Residential College in the Arts and Humanities
Poetry Lesson Plans
Need some ideas for poetry lessons? Check out this packet loaded with suggestions for elementary, middle, and high school writers.
BW Walch
“Outsider” Poet Kay Ryan Goes from Poetry Club Reject to Poet Laureate
The cat might have got your tongue, but you can’t avoid the elephant in the room while you wait for the other shoe to drop. After all, the early bird gets the worm and the chickens are circling. After researching Poet Laureate Kay Ryan...
Curated OER
Writing a Shape Poem
Shape poems can be fun! Give your writers this example of a poem shaped like a fir tree, then give them the chance to try one of their own. This can be a fun poetry-style exercise to let visual learners experience a new side of poetry.
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...
Western Education
Math Poems
The logic, rhythm, and beauty of math sometimes get lost amidst numbers and variables. Amplify math's lyricism with a poetry project that uses metaphors and similes to compare mathematical concepts to other images.
Curated OER
Writing a Historical Poem
Students work together to research a historical event. They create their own poems based on their research. They share their poems with the class and discuss the historical event further.
Utah Education Network (UEN)
7th Grade Poetry: I Am Poem
A study of Alfred Noyes's poem "The Highwayman" opens a lesson about narrative poetry. Scholars read the poem and compare it to the animated video version using a worksheet. Learners look at models and use a template to craft an "I Am"...
University of British Columbia
Pondering Poetry and Playing with Words
First-year High school scholars explore the world of poetry with an 11-lesson unit that examines a range of poetry forms and tries their hand at crafting their own poems. Young poets then collect their work in a portfolio that they...
Poetry Society
Writing a Personification List Poem
After a close reading of Sylvia Plath's "Mirror" and Flora de Falbe's "Five Things About the Lake," young poets craft their own personification list poem about a very special place.
Academy of American Poets
Teach This Poem: "somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond" by E. E. Cummings
Scholars engage in a role-play exercise, compare their demonstration to a time-lapse video, and to a poem by E.E. Cummings. The ensuing discussion asks learners to consider the similarities among the three.
EBSCO Industries
Music and Poetry
Song lyrics, like poems, are meant to be heard. After examining the literary devices in several poems, scholars examine the lyrics of popular songs and identify the sound devices and the figurative language writers use to create the...
Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art
Where I'm From: Symbolism in Paint and Poetry
After a review of symbolism, class members use the provided worksheet to first list the objects they observe in Arnold Mesches' painting "Coney Island" and then suggest possible symbolic meanings for each of the objects. A second...
Academy of American Poets
Teach This Poem: "Instructions on Not Giving Up" by Ada Limón
What do the myth of the phoenix bird and Ada Limón's poem "Instructions on Not Giving Up" have in common? Young scholars create a list of what they notice about both the myth and poem, then consider what the similarities might indicate...
ReadWriteThink
Alliteration in Headline Poems
Poetry is everywhere you look! Create found poems using headlines from newspapers and magazines. Young poetry focus on creating alliterative phrases with words they find in headlines, tying their poems to a central theme.
Curated OER
Library Media: Poetry
Fifth graders explore different kinds of poetry. They work in groups to collect different styles of poetry. Then they use charts to organize the attributes of various poems. Conclude the lesson by having each individual choose the style...
Curated OER
Personification Poem
Young scholars write a personification poem and identify its use. They make a pattern worksheet and then use Photoshop Elements skills to illustrate their poem. Students use layer styles with the text to highlight the poetry.
Curated OER
Alphabet Poems
Develop fluency with a variety of works. Help kindergartners use multiple strategies to understand text and decoding. They will create an alphabet poem book on Kid Works 2 to illustrate and write their own poem. In the end, they will...
Curriculum Corner
My Book of Poems
Copy all pages to create a book of poems during a poetry study. From alliteration to cinquain to acrostic poem, your class won't run out of templates for writing poems! Each sheet serves as a template for an entire book of poems. Other...
Geography 360°
Poetry Writing
Put the tips and tricks in this guide into practice in order to encourage your pupils to blossom into poets. A wonderful reference material for teachers, this packet includes definitions of poetic terms and forms as well as step-by-step...
Utah Education Network (UEN)
7th Grade Poetry: Metaphor Poem
The second instructional activity in a five-part poetry unit asks seventh graders to construct a metaphor poem. First, pupils examine Emily Dickinson's "The Railway Train" and identify the metaphor. They then select an object and an...
Curated OER
Different Types of Poetry
Provide pupils samples of different types of poems including haikus, narrative, nonsense, shape, and rhyming poems. In groups, class members read the poems, establish their general meaning, identify poetic devices, and rate the poems,...
Curated OER
On World Poetry Day, We're All Poets
Put away the books and the printouts, and break out the paper and pens to honor World Poetry Day.
K12 Reader
Valentine’s Day Acrostic Poem
Be mine! Young poets use the provided worksheet to craft a Valentine's Day acrostic poem for the word heart.
Utah Education Network (UEN)
8th Grade Poetry: Narrative Poem
The first lesson of a five-lesson unit designed for eighth graders has class members reading and watching a video of Edgar Allen Poe's narrative poem, "The Raven." They then craft their narrative poem, illustrate it, and share their work...