World Poetry Day: Teach Poetry in Elementary Schools & Foster a Love of Language and Literacy

Poetry writing is a vital part of elementary school education. Not only does it allow students to express themselves creatively, but it also helps with developing those essential writing skills. In today's world, where literacy is a crucial attribute for achieving success, including poetry writing in your literacy programme can contribute positively on children's learning and personal growth.

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When World Poetry Day, coming up on 31st March 2013, puts the spotlight clearly on poetry, many school use this as the basis for holding a Poetry Week and focus solely on this writing genre.  But we know that teaching poetry in elementary schools fostering a love of language and literacy so why do we limited to only this week, in a whole year?

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Admittedly when I first started teaching poetry writing, I quickly realised that I didn't really know much about this genre either. So I set about an inquiry into how best to teach my students the skills they needed to make a good start. I wanted  to scaffold them for success, rather than frustrating students because it was too hard, confusing or unfamiliar.

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These hours of research lead to a teaching presentation that I worked through with my students during writing periods, building each day on prior knowledge gained in earlier sessions. It worked so well, that I developed it and published it for other teachers to use, too.

If this resource could help you with teaching poetry elements to your students ages 8+ or of an independent reading age, preview it here on:

TPT

With this structured poetry unit, you and your students can enjoy an engaging inquiry into Poetry as an exciting genre. The unit is chunked into small manageable lessons, to help experience success with discovering a love for reading and writing poems.

But don’t take my word for it. Read these comments from teachers already using this resource.

PRAISE FOR ELEMENTS OF POETRY 

⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ "Great resource! Love the IB links too! =0)"

⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ "Great resource for poetry!"

To engage students and encourage them to take ownership of their work, incorporating student agency into the poetry writing process is key. Allowing students to choose their topics and styles can help them develop their unique voice and creativity. By providing diverse approaches and choices, teachers can help students develop a passion for writing and language that will stay with them for a lifetime.

Writing Bio Poems is a great way to start a new school year. Using this guided lesson plan will help you to support your students in creating individual and personal poems about themselves.

If this resource could help you with guiding your students ages 8+ or of an independent reading age, to write unique & individualised Bio Poems, preview it here on:

TPT

One approach to poetry writing in elementary schools is to have students write rhyming poems. This type of poetry helps students learn about syllables and phonemic awareness, which is an essential aspect of literacy development. Writing rhyming poems can also be a fun and engaging activity for students, sparking their imagination and creativity. One really engaging & informal way that I introduce rhyming couplets to students is with our daily farewell routine. I display the chart in this product in my room and students pick their personal farewells each day. This is a resource I have used for many years now and one that students always ask for.

If this resource could help you with introducing your students ages 5+ to rhyming couplets on a fun & informal way, preview it here on:

TPT

My favourite approach to teaching poetry writing is to have students write free verse poems. This type of poetry allows students to express themselves freely, without the constraints of a specific form or structure. By tapping into their imagination and creativity, students can develop their own unique voice and style as writers. This approach can be especially helpful for students who struggle with writing or have limited experiences with poetry.

Aside from developing writing skills, poetry writing in elementary school can have a positive impact on children's literacy skills. Poetry provides an opportunity for students to

• play with & analyse language, 
• experiment with words, 
• develop their vocabulary
• to think critically 

All essential aspect of literacy development.

Moreover, poetry writing can help students develop important 21st-century skills, such as communication and collaboration. When my students share their poems with each other, they have the opportunity to give and receive feedback, learning from one another. This type of collaboration can foster a sense of community in the classroom and help students develop important interpersonal skills.

Poetry is a genre that can come into many learning themes throughout the year. Click the link below to preview these guided poetry lessons.

For  themes based around well-being, personal identity & prejudice/ assumptions:

For  themes based around understanding our emotions:

For  themes based around building friendships:

These 2 lesson guides focus on Metaphors & Similes with themes based around I relationships with colours and to suit a unit about insects:

And finally a great one to use at the end of the year, reflecting on the year of learning that has been:

In conclusion, teaching poetry in elementary schools is a valuable way to foster a love of language and literacy. By incorporating diverse approaches and choices for students and fostering student agency, teachers can help students develop a passion for writing and language that will stay with them for a lifetime. So, let's make poetry a regular part of our classroom writing programmes and inspire the next generation of writers!

Thank you for stopping by,

With love, Te Aroha 

Timea 

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Build Positive Classroom Culture From the Start of a New School Year

When we as teachers take the time to build a positive classroom culture from the very first week of school we, along with our students, have a much better outlook for a successful school year. A strong and supportive learning environment helps to foster student engagement, academic achievement, and overall well-being. The start of a new school year provides a unique opportunity to establish the foundation of a successful classroom culture.

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In today's diverse and inclusive classrooms, it is important to adopt approaches that respect and celebrate these differences among students. By:

1. offering a variety of choices where possible, and 
2. allowing students to exercise agency over their learning, 

teachers can create an environment that is inclusive, empowering, and engaging.

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Student agency refers to the degree to which students have control over their own learning experiences. By giving students the opportunity to make decisions about:

• what they learn and 
• how they learn it, 

teachers can help to build a sense of ownership and responsibility in the learning process. This, in turn, leads to an increase in:

• motivation, 
• engagement, and 
• achievement.

This Inquiry Unit into body systems is a great example of how, you as the teacher can lead a teacher inquiry into 1 aspect - in this case the digestive system - and use this as the vehicle to teach the skills your students need to run their own inquiries into a system of their own choosing. They then engage more deeply with their subject matter, are more motivated to persevere through the challenges (aka the learning pit) and strive to achieve an outcome they are proud of, all while practising the skills you taught and moving towards becoming more independent inquires. Click the images to preview the resource on TPT

Another critical component of building a positive classroom culture is a focus on social and emotional well-being. A supportive and inclusive environment is essential for students to feel:

• safe, 
• valued, and 
• respected. 

By encouraging open communication, providing opportunities for collaboration and positive relationships, and promoting a growth mindset, teachers can help to cultivate a sense of community and belonging within the classroom.

Using the language of Growth Mindset can shift perspectives and attitudes that would otherwise impede leading progress. 

I’ve used the cards in this teaching resource to explore a different learning challenge every day, by challenging my students to use the language of growth depicted on each card. Once the first 3 students have successfully used it in a learning context (over the next day or two) we add that card to a display, like the Growth Mindset tree in the classroom corner, or across the white board at the front of the room. Click the images to preview the resource on TPT

In order to build a strong and supportive classroom culture, it is important to invest time and energy at the start of the school year. Here are a few strategies that can help:

• Establish clear expectations and rules, but be fair! Focus on equity rather than equality.
• Foster positive relationships and encourage open communication. For example, the I’m sorry - its okay conversation needs expanding. I ask my students to follow this script instead:

Child 1: You hurt me by / when you…(explains to the person what they did) and it made me feel….

Child 2: I am sorry that I …(repeats what they did) and that it made you feel … 

Child 1: Thank you for saying sorry. Please try not to do that again.

Child 2: Are you okay now? Is there anything I can do to make you feel better? (This is about making amends, it can be as simple as getting a tissue or fetching their drink bottle) 

Then let it take a natural progression from there. Sorry is not a 'magic' word, the magic is in learning that sometimes our actions have negative consequences that could even impact on others. We need to own our mistakes, making amends to the people we affect, and try better next time. We also learn that this can happen to the best of us and we need to learn how to resolve these conflicts.

• Promote student agency and choice in learning, within the context of what you are required to teach. Intentionally build your units of learning around the choice components at the core. 
• Create a positive and inclusive learning environment. Show that you value a variety of contributions - and intentionally model / verbalise why diversity matters.
• Look to supporting the social and emotional well-being of all students.

My final yet simple agentic activity recommendation for today - one we absolutely love in our classroom is the Good-bye Animals action activity. I’ve used this resource both at the end of  classroom teaching days and also as a subject specialist, at the end of each period.

And my students won’t let me forget, they're always asking for it.

Each students chooses a way to say goodbye, from the chart. The photos help pre readers make their selection. 

I then say the chant and do the action, and they repeat. 

Older students can do it independently. Some students also like to invent their own.

A couple of examples are well known, like:

• See you later alligator - action resembles a ‘Night Fever’ dance move
• Give us a hug, ladybug - action is obvious
• So long King Kong - fists on chest, and so on

Click the images to preview the resource on TPT

Wishing you all another happy & productive learning year. I encourage you to try some of these ideas, you honestly will be so glad you did!

Thank you for stopping by, 

With love, Te Aroha 

Timea 

My TPT store 

My Pinterest Page 

The Gram 

My Website

Learning outside the classroom

 

WORKING OUTSIDE THE CLASSROOM can include working in outdoor environments, field trips, museums, or galleries. 

Even the environment just outside your classroom is rich with possibilities, yielding choice and agency to your students as they strengthen their skills for selecting, rejecting, having a go, resilience and open-mindedness.

Dillon et al. (2007) speculate that the different ownership of the space might contribute positively, as they found that teachers felt ownership of their indoor school space, whereas outdoors both time and space were considered to be more owned by the students.

Therefore, taking students out of school or their classroom can increase their creative skills (Borradaile,
2006; Burgess & Addison, 2007; Dillon, Craft, Best, Rigby, & Simms, 2007; Kendall, Muirfield, White, & Wilkin, 2007; Rutland & Barlex, 2008, cited in Davies et al., 2013).

These are a few simple but highly effective examples I have used, that you might like to try too:

1. Y3 - My Korowai Cloak - Looking for 'plants' texture: 

ART LESSON PLAN AVAILABLE HERE

 

For this art lesson, students went seeking out textures to add extra depth to their artwork designs. This was found outside the classroom in the concrete, wooden boxing around flowerbeds, metal manhole covers, wall claddings etc. Students had earlier composed a New Zealand 'bush' scene using simple, stylised shapes for their plants like Cabbage Trees, Flax and Nikau (palm),  then went in search of rubbings in nature to add texture to these shapes using suitable wax crayon colours. Once back in the room, students painting in these drawings with analogous colours using water based paints (like dye or liquid water colours)

 

 

 

 

2. Y4 - Introduction to the Element of Texture -  conceptual understandings  

ART LESSON PLAN AVAILABLE HERE

 

To introduce the Elements of Art, we conducted a mini inquiry into each element. 

For TEXTURE we used photocopier paper folded into smaller segments and a range of wax crayon colours, then went for a walk around the school to collect a range of rubbings before returning to class. Here we had a go at drawing our favourites with markers, learning ways to represent texture in 2D on flat artwork. Later, these designs influenced the patterns students used in their TEXTURE informed artworks 

 

 

3. Y3 - Exploration inquiry - walk around the school

 

To help students understand the concept of being an alien in a foreign land,  I asked them to think back to when they first started school and how everything was so foreign to them.

We went outside and returned to their first year classrooms and playgrounds, where they took photos of the areas that brought back fond memories. (We have classroom iPad sets so students worked in groups of 3 to take their photos.)

Next we visited the senior part of the school and asked then to photograph areas that they were looking forward to exploring in the future. After returning to class, students reviewed their photographs and deleted all but their 2 personal favourites, which I printed as the inspiration for their individual artworks you can see here.

4. Y4-6 Photography

Camera LESSON PLAN AVAILABLE HERE

 

iPad LESSON PLAN AVAILABLE HERE

 

I regularly teach photography as an after school elective. I have used both school supplied classroom cameras (simple point 'n shoot models) that I have borrowed from across the school, and more recently with iPads. In each lesson, I introduce a new focus and then students go on a walk around the school to capture images that meet those requirements. Since iPads, students now also have the opportunity to play with the editing tools once back in class.

And finally, some of the simplest but most effect lessons have been to simply go outside and observe nature. For example:

• The sky (blue colour) comes all the way down to earth. Most younger students typically colour a blue strip across the top of their drawings to represent the sky as they have not yet grasped the concept of the horizon line. 
• Tree trunks have texture and a variety of colour. Some tree trunks also split into branches while some don't.
• Leaves come in a vast variety of shapes and colours. As do flowers.
• The tops of doors and windows are usually at the same height at ground level. They also have frames that hold the glass. 
• Things further away appear smaller - even big things. A pathway appears to converge in the distance.

There are a hundred great learning opportunities to be had outside the classroom. I hope you will also take your students outside during the fine weather to observe and learn in a new way. Even if it's just to enjoy a class novel under a tree while listening to the birds sing in the trees.

Thank you for stopping by today. Would love to read your ideas on this theme below in the comments. Come and  connect with me by clicking on the links below to follow along 👇

With love, Te Aroha 

Timea

My TPT store
My Pinterest Page
The Gram
My Website