5 Steps To Pack A Reading Punch With Daily Poetry Study

My love for poetry is no secret in my classroom, and my students know that I will always find time to rhyme during our reading lessons. Reading poetry aloud builds student phonemic awareness and rhyming skills by helping them hear the repetitive, familiar vowel sound patterns. It also builds their syllabication skills by allowing them to hear the rhythm and pattern of the poetry sentences or stanzas. Reading fluency and accuracy improves every time they re-read a poem either with the whole class, in a small group, with a partner, or at home for practice with a family member.


This post will guide you on how to host weekly poetry studies in your classroom, and provide mentor texts, ideas, and additional resources to help you do it well!

Read One Poem Each Week

In addition to using poems written by favorites like Shel Silverstein and Jack Prelutsky, I often use verses that I have written especially for my students. In them, I try to include words with familiar vowel patterns and our grade level sight words.

Yetis, unicorns, gnomes, snow, mittens, leprechauns, puppies, and winter fantasy creatures are just some of the thematic poetry units I have created, and my intervention groups are always excited to practice what I have written for them.

It makes me happy when they exclaim.....

YOU ARE A POET, MRS. REYNOLDS.....AND WE KNOW IT!

Build Student Interest With Favorite Read-Alouds

I

n an effort to access student background knowledge about our weekly poetry theme and hook their interest, I always share some of my favorite mentor texts before we begin our poetry study. Our discussions of the stories encourage my students to think creatively about our topic and excites them to read and write about it.

Read The Weekly Poem Many Times

Provide students with a variety of opportunities to re-read the selected poem each week. You can lead the whole group in an echo or choral read. The members of your small group can take turns reading the rhyming sentences or complete stanzas. Student partners can practice reading in pairs. These repeated readings not only boost student confidence, but also help them improve their expression, automaticity, and accuracy.

Use Poetry To Practice Many Literacy Skills

After students have read our poem-of-the-week many times, they are ready to complete practice and assessment pages to check both their comprehension and rhyme recognition skills. Often times, we highlight the rhyming pairs in the poem and then brainstorm lists of words for each familiar spelling pattern on chart paper.


Asking questions about the events or character details in the poem helps students practice their ability to return to the poem text, recall important details, and to find evidence to support their answers.

Use Poetry To Inspire Creative Writing

After each poem we study, I try to provide my students with an opportunity to write creatively and imaginatively about our topic. Graphic organizers that help them plan out their ideas and prompt pages/templates help them compose and publish their work.

Helpful Poetry Study Resources

Another blog post I wrote, FIVE DAYS AND FIVE WAYS TO USE POETRY WITH PRIMARY GRADE STUDENTS, will provide some more helpful tips on how to plan and execute effective and engaging poetry studies in your primary classroom! Check it out {HERE}!

Click {HERE} to see this fun pack of Yeti Poems your students are sure to enjoy, along other thematic units in my TpT shop!

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Continue to teach your children well, my friends!