Poetry with children has always been one of my favorite activities to incorporate into our weekly activities.
Once a week, we have poetry time. We sit at the table and I read from different poetry books. I also introduce a type of poem to them.
I started doing this when they were really young. Before they were even able to write, I would have them narrate their poem ideas to me and I would write for them. At this age, we mainly wrote acrostic poems. An acrostic poem is where the first letters of each line spell out the word or phrase.
Example from my son, around Valentine’s Day, when he was 4:
L living with family
O obedient every day
V valentine’s day candy
E eating lots of food
Making poetry special
Also, we would have fun decorating borders and drawing pictures around the edges of the paper. Each month, I would have new ones hanging all over my house. I loved it!
After this, we switched to couplets. I would, once again, give them a topic–either something they were learning about, a holiday, season or an event coming up.
A couplet consists of two lines, and each is a stanza.
The last word in the lines rhyme. The lines should be the same length. The number of stanzas depended on the age of the child. Sitting with them, brainstorming rhyming words, led to so much fun and laughter. We’d once again, have fun making decorative borders for the poems, or attach them to a themed scrapbook paper.
Next, we moved on to ABAB poems.
The “A” lines would rhyme with each other, and the “B” lines would rhyme with each other. Each stanza had 4 lines, and I would, once again, ask for the number of stanzas that I felt they were capable of, depending on their age.
Shortly after this, we moved on to haikus.
Haiku poems consist of 3 lines.
The first and last lines of a Haiku have 5 syllables and the middle line has 7 syllables.
The lines rarely rhyme.
These poems were generally silly and so much fun!
Example from my 8 yr old:
Pumpkins everywhere
Corn mazes with scarecrows are fun
Harvest time is here
Cinquains were another type that we had so much fun with!
These made great gifts/cards for family members or teachers/leaders.
A cinquain has 5 lines, 11 words total, that follow this sequence:
Line A: One-word subject or topic
Line B: Two vivid adjectives that describe the topic
Line C: Three interesting -ing action verbs that fit the topic
Line D: Four-word phrase that captures feeling about the topic
Line E: A very specific term that explains Line A
An example from my 13 year old:
Sheboygan
Cold, Beautiful
Inviting, Charming, Exciting
Want to stay forever
Home
Next, came shape poems, which are also a lot of fun!
Some of our most memorable poems have been in the shape of ice cream cones, kites, birds, circles, circus tents, animals, and a football. The sky is the limit with these!
Never too old for poetry
As the children got older, we expanded on these and added other types of poems as we came across them. Ballads, odes, autobiographical, color, limericks, and sonnets.
Poetry with children has quickly become one of the highlights of my homeschooling life.
Even the children’s grandparents loved visiting and reading their poems scattered around my walls.
Over the years, poetry has been a great way for all of us to express ourselves. Whatever type of poem my children are writing, I write too. This helps them to learn by my example, gives us something to do together, and helps me stay in touch with my creative, linguistic side. Jumping in and joining your children, whenever possible, makes poetry with children all the more memorable!
Here are some affiliate links (no extra charge to you!) to some of my favorite resources through the years!
To learn more about how I began my homeschooling journey with my children, please check out my first blog post: https://learningisawayoflife.com/how-my-journey-began/
