There is a need to integrate into classroom learning the out-of-school technologies that students interact with every day. We know that reader response approaches to the study of literature engage learners, and we also know that both students and teachers have mixed attitudes about the study of poetry. In this article, a response activity with…

Georgia Heard spent a week with students in New Mexico, encouraging their search for "self-portrait poetry"--poetry in which they saw themselves. She witnessed courage, pain, tragedy, and hope in the choices and writing of those struggling students, and came to learn that at least one among them had found a life-changing outlet.…

Describes how writing with specifics can transform poetry, helping to create vivid pictures in the reader's mind. Offers three of the author's own poems that illustrate the judicious use of detail. (SR)

Describes a series of activities to help middle school students develop an artist's vision and then convey that vision through poetry. Describes how lessons progress from looking at concrete objects to observations of settings and characters, gradually adding memory and imagination to direct observation, and finishing with revision. Notes that…

Describes how one eighth-grade teacher, disturbed by students' ignorance of the variety of poetry available to them, developed a poetry anthology assignment, in which students immersed themselves in poetry for three weeks, each one choosing and creating a poetry anthology comprised of 20 poems. Notes students' enthusiasm for the project and pride…

Describes a six-week poetry writing workshop for an eighth-grade class. Discusses getting started, two weeks of immersion in reading poetry, students writing their own poetry, creating a community of poets in the classroom, evaluation, students' poetry, and what the teacher learned. Notes that students gained a much richer understanding of poetry.…

Argues that children are as deep as the ocean, with secret places inside of them waiting to be opened. Notes that it is powerful for students to learn they can make sense of the world through words, and describes inviting them into poetry as they read poetry, create poetry packets, and write and revise poems. (SR)

Describes organizing a poetry "slam" (a contest in which people read their original poems and listeners cast votes for their favorites) involving 200 eighth graders from two different schools. Discusses how this experience made vivid for students the need to write for an audience and to revise. (SR)

Describes how a seventh-grade teacher incorporated poetry writing into her science class, helping students to learn the science material and helping the teacher to evaluate the students' knowledge. (SR)

Presents an activity to connect language arts, social studies, and technology in a meaningful way while encouraging students not only to read for details but to "read between the lines" and draw conclusions about a historical figure's inner thoughts and personality. Notes that the biopoem is a simple 10-line poem with a specific, easy-to-follow…

Considers how to involve students more in discussing poetry. Describes a class activity involving creating a low-risk poetry porthole: the list poem. Talks about learning how to discuss the poetry of others. Presents ideas for making the transition to the discussion of "school" poetry. (SG)

Suggests that if adolescents are going to get hooked on poetry and read and write more than an occasional sample, they need to have teachers share with them poetry they will enjoy. Considers a study by Karen Kutiper of middle school student poetry preference. Presents conclusions from this study along with a list of the 25 most popular poems. (SG)

Discusses one Sudanese student's frustration with learning English his second year in the United States. Describes writing assignments used in the seventh grade class. Notes that Simon, the Sudanese student, found poetry to be an easier way to express himself using the English language. (SG)

Examines ideas about the literate and the illiterate, the tutored and the untutored in the poem "Answer," by Mary Oliver. Suggests that if educators want students to read carefully and analyze conscientiously, then the works they study have to matter to them. Discusses universal literacies, literacy in school and out, classroom discourse and real…

Offers brief descriptions of 23 books of poetry for middle schoolers. Notes that these selections may lure readers who are dismayed with poetry back to a love of poetry. (SR)