National Poetry Month Offers Oodles of Outstanding Poetry Activities for Young Ones

Have you been feeling a bit overwhelmed by all of the poetry-related resources that have been flooding your inbox the past few days? I know I have! Hence, I’ve tried to boil-down what I’ve been reading for you in time for the start of National Poetry Month. Here are some online activities I found that might be fun for students:

• Browse through the National Poetry Month Gallery at http://www.poets.org/page.php/prmID/98. Then, kids can design their own National Poetry Month Poster for April 2010.
  
• Create Magnetic Poetry by pointing your browser to http://www.magneticpoetry.com/kidspoetry. When you finish positioning the “magnets” on the screen, click save.
  
• Enter poetry contests at http://teacher.scholastic.com/clubs/contests/index.htm.
  
• Get ready for “Poem in Your Pocket Day” by going to http://www.poets.org/page.php/prmID/409 and printing out your own pocket-sized poem for this special day, which falls on Thursday, April 30^th, 2009. (Students can print out extra copies for their pockets in case others hear their poem and like it.
  
• Listen to poetry read aloud by the poets themselves at http://www.poets.org/audio.php/prmAlpha/.
  
• Print out your own poetry bookmarks at http://www.jpatricklewis.com/visits_bookmarks.shtml. Encourage kids to print more than one so that they have one in all of the texts they may be reading at a given time.
  
• Read and print out one of poems featured in the “30 Poets/30 Days” Series at http://gottabook.blogspot.com. (Details can be found at http://gottabook.blogspot.com/2009/03/announcing-30-poets30-days.html.) Then, students can mentor themselves after their favorite “30 Poets/30 Days” Poem by writing a poem that has a similar style.
  
• Read through the found poems at http://www.foundpoetry.org. The Found Poetry Project contends that we can find poetry “anywhere we choose to look.” So… kids can look around for some poetry. They can write it down on a piece of paper and submit it to you (their teacher).
  
• Take a class on free-verse poetry at http://teacher.scholastic.com/writewit/poetry/karla_home.htm with Karla Kuskin. While Kuskin doesn’t promise to comment on kids’ poems, she does promise to read their published poetry online.
  

I tried some assonance above… I think my assonance, and my use of other poetic devices, needs some work this month. Does yours? Well, if so, stay tuned for details about our second ONE-WEEK POETRY CHALLENGE, which is coming-up later this month.