Teacher's Corner
Shape Poetry
Calligrams, or shape poems, are the focus of ninth exercise in a ten-part poetry writing series.
New York City Department of Education
Poetry…Do I Dare?
Whether you're considering a poetry unit or just want to incorporate more poetry in your curriculum, this unit plan is a must-have. Packed with poems, teaching points, powerful prompts, and poetry performance suggestions, the resource is...
Poetry4kids
How to Write a Tanka Poem
Take your haikus to the next level with tanka poems, another form of Japanese poetry that regulates the length and rhythm of each line by syllables. Young writers read the explanation, examples, and tips for tanka poems before writing...
Poetry4kids
How to Write a Clerihew
Writing funny poems is the best part about learning poetic forms! Young poets learn all about clerihews—humorous four-line poems about people—with an explanatory lesson.
Poetry4kids
How to Write an Acrostic Poem
Acrostic poems are perfect for any topic! A quick tutorial guides learners into writing acrostic poems with the basics and key examples.
Poetry4kids
Playing With Your Food Poem Lesson
What's more fun than playing with your food? Writing a poem about it! A quick and straightforward lesson guides young writers through the steps of writing a funny, well-structured poem about combining sports and food.
National Council of Teachers of English
Writing Poetry with Rebus and Rhyme
Young scholars write rhyming poems using rebus. With pictures instead of words, authors create original work about things they love.
ReadWriteThink
Diamante Poems
The blank page can be a huge hurdle to overcome when writing a poem. Take that hurdle away with an interactive format that enables pupils to write elegant diamante poems. After they add the first and last words in two separate fields,...
Poetry4kids
How to Write a Repetition Poem
A repetition poem is the focus of a lesson that challenges scholars to compose an original piece. To add meaning to their poem, authors choose words to repeat at the start of most lines.
Curated OER
The Pearl: Found Poem
It's hard to beat the beauty of John Steinbeck's prose, so borrow a little of it to form your own found poetry. After kids finish Chapter One of The Pearl, they select the most evocative and vivid words to create found poems.
Poetry4kids
How to Write a Fractured Nursery Rhyme
Scholars take a popular song or nursery rhyme and make it their own as they write a fractured nursery rhyme. Writers seek out a nursery rhyme's rhyming words and change them to create an original poem.
EngageNY
Revision: Best Draft of “Inside Out” and “Back Again” Poems (Final Performance Task)
Scholars read their poems to their research teams as their final performance task. The teams listen and give feedback on the flow between the two poems. Writers then take the feedback from their teams and revise their poems before...
Poetry4kids
How to Create a “Found Poem”
Writers compose an original found poem by searching for words that inspire them. Words are taken from everyday conversation, books, cut from magazines, the mail, or an already written poem.
National Council of Teachers of English
Acrostic Poems: All About Me and My Favorite Things
Budding poets create two acrostic poems, one for their name and another using a word of their choice. Over the course of five days, scholars compose, revise, publish, and share their work with their peers.
Poetry4kids
How to Write an Exaggeration Poem
The best poetry writing lesson of all time is here for you! Learn all about the art of exaggeration with a lesson on exaggeration poems, which instructs students to use wild imagery to convey their message.
Poetry4kids
How to Write a “Favorite Things” List Poem
If your students made a list of their favorite things, would writing poetry be on it? After this poetry writing lesson, it might! Young writers make a list of what they like—or what they don't like—before crafting the list into a rhyming...
Poetry4kids
Evoking the Senses in a Poem
Budding poets choose a topic for a sensory-filled poem. Authors describe that topic using detailed language based on the five senses. Then, switch the senses to create a fanciful poem intended to add a touch of fun to the objective.
Poetry4kids
Twenty Fun Writing Prompts for Kids
Twenty prompts reinforce scholars' writing skills of essays and poems. Prompts cover topics such as superpowers, holidays, the weather, and more!
National Council of Teachers of English
A Bear of a Poem: Composing and Performing Found Poetry
Scholars work collaboratively to compose a found poem from one of their favorite stories. With a finished product in hand, class members form a circle and perform their work for an audience by taking turns reciting one line till the poem...
Curated OER
The Sound of…Poetry!
Scritch, scratch, scritch. It's the sound of pupils writing poetry! Focus on sensory language and onomatopoeia with a writing lesson. After listening to some sounds, learners examine a couple of poems that include sound words and then...
Poetry4kids
How to Write a “Backward” Poem
If you like poetry, wait till you try backward poetry! Young writers read Shel Silverstein's "Backward Bill" before writing their own funny poems that are full of backward imagery and phrasing.
Poetry4kids
How to Write a Funny Epitaph Poem
What can happen if you eat too much cafeteria food? Or wear dirty clothes every day? Or talk back to your mother? Use a lesson on humorous poems as a way for students to practice silly rhymes as fictional epitaphs.
Poetry4kids
Writing Riddles
What's got 60 eyes, 150 fingers, and an endless number of ideas? Your language arts class! Challenge young writers to come up with clever riddles with an online poetry lesson.
Little Stones
How Can Poetry Make People Think and Care?
Can beautiful words change the world? Literary scholars discover how to paint their visions of change using poetry in a series of three workshops. Each independent topic gives participants a chance to examine their feelings about...