I am excited by all that is going on in the poetry world this month! I am bursting with teaching ideas and since I love teaching poetry…. I want to try them ALL. I am in awe reading the many poetry challenges and goals poets have set for themselves. I am devouring them each day so far and have decided my goal is to try as many of them as I can with my students and of course myself.
April arrived and as we ended our last week of school before spring break, I set up as many National Poetry activities as I could so we would be ready to dive when we return. My Poetry Club announced an opportunity for the whole school to take part in a school poetry anthology. We will begin collecting submissions after break. We hung signs in the stairwells, gym, lobby, and even the bathrooms! The club also left me with a beautiful collection of poems to deliver to our neighborhood library to display during National Poetry Month.
My third grade class made poetry pockets and hung them in the classroom, ready to receive poems from classmates during the month. I created teams of “Star Poets” to take turns creating poetry displays in our classroom for the rest of the school year. They will also be in charge of poems and props for our Poetry Suitcase each Friday. I created special blank Poetry Notebooks for all three sections of third graders as upon our return, I will be teaching a Unit of Study on Poetry. Yay! I can’t wait to incorporate all of the ideas you poetry friends are sharing! Amy’s singing, Linda’s Haiku, Mary Lee’s emotions, National Art poems with Irene, singing with Amy, clothing prompts from Laura, videos with Sylvia, tips from Laura P.S …. and more I have yet to discover. I’m feeling a little like spring break got in the way (but I’ll take it).
Today I am late with my post but it’s a good thing because while having lunch with my good friend and her two granddaughters, I found a poem. I will lean on Amy Ludwig VanDerwater from the Poem Farm for a singing poem, although I will not be singing it. I will suggest that you may try singing it to the tune of, “You Are My Sunshine.” The videos I had hoped to share would hint at my lunchtime meal but this is something I will need to learn how to do. Hopefully I have created the scene for you.
Sisters 
Sis-ter run ca-fe
Alpha-bet soup plate
Lemon-ade tea-cup
Cookies baked new
Ser-vers in tu tus
and wearing jam-mies
I see a fu-ture here
Oh, this is the sweetest sweetest scene. It has a picture book feel. And I am singing it so happily over here, Kim. What a beautiful picture and meal. And what a MONTH you have planned! I can’t wait to see and read and hear all about it. Please know that I’d love to chat with your poets anytime… xx
Tutus and jammies! Yay! So happy you are inspired for your students AND for yourself. That’s what poetry month is all about. xo
Kim, you say that your post was late but it is brimming with all sorts of ideas especially the ones stemming from your luncheon date. A sister-run cafe sounds charming. (If you think you were late-mine has not even made it to the page yet).