screaming, exploding,

It is very scary/cool

Space

What is your favorite type of poetry to write?

“Rhyming is my favorite because I think poems sound the best when they rhyme. And a lot of times rhyming poems make you laugh!”
“I like acrostic poems because it’s kind of hard to think of words that start with the letters you need. It really gets your mind thinking.”
“I like writing concrete poems because you write the poem in the shape of the subject of the poem, and it makes me feel creative to shape the poem and add illustrations.”
“I like writing poems with onomatopoeia, because it fills the poem with sounds.”
“Diamante is my favorite because it uses grammar—verbs, nouns, adjectives—to build a poem.”
“I like free verse because it can be anything you want it to be.”

They Will Always Be With You

by Autumn

Hard times,

Soft times,

Curious times,

They will always be there.

If you need help,

They will guide you.

How does reading poetry make you feel?

“It makes me feel happy and calm because it’s soothing and comfortable. It makes me feel inspired to write my own poetry.”
“It is entertaining because you can flip around an anthology and find all different types of poems that make you feel all different ways.”
“It depends on the poem—if it’s a dark poem, it’ll make me feel scared; but if it’s a happy poem, it makes me feel calm.”
“I feel good when I read poems, especially when they teach me things—like about history!”
“I feel calm, especially when the room is really quiet. You’re able to really understand it and know how the author was feeling when s/he wrote it.”

Kitty Kitty by Aaron Kitty Kitty very sweet, You are always good to meet. Very cute and always nice, Your eyes every day are so bright. You’re sometimes stuck up in a tree, But you are always friends with me.

What do you love about writing poetry?

“It’s fun because it can be about anything you want it to be about, and you can express your feelings or tell people a story.”
“What I like about writing poetry is that you can think outside the box and let your mind run wild with creative ideas.”
“It’s not like a story—it doesn’t need rising action or falling action—it can be anything you want.”
“I like that there aren’t as many rules or right and wrong ways to write poetry.”
“You get to be creative about what you want to write—you can send a message, or be funny, or weird. It’s up to you!”