Will's Words: Learning to Love Language with William Shakespeare

Students are never too young to begin immersing themselves in the language of William Shakespeare. Will's Words: How William Shakespeare Changed the Way You Talk, is a wonderful place to start. Author Jane Sutcliffe and illustrator John Shelley takes us on a tour of 1600's London and its thriving theater culture, while at the same time pointing out many now-common words and phrases that originated from the quill of William Shakespeare.

The tour consists of backstage glimpses and onstage antics, while at the same time describing the scope of Shakespeare's work and his audience's reaction toward it. Students will love the images which are all-encompassing and minutely detailed at the same time. Your kids will leaf through this book again and again, searching out the secrets that John Shelley has so cleverly and humorously included in the illustrations.

Jane Sutcliffe admits that not all of Shakespeare's words and phrases were original, but are certainly recorded for the first time in his works:

We know that Shakespeare used words like no other writer before or since. The man had an amazing ear for words. At a time when the English language was changing rapidly, he noticed words in playhouses and taverns, and on London street corners. Then he put them in his plays and poems. Sometimes he was the first to write down a new word. Sometimes he seems to have made up his own. He put all those words together in extraordinary, ingenious ways.

Regardless of which activities you choose to try from below, I highly recommend Will's Words as a starting point, no matter what grade level!

But Keith... What if I don't know a lot about Shakespeare and his works? What if I hated Shakespeare when I was a student? 

In his TED Talk titled How NOT to Hate Shakespeare, actor/educator Rob Crisell explains:

For most of us in school, Shakespeare’s works were a "literary enema..." (but) he’s the world’s most famous author for good reason. No writer, not Homer, not Dante, not Cervantes, not J.K. Rowling, rivals him in terms of his art and influence. His characters have become part of our mental landscape... And how about his words? Shakespeare wrote 884,000 of them, credited with being the first to use or inventing more than two thousand of them.

So how can we explore poetry and language in the true spirit of Shakespeare? I've provided a few ideas below.

1. Featured Creatures
Suggested Grades: 3 and up

Curious as a cricket, happy as a lark, slow as a snail. See where this is going? Students enjoy creating simple similes, and their vast store of animal knowledge makes these comparisons easy.

A wonderful mentor text for this activity is Shakespeare's Zoo (Volume 1) by Laudea Martin. It was "a very old and well-loved boxed set of the complete works of William Shakespeare, which once belonged to Laudea's great grandmother... that sparked her interest in the richness of Shakespeare's written words." The author soon discovered that in many of Shakespeare's works, both famous and obscure, the Bard employed animal imagery to paint perfect pictures of human passions and pratfalls.

From the book description:

Shakespeare's brilliance shines through, not just in his most famous lines, but in every line. The tiniest snippet of his work contains fantastic wordplay and depth of imagery. This book takes some of his less-known bits about various animals and pairs them with Laudea Martin's unique illustrations assembled from textured layers.

And, like all Shakespeare, each page will become easier to understand the more you read it. The brilliant words of Shakespeare are meant to be heard, not seen, so read the words aloud and listen to the rhythm. Read them again and again, and let your imagination fill in the details of the scene.

Classroom Extensions:

• Students can search out favorite animals using the concordance at OpenSourceShakespeare. They can illustrate the lines they find, or possibly even add to them.
• Students can create biographical poems by first selecting adjectives that they feel describe them (pretty, busy, fast, etc.) and then selecting animals that match those adjectives. Students can pair the adjectives and animals in simile form, such as, "I snore like a lion when I'm really, really tired," and "I'm busy as a beaver every day when I get home."
• Creating a flip book is a fantastic way to show off and illustrate the comparisons described above, and the sizes of the books can vary from tiny to huge.
• Collect a pile of animal poem books and let students browse them and share their favorites. Then offer trade books or an assortment of animal pictures, and ask students to write a simile poem inspired by a favorite critter, perhaps using iambic pentameter to create it. The TED Ed lesson on Why Shakespeare Loved Iambic Pentameter is a fun and effective introduction to this poetry form, or use this kid friendly handout (see image to the right) from Shakespeare's Globe Theatre.

2. Reverse-A-Verse 

Suggested Grades: 4 and up

In Echo Echo, Marilyn Singer retells Greek myths via reverso poems, poems that can be read both backward and forward, typically revealing new meanings each time. "When read from top to bottom, each poem tells a well-known story from a world of heroes and monsters. When read in reverse, however, the very same words convey a whole new point of view!" (from the book flap) Illustrator Josée Masse creates dramatically saturated pictures which truly complement the duality of the poems.

When reading these aloud, be sure to assign each poem to a different reader, and see where the words lead you.

Classroom Extensions:

• After viewing a live production of a Shakespeare play, challenge students to write a reverso poem on any one of the play's characters. Have a script handy, as students may want to include snippets of a character's lines in their poem.
• Older students might enjoy reading Jonathan Reed's The Lost Generation, arguably the most well-known reverso poem. Genius.com does a painstakingly thorough job of breaking down this poem. After discussion, challenge students to write their own reverso poems using characters from popular culture, contemporary novels, and, of course, Shakespearean plays. 
• After studying animals for a research project, students can use that same animal as the subject of a reverso poem. In my class, I purposely assigned students those animals traditionally considered pests. As the poem is read forward, the lines recount the pest's nasty reputation, but read backward, the lines vindicate the pest for what good it may do. This Slides presentation offers a template, plus two examples.

3. Write a Sonnet Upon It 

Suggested Grades: 4 and up

For this activity, I show my students actor Matthew Macfadyen's version of Sonnet 29. Upon first playing, however, I leave the volume off. I then ask students to interpret what took place. I then play it again, with the volume up, and again ask students to interpret, first verbally, and then by rewriting the sonnet in their own words.

Classroom Extensions:

• Have students write their own sonnet based on Sonnet 29. They can write it from one character to another (using a recent novel or play for inspiration), or they can write it to someone who has been meaningful in their life. This Google Slides presentation includes examples of both. Feel free to copy and adapt this for your own uses.
• A similar exercise could be done with Sonnet 18 (Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?...) which is likely more familiar to students. (Both Sonnet 29 and 18 can be found here in a printable version.) If you want students to examine this in more detail before writing on their own, check out this annotated version.
• Depending upon your students' tech sophistication, they may like the idea of putting sonnets to film. In this version of Sonnet 18, the poem is read by Peter O'Toole, the film footage is sourced from "No Country for Old Men" and "The American," and music is by James Newton Howard. Students are familiar with such mash-ups, and they might enjoy a similar challenge. 
• If needed, begin with a more contemporary sonnet that uses familiar language. This lesson plan from the Folger Library using Edna St. Vincent Millay's "What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why" provides a comfortable starting place.

4. Language Loopholes 

Suggested Grades: 3 and up

When I taught fourth grade, I overheard one student complaining that Spanish class was aggronizing. “Is that a real word?” I asked. He replied that of course it was, since it combined agonizing and aggravating!

Just a week or two later, one of my students paused by the door before leaving. “Is something wrong?” I asked.

“No,” she responded, “I’m just waiting for the eighth graders to pass. I don’t want to get stampled.”

“Stampled?”

“Yeah, it’s a portmanteau I invented. It’s when you get trampled by a stampede. You can use it if you want.” And off she went.

It's true that Shakespeare coined many new words and recorded many others for the first time, but students are often surprised to discover that new words are entering our lexicon all the time. Sometimes students are even inventing their own! Language isn't static; like any other discipline, it continues to evolve.

One case in point is the July 2009 announcement from Merriam-Webster regarding the addition of new words to its dictionary:

Hardworking word-lovers everywhere can now learn the meaning of the word staycation ("a vacation spent at home or nearby") along with nearly 100 other new words and senses added to Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, Eleventh Edition. America's best-selling dictionary offers its new 2009 entries in its updated print edition and online at Merriam-Webster.com.

"Our language evolves in many ways," said John Morse, president and publisher of Merriam-Webster Inc. "As we've seen from our Open Dictionary feature on Merriam-Webster.com, people enjoy blending existing words, like combining 'stay' and 'vacation' to make staycation. Staycation is a good example of a word meeting a need and establishing itself in the language very quickly. Our earliest record of use is from 2005, but it seems to have exploded into popular use in 2007."

Classroom Extensions:

• Many of Shakespeare's original words are simple compounds, such as bedroom, bloodstained, and moonbeam. Give students time to play around with their own original compound creations.
• Allow students to create portmanteau words to express those ideas for which no words exist. A portmanteau word is two words "jammed" together to make a new one, such as smog, staycation, emoticon, administrivia, and brunch. It differs from a compound word (where no letters are lost) and a contraction (where an apostrophe denotes removed letters). Start off by giving students a list of portmanteaus to dissect, and then allow them to create their own.
• Challenge students to define some of the latest entries to Word Spy, The Word Lover's Guide to New Words. Word Spy is a wonderful resource for neologisms, or newly coined words. Wordspy takes on a recent word such as vegangelical and not only defines and parses it (n. An extremely zealous vegan who is eager to make other people believe in and convert to veganism; blend of vegan and evangelical) but also traces it to its earliest citation (in this case, to the blog The Smoking Vegans in 2005). Wordspy is a fun site to browse, and readers are welcome to comment on entries and suggest new words as well. Its biggest strength is that it offers citations for all the words it lists. It isn't entirely G rated, however, so it's best left to the teacher to explore.
• Ask the question, "Just because someone uses a word, does it become a word?" To put it another way, "Are all neologisms created equal?" Sure, Shakespeare, Dr. Seuss, and Lewis Carroll coined words all the time, but do the rest of us carry enough clout to do the same?

5. Acting Out

Suggested Grades: 3 and up

In his TED Talk titled "How NOT to Hate Shakespeare," educator/actor Rob Crisel asks the audience, "Were his plays meant to be read silently or aloud?” and then answers, “Trick question; his plays weren’t meant to be read at all; they were meant to be heard, and watched, and acted. They were meant to be experienced.” He likens most students' classroom experiences with Shakespeare to "trying to appreciate a musician by studying their lyrics, but never hearing their songs."

If you think your students may struggle with original versions of Shakespeare, or if you face time constraints, dozens of adapted scripts are readily available online, such as the Macbeth adaptation pictured here.

Classroom Extensions:

• Whenever possible, use the full scripts. In the same way that we do Close Reading with other texts, do Close Acting with selected passages. If students struggle, consider using excerpts from films that portray actors speaking the lines in context.
• If students plan to act out lines written in iambic pentameter, then definitely check out this lesson on Living Iambic Pentameter.
  
• If your students struggle with full texts of Shakespeare's plays, use a resource such as Shakespeare with Children: Six Scripts for Young Players that uses original lines from the plays, but in shorter, abridged versions. These can be performed successfully in the classroom as readers' theater if time doesn't allow for students to memorize lines.
• Challenge students to use soliloquys or scenes in an original interpretation. This Levi's 501 commercial, for example, uses line from Midsummer Night's Dream Act 3 Scene 1 in an innovative way. 

6. Pop Sonnets

 Suggested Grades: 6 and up

In Pop Sonnets, author Erik Didriksen has rewritten dozens of pop songs as Shakespearean sonnets. Works by artists such as Bruno Mars, Taylor Swift, Katy Perry, Lorde, and the Backstreet Boys have been cleverly reimagined and reworked in sonnets such as these:

What thou requir’st, I harbor deep inside — 
I too possess the things for which thou yearn’st. 
So if thou want’st these hungers slak’d, my pride
should not be injur’d fast when thou return’st.
I shall not cuckold thee or break thy trust;
my wish is not to leave my lover spurn’d.
But if I will not satiate my lust,
I should be shown the deep regard I’ve earn’d.
’Tis true, thy kisses are like honey sweet, 
but so’s the gold that doth my coffers fill. 
I have no need to once again entreat
thee to be shown a shred of thy good will.
        — And so, good sir, do not my heart neglect;
        when thou com’st home, pray show me some respect.
                               ~Aretha Franklin, “Respect”

A lonely maiden from a hamlet small;
a boy within a woeful city rear’d —
they both at midnight left their ports of call
t’ward any destination volunteer’d.
A public-house is where their journeys end,
where patrons’ pipes burn long and minstrels play.
The darken’d hours have made them more than friends,
the other’s smile inviting each to stay.
Look ye on those who wander through the streets
beneath the lamplight, searching for a soul —
they comb the darken’d night in hope to meet
the sweet companion that shall make them whole.
— Ensure thy heart won’t let their spirit leave;
’tis most important thou dost e’er believe.
                            ~Journey, “Don’t Stop Believin’”

Can you still sing along with them? Surprisingly, yes! Some of them anyway. Give it a try, And then consider these additional ideas for using Pop Sonnets in your classroom:

Classroom Extensions:

• As a warm-up to each class, post one of Erik Didriksen's sonnets on the whiteboard. Challenge students, perhaps working in pairs or groups, to identify the modern song which inspired it.
• Challenge students to rewrite their own favorite songs in the form of a sonnet. Use the TED Ed lesson on Why Shakespeare Loved Iambic Pentameter and the handout Writing Like Shakespeare (iambic pentameter) to get students feeling the rhythm of the sonnets rather than the rhythm of the song they've chosen.
• Lay down the gauntlet for your class musicians: Now that you've rewritten the lyrics, can they be put to music that keeps the sonnet lines intact while restoring the spirit of the original song
• Check out the ideas for Hip Hop or Shakespeare below. 

7. Language Lost

Suggested Grades: 5 and up

In The Word Museum: The Most Remarkable English Words Ever Forgotten, Jeffrey Kacirk shares hundreds of fascinating archaic words and phrases. In the Introduction, Kacirk explains:

The English language, as the largest and most dynamic collection of words and phrases ever assembled, continues to expand, absorbing hundreds of words annually into its official and unofficial rolls, but not without a simultaneous yet imperceptible sacrifice of terms along the way. Fortunately, before they're quiet disappearance, many of these reflections of antiquity, the remnants of History which casually escaped the Shipwreck of time, to use a phrase of Francis Bacon, were recorded in a variety of published and unpublished writings, including dictionaries and glossaries.

Yes, we all studied history in school, but usually just the "big picture." Often we need to turn to the scholarly work of writers of historical fiction to get the specifics. This sentiment is shared by the author who explains:

In my schooling, I found that teachers and historians, because of their socially prescribed curricular attention toward larger social concepts, often bypass the smaller and more personal expressions of social custom and conduct, often leaving the novel as the best lens with which to view forgotten elements of everyday life… Specifically, my bias has been in favor of expressions that not only offer insights into the nature of our living language but simultaneously illustrate telltale beliefs and customs.

Some words, like anywhen (meaning at any time), make perfect sense when compared with a surviving relative like anywhere. We still use the expression "out of earshot," but we've abandoned the equally useful words armshot and eyeshot to describe relative distances.

Then we find words which make perfect sense when broken into Greek and Latin roots, such as biblioklept (a book thief), ambidexter (one who plays both sides, usually unethically as in a court case), and noctuary (an account of what passes during the night, such as Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time). Other words, such as gazingstock (an object of public notice, contempt, and abhorrence), seem to simply be compounds which have been forgotten.

Classroom Extensions:

• Using the Online Etymology Dictionary, students can research commonly understood words to discover their actual origins. Another great resource is the on line Merriam-Webster Dictionary, which often provides detailed word histories, such as this one for ostracize: 

In ancient Greece, prominent citizens whose power or influence threatened the stability of the state could be exiled by a practice called ostracism. Voters would elect to banish another citizen by writing that citizen's name down on a potsherd (a piece of broken pottery). Those receiving enough votes would then be subject to temporary exile from the state (usually for ten years). The English verb ostracize can mean "to exile by the ancient method of ostracism," but these days it usually refers to the general exclusion of one person from a group at the agreement of its members. Ostracism and ostracize derive from the Greek ostrakizein ("to banish by voting with potsherds"). Its ancestor, the Greek ostrakon ("shell" or "potsherd"), also helped to give English the word oyster.

• As a daily challenge, list one of the words from The Word Museum on the board, and offer up three definitions. Let students defend their choices before the "big reveal." In many cases, students are likely to have very convincing arguments for their decisions.
• Similarly, list three entirely fictional words and one from the book. See if students can guess which word really existed. Before the "big reveal," you can additionally provide a context sentence with a blank left for the real word. The sentence may provide enough context for students to not only choose the correct, genuine word, but also to ferret out its meaning.
• Have students research those words that Shakespeare coined or recorded for the first time that didn't catch on. Have students report back with their own hypotheses of why these words were forgotten when other original words weren't.

8. Hip Hop or Shakespeare?
Suggested Grades: 5 and up

Award-winning hip hop artist Akala challenges audience members at a TED Talk to decide whether a line he shares is Hip Hop or Shakespeare. More difficult than you'd imagine! The first four minutes shows this challenge, but the remainder of the video is worth a watch.

Classroom Extensions:

• Provide students with a similar list of lines, and see how they fare. Lyrics.com is a straight-forward, ad-free site which allows you to easily search lyrics by most popular searches, artist, keyword, and more. Many songs are accompanied by the music video which can play in a small screen to the left. Also cool is that each page includes a bibliographic citation at the bottom!
• Even better, challenge your students to stump one another with the Hip Hop or Shakespeare challenge. They can likewise use Lyrics.com and OpenSourceShakespeare to search up lines. Bonus points to those who can name the song or artist of the non-Shakespearean lines.

9. Shakespearean Shamings
Suggested Grades: 8 and up

I'm not sure how I feel about encouraging elementary aged students to insult each other, but for upper middle schoolers and high schoolers this could be lots of fun. I would likely start with the video If Shakespearean Insults Were Used Today, the source material for which can be found here. 

Classroom Extensions:

• Direct students to complete this TED Ed lesson on Insults by Shakespeare. Good intro activity.
• As a sponge activity, allow students to use this Shakespeare Insult Generator (printable pdf) from Shakespeare for Kids, (where you can also find fifteen minute plays from Shakespeare).
• For fun, let students try an interactive insult generator, such as the Shakespeare Insult-O-Meter. This allows you to specify male or female, and the resulting authentic insult is displayed with the play from which it originates, as well as its literal meaning.
• Challenge students to replace all school inappropriate words they've been using with some of these new phrases for at least a week's time. Check in to hear the results.

Other Resources for Creating Your Own Activities and Finding Your Own Way:

• Looking for an all-around excellent resource for teaching this Shakespeare stuff? Try How to Teach Your Children Shakespeare by Ken Ludwig. Excellent for parents, home schoolers, and teachers who want to raise the bar for what children can learn from the Bard. 
• Teaching modules for high school students from Folgers (several of the plays and the sonnets, plus ideas to use with any play)
• Simple list of words coined by Shakespeare.
• Simple list of phrases coined by Shakespeare.
• 135 Phrases Coined by William Shakespeare, with meanings and origins.
• From TED Ed, Shakespearean Dating Tips.
• Shakespeare on Love, an infographic.
• The Horrible Histories William Shakespeare Song, containing many of the phrases he coined. Could be just for fun.
• The Horrible Histories - Shakespeare Goes to School video is even funnier.
• This Globe Theatre Model can be printed out on paper and assembled.
• The Virtual Globe Theatre is an in-the-round tour of the theatre, with embedded videos to better explain each part of the venue.
• Still afraid of Shakespeare? Check out the TED Talk video What would Shakespeare Think of Us? in which Dan Poole and Giles Terera discuss Shakes-spism: A highly infectious, extreme and irrational aversion to Shakespeare (William) and his plays, caused by poor teaching, and bad experiences in the theatre.

Purposes for Poetry: Ten Ways to Use Poetry in Your Instruction

Often when I mention poetry during a workshop, at least one teacher laments, "I would love to do more poetry with students, but there's so much else to teach in my curriculum!" What I try to encourage (and I'm often helped big time by the workshop participants) is for this teacher to consider using poetry within her curriculum, as an integral part of her language, reading, and writing lessons, rather than as an add-on. In other words, I ask her to find a purpose for poetry.

Now, before you poetry purists flame me and cry out, "Poetry is in itself worth reading!" let me explain that I agree with you. I fondly recall organizing poetry picnics in third grade, where we would spread sheets and blankets on the field adjacent to the school playground and share favorite poems as we munched on morning snacks. So yes, I believe in poetry for its own sake.

But at the same time, I'm a realist. Many of us find it increasingly difficult to allocate the time to read poetry for its own sake; we would, in fact, like to discuss it beyond the month of April without needing an excuse or (shudder) a learning objective.

So increasingly it seems that while teachers can name lots of good reasons for using poetry with children at an early age, they still wonder how they can continue to integrate poetry in later grade levels. I offer a few suggestions below. And even if you can't get through my ten reasons, do take the time to explore the recommended sites and resources appearing at the close of this post. I could in no way do justice to all the fantastic poetry books that are available, so I encourage you to share your favorite title in the comments section below.

1. Activate Prior Knowledge

Students are most receptive to new learning when they can connect it to what they already know. Poetry provides a quick and fun way to do this.

Recommended Texts:

• The Year Comes Round: Haiku Through the Seasons by Sid Farrar and illustrated by Ilse Plume presents students with vignettes of each season in the signature haiku 5-7-5 syllable, three line form, focusing upon nature with a surprising perspective. Each month is represented by its own poem, and students can write their own after determining what makes a poem a haiku. Students can also unearth the literary devices employed by Farrar such as personification, metaphor, alliteration, and simile. A sample from the book:

Lawns call a truce with

mowers and slip beneath their

white blankets to sleep.

• Guyku: A Year of Haiku for Boys by Bob Raczka and illustrated by Peter H. Reynolds stays true
  
  to the form and function of haiku, with each poem offering a funny twist in the final line. Apart from pure enjoyment, this book shows students (especially some of your hard to motivate boys) that poetry can be simple and straight forward and even fun. in "why I wrote Guyku," Raczka says, "When I was a boy, I didn't even know what a haiku was. But I did spend a lot of time outside with my friends. Nature was our playground, and we made the most of it - catching bugs, climbing trees, skipping stones, throwing snowballs. Now...I realize that haiku is a wonderful form of poetry for guys like us. Why? Because a haiku is an observation of nature, and nature is a place where guys love to be." A sample from the book:

If this puddle could

talk, I think it would tell me

to splash my sister.

2. Establish Theme

Teaching with a theme and its accompanying guiding questions isn't new to most of us, and the majority of teachers maintain a ready repertoire of methods to establish themes for classroom novels or other literature units (see some ideas and a huge list of Universal Themes in my How to Teach a Novel Handout). The perfect poem, however, can lead to a wonderful writing reflection or discussion that allows students to construct the theme and essential questions for themselves.

Recommended Sites and Texts for Theme:

• The Children's Poetry Archive groups poems by themes, and my class always enjoys reflecting upon poems about death since, after all, every novel we read seems to be about death! Many poems on this site are read aloud by their authors, and my students especially love hearing The Carrion Crow read aloud.
• A common theme in upper elementary and middle school novels is Change. Encourage an in-depth study of Change using Paul Janeczko's examination of Nothing Gold Can Stay in his new Heinemann title Reading Poetry in the Middle Grades. This highly recommended book features 20 thought-provoking poems from contemporary writers, with extensive lesson plans which help students to better understand each poem, and to apply it to other texts and their own experiences.
• Students can compose and publish their own poems using the Theme Poems interactive from ReadWriteThink.

3. Explore Language

If you're anything like me, you struggle to teach students grammar in way that is motivational or memorable. How many of us can recall learning our parts of speech and verb forms in deadly dull exercise books? While drill and example books might have a place in instruction, I'd recommend some verse to liven up the process of language learning.

Recommended Texts and Sites:

• If you're seeking to help students learn parts of speech,
  
  check out the Language Adventures from Gibbs Smith. These highly engaging and hilarious books focus on discrete parts of speech through the incorporation of rhyme and humor, and later editions contain learning activities, definitions, and reproducibles related to the book's topics. Answer keys and additional activities can be accessed at author Rick Walton's website. There Rick offers some wonderful language learning activities (your lesson plan for next week might just be waiting for you there), as well as an amazing assortment of ideas for using his picture books (over fifty in print!). 
• At The Poem Farm, Amy Ludwig VanDerwater shares wonderful original poems and teaching ideas.
  
  One of my favorites is Getting Dressed, a wonderful poem featuring personification. In addition to the many poems she shares on the site, you can have her work for your very own in her newly published collection of poems titled Forest Has a Song. In addition to the resources at Amy Ludwig VanDerwater's site, you can also download a Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Poetry Activity Kit, featuring ideas for "Forest Has a Song" as well as several other poems from HMH titles.
• Alphabest: The Zany, Zanier, Zaniest Book about Comparatives and Superlatives probably isn't a poetry book, since each page contains just three words (such as Fuzzy, Fuzzier, Fuzziest) but it reads like poetry, and helps kids understand how adjectives can be changed to compare two or more things. Author Helaine Becker sets the scene in a busy amusement park, and illustrator Dave Whamond delivers the goods with his spirited and wacky illustrations. Students can likewise choose a single adjective, and create images to illustrate its comparative and superlative forms. 

  

  From Alphabest: The Zany, Zanier, Zaniest Book

• Looking for poems with onomatopoeia? Check out Noisy Poems for a Busy Day by Robert Heidbreder and Lori Joy Smith. Short and fun, and easily replicated by students. Collect all your students' poems and create your own Busy Day anthology!
• Finally, check out this Figurative Language lesson on personification and alliteration from TeachersFirst.

4. Focus on Facts

Creating poetry is a wonderful way for students to share information they learned through class or independent study. What's fantastic about poetry is that it can bring life to otherwise dry and lifeless facts!

I can recall assigning fourth grade students to create poems for mathematical operations, and as a class creating couplets describing the most important names, places, events, and dates for the American Revolution. Students are incredibly receptive to these challenges! So after checking out some of the examples below, be sure to devise your own lessons to have students write informational poems in class as well.

Recommended Texts:

• In Golden Domes and Silver Lanterns: A Muslim Book of Colors, Hena Khan introduces young readers to the world of Islam by describing its colors and traditions in simple rhymes.
  
  Each poem serves as a definition, and the terms introduced are explained in greater detail in the book's end. Mehrdokht Amini's gorgeous bright and intricate illustrations make this book itself a treasure, perfect for reading with groups or sharing on a parent's lap. A sample from the book:
  
  Gold is the dome of the mosque,  
  big and grand.
  Beside it two towering
  minarets stand. 

• Animology: Animal Analogies, written by Marianne Berkes and illustrated by Cathy Morrison, introduces students to word relationships (also known as analogies) through the simplest of rhymes. Bold, full spread pictures show realistic depictions of the animals in their natural settings. Like all Sylvan Dell books, this one includes the "For Creative Minds" follow-up activities in the back of book, which can also be accessed at the publisher's site, along with an e-book preview, a video trailer, a 48 page teaching guide, and other resources.
  
• Hey Diddle Diddle: A Food Chain Tale is another Sylvan Dell title featuring a wealth of support materials for classroom instruction (see the menu bar to the right on this page). In catchy rhyme, author Pam Kapchinske describes the the animals and complex relationships which make up a food web, the circle of life, and more specifically the ecosystem on a pond and forest habitat. Sherry Rogers' images capture each animal playing its part in this ongoing natural cycle.

5. Set a Scene

Before launching a science, social studies, or math unit, I often used poetry to set the scene. The poems I chose from myriad books would spark discussion, curiosity, and prior knowledge, ultimately building excitement and anticipation for the new unit. If only all textbooks were nearly as engaging!

Recommended Texts:

• Water Sings Blue, written by Kate Coombs and illustrated by Meilo So, provides the denizens of the deep with their own voices, priming student curiosity about life in the ocean. One of my favorites is the poem "Old Driftwood," wherein this artifact is described as a "gnarled sailor"..."telling of mermaids/ and whales thi-i-i-s big/ to all the attentive/ astonished twigs." Another sample from the book:
  
  
  

  Sea Urchin
  The sea urchin fell in  love with a fork.
  With a tremble of purple spines,
  she told her mother, "He's tall, not a ball,
  but just look at his wonderful tines!

• Dark Emperor and Other Poems of the Night is a perfect poetry/informational text companion to Poppy or any other novel that takes place in the forest.
  
  Each of Joyce Sidman's wonderful poems about the nocturnal world of the woods is accompanied by a fact-filled sidebar, exploring the creatures described in the poems and in Rick Allen's beautiful relief print illustrations. The title poem in part reads:  "Perched missile, almost invisible, you preen silent feathers, swivel your sleek satellite dish of a head." This small excerpt gives you an idea of the book's sophisticated verse! The author cleverly formatted the poem "Dark Emperor" in the shape of an owl, and if your students are interested in creating concrete poetry like this, you might find that shape templates are a good way to get started. And if you're not familiar with Avi's novel Poppy, be sure to check it out! Boys find it easy to root for this strong female character because "she is, after all, a mouse."

6. Inspire Writing

If you're seeking ways to get students writing, poetry is an effective vehicle to transport them to success. Take the opportunity to preview Poetry Mentor Texts online at the Stenhouse site; you'll be amazed at the simple steps to sophisticated writing using the lesson ideas presented there. In addition to Poetry Mentor Texts inspiring students to write their own verse, this book will also provide you with ideas for using poetry as a creative response format for other disciplines as well:

Poetry shouldn't be just a part of the language arts curriculum. It offers another way to communicate and demonstrate our understanding of a concept in content areas. It is a method for deepening comprehension and developing a level of empathy and knowledge that can be applied to real-world situations. Poetry can be used to informally assess science and math. It can help students link content areas.

Additional Recommended Texts and Sites:

• Students can extend or rewrite or revisit favorite or famous poems. In Casey Back at Bat, sports writer Dan Gutman revisits the classic American poem (the picture book version illustrated by Max Payne is one of my favorites). Choose similar narrative poems, and challenge students to extend them, revise them, or "answer them" with poems of their own.
• In an earlier post, I discussed writing "Valentines for Vermin" using Vulture Verses: Love Poems for the Unloved as a mentor text. The book closes with a request: "So many cards to write! So many animal friends! I may need some help. Do you know someone who is misunderstood? Will you help me write friendship notes, too?" Such a fantastic suggestion! Working in pairs or teams, students can research basic facts about other unloved animals that "scuttle, slither, buzz, and sting." A really fun and stress free way to get students writing creatively, with results which they'll be eager to share with others.
• If you're seeking inspirations for students to write poetry in a number of forms,
  
  you'll be amazed and delighted to read Fly with Poetry: An ABC of Poetry or Leap Into Poetry: More ABCs of Poetry. First, it's amazing that author/illustrator Avis Harley has found enough poem forms to write and illustrate not just one but two ABC collections, and second, she's done it by focusing solely on the topic of insects! So she not only presents and explains the poetry forms in detail, but these mentor texts teach students wonderful facts about dozens of creatures that crawl, climb, and fly as well. Extensions using other animal species are possible, although I can see these form poems being applied to almost any subject area.
• Students love the idea of fractured fairy tales, so a book like Monster Goose by Judy Sierra is certain to be hit. The author's creepy and comedic new versions of classic childhood rhymes will inspire your students to want to create the same.
  
  After sharing a few poems such as Humpty Dumpty (below), provide students with a collection of unrevised rhymes, and see where their imaginations can take them. See, too, if their accompanying illustrations can be as entertaining as those of Jack E. Davis, illustrator extraordinaire of Bedhead fame. Davis not only captures a key moment of each poem, but also cleverly establishes and then breaks the borders of each illustration, creating an off-the-page effect.


Humpty Dumpty
Humpty Dumpty swam in the sea
Humpty's sunscreen was SPF-3.
Because he was so lightly oiled,
Dear Humpty ended up hard-boiled. 

7. See New Perspectives

One of poetry's transcendent powers is its ability to refocus, if not totally transform, our point of view. It's far too simple for students (and teachers!) to lose themselves in their egocentric viewpoints, and fail to consider issues from another perspective. Poetry open students' eyes to new ways of seeing.

Recommended Texts:

• Make Magic! Do Good! by Dallas Clayton is a quirky and crazy collection of verses that collectively encourage readers to see the best in themselves, in others, and in every situation.

  

  From Make Magic! Do Good!

  So much of modern day communication relies upon snark and sarcasm, it's refreshing to find poems that are open and honest and encouraging, while at the same time remaining zany and random, which kids also appreciate. I also think that the way the book cover turns into a poster is a pretty cool twist!
• Perspective, or point of view, plays a huge role in history and its interpretation. Although not entirely accurate in historic detail, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere remains a classic of American Literature. Check out this previous post where I discuss several picture versions of the text, and the unique perspective supplied by each. 
• In Daniel Kirk's Dogs Rule! and his later Cat Power!, the author/illustrator profiles some of the furriest and funniest heroes of each species. See my Words and Images in Perfect Harmony post for more details, as well as teaching suggestions.
• The National Geographic's Book of Animal Poetry is wonderful in that it often features multiple poems for a single animal.
  
  The zebra and the pig, for instance, are both celebrated by four different poets. Examining the poems, students can discuss what facts and features each poet chose to discuss. In what ways are their poems alike? Different? Older students can even attempt to identify the poem form used by each writer. After reading some of the examples in this book from both classic and contemporary writers, students can then try their own hand at describing animals both foreign and familiar. Such poems are an excellent addition to those animal reports and presentations which many teachers already include in their curriculum.

8. Ignite Curiosity

Much has been said in educational texts about inquiry learning. From my own experiences, however, I find that students are naturally inquisitive, and there's not much more we need to do but focus their natural curiosity. Poetry can do this!

Recommended Texts:

• A Strange Place to Call Home, written by Marilyn Singer and illustrated by Caldecott Medalist Ed Young, is an intriguing exploration into diverse and unique habitats of the world.
  
  In the preface, the author explains: "Extreme environments such as deserts, glaciers, salt lakes, and pools of oil may not seem appealing, yet in these places, there is often less competition and more safety from predators. So over time, a variety of animals have adapted to these challenging conditions. This collection of poems celebrates some of these great adapters and the risky places where they live." End notes give further explanation of each animal and its adaptations to its specialized niche, along with notes about the poetry forms employed for each piece. Below is a sample poem, written in sonnet form:

TOP OF THE WORLD 
mountain goats 

Atop a rocky peak, the air is pure, 
    but the wind blows fierce and the climb is steep. 
Each step must be confident and so sure, 
    there's little need to look before you leap. 
The ice, the snow, the winter's biting cold 
    require a cozy, insulated coat. 
What animal lives here, hardy and bold? 
    Behold this king of cliffs, the mountain goat! 
Feasting in springtime on grass that is lush, 
    avoiding in summer the sun's blazing rays. 
Browsing in autumn on stubborn dry brush, 
    learning to deal with the year's hardest days. 
Living where enemies cannot intrude, 
    it succeeds indeed at this altitude.

• World Rat Day by...wait for it...J. Patrick Lewis is a fun collection of unusual but authentic holidays, celebrated here in verse. Where else could you learn about Cow Appreciation Day, Limerick Day, or Chocolate-Covered Anything Day? Students will enjoy researching these and other wacky holidays, and even inventing their own to commemorate people, places, and events that are important to them. (See a video trailer here at the Candlewick Press site).

9. Provide Pleasure

Okay, so you may think I cheated on this one. After all, I'm supposed to be giving you purposes for using poetry. But if we can't convince our students that one of reading's purest functions is pleasure, then I don't think we've really done our job.

So many poems and books of poems exist to fill this classification that I won't even begin to list them all here. So if you have a favorite poem or book you read with students for pleasure, please share it in the comments section below!

Recommended Texts:

• A Dog is a Dog by Stephen Shaskan is an incredibly simple, yet funny and clever book about a dog who may not be a dog at all, but perhaps instead a cat...or is it a squid?...or a moose?
  
  This crazy dog sheds one disguise after another, and who knows what he'll be next? It's short, fun, and you'd better be prepared to read it more than once, although its simplicity, meter, and rhyme make it easily accessible to independent beginning readers. Also be sure to check out the cool stuff on the author's site.
• Do you have older students who are obsessed with zombies? The Zombie Haiku site offers a unique twist on this traditional poetry form, with submissions from famous contemporary authors, as well as poetry "fakes" by greats of the past.

10. Capture Character

Most of us have assigned biography reports, only later to be disappointed when some students fail to capture the greatness of the men and women they studied. What's awesome about biographical poems is that they encapsulate the essence of what makes a person's life memorable and meaningful.

Recommended Texts:

• When Thunder Comes: Poems for Civil Rights Leaders by Children's Poet Laureate J. Patrick Lewis features a satisfying mix of heroes and heroines from the world-wide struggle for human rights.
  
  Familiar names such as Jackie Robinson,  Harvey Milk, and Mohandas Gandhi share the pages with new discoveries such as Sylvia Mendez (Mexican-American-Purto Rican civil rights leader), Muhammad Yunus (Bangladeshi banker), and Dennis Banks (Cofounder of the American Indian Movement and Anishinabe political activist). Several artists collaborate to illustrate the poems, which can also lead to a discussion of what each artist chose to represent the whole of a person's life in a single image. For more teaching ideas integrating these poems with informational writing, see the related post at Two Writing Teachers blog.
• Another collection of biographical poems, also be J. Patrick Lewis, is Freedom Like Sunlight: Praisesongs for Black Americans. These poems are notable in that they capture the content of each person's character, rather then the rote facts of his or her life. John Thompson's realistically rendered illustrations help to make this title a standout.
• Use the The Explorers' Graveyard lesson plan for sharing facts and findings when reading biographies. Again, the aim here is to get to what's worth knowing about this famous person.If you're looking for a funnier take of epitaphs, I recommend Once Upon a Tomb: Gravely Humorous Verses by J. Patrick Lewis (yes, him again!), and illustrated by Simon Bartram. The hilarious and revealing tombstone tidings capture in the most clever way the humor of many professions. Take this one, for instance, written for a Book Editor:
  
  
  Miss Spellings

  Exclamation points

  Were myriad!!!

  She live on the margin.

  And died. 

  Period.

Recommended Online Tools for Writing Poetry:

• My top pick is Instant Poetry Forms, which allows students to enter prompted words and verses in order to form (you guessed it!) instant poetry. Some of the forms are purely creative and student-centered, while others allow students to enter researched information (such as data on an early explorer) to create nonfiction verse. An excellent way to encourage your poetry-phobic students (usually the boys!). Each prompt generator includes an example of a finished poem in that style, so students can get a good idea of how the finished poem might sound.
• Rhyme Brain isn't just another rhyming site; instead, it has three functions: rhyme creator, alliteration creator, and portmanteau creator. The results for the latter two tools are pretty impressive, and lend themselves to some real playfulness with language.
• Poetry Splatter is a decent site for reluctant or struggling writers. Students are offered limited words to complete template poems. The results are fairly closed ended, but this might be a good place to start for those students who struggle to generate poems wholly on their own.
• At the PBS NewsHour Extra Poetry site, students can write poems based on current events using the poetry forms and examples found there.
• At WriteRhymes, it's as easy as "As you write, hold the alt key and click on a word to find a rhyme for it..." That's it. You can Copy, Save, or Print from the site.

Additional Recommended Resources for Poetry Month:

• Stenhouse Publishing has compiled a wonderful collection of poetry lesson plans and teaching ideas from about a dozen of their best-selling professional resources.
  
  Check out the Poetry Sampler, available as a pdf download directly from the publisher.
• ReadWriteThink is a go-to resource if you're seeking poetry lesson plans complete with interactive or printable components. From the search page, you can narrow down the 285 results by grade level, resource type, or popularity.
• If needed, here's an extensive glossary of poetry terms. I wish each term was accompanied by an example, but a good place to start regardless. If you can't find a term there, then you can likely find it in this Glossary of Poetic Terms.
• Bruce Lansky books and teaching ideas at Poetry Teachers. Sixteen poetry categories, fun ways to get students writing, and poetry theater (poems to download in read-aloud theater versions).
• The Children's Poetry Archive is a wonderful collection of poems selected just for children, and read by their creators.
• For older students (middle school and up), The Virtualit Interactive Poetry Tutorial features three study poems, as well as extensive online aids including Elements of Poetry (understanding language), Cultural Contexts (social, political, and economic currents) and Critical Approaches (literary criticism).
• Tweenverse is a fun collection of poems by Richard Thomas. No activities included here, but you'll several of these to be perfect as mentor texts for helping students write verse to reflect on their own experiences. See Summer Camp Souvenirs or Brother Trouble for a quick idea of what you'll find there.
• The Poets.org Educator Site provides teaching tips, popular poems to share, curriculum units and lesson plans, and suggestions for Poetry Month.
• Poetry for Tough Guys features poems written by Steven Micciche, mostly aimed at guys. Don't worry; it's still kid appropriate! Perhaps a good stop for reluctant boys to gain entry into verse.