April is National Poetry Month! I love to write. Creative writing is one of my favorite things to teach, however it takes a great deal of time. It is difficult to instill that desire to write which sometime makes me want to pull my hair out. We have a wonderful Media Specialist at our school (Angela Newton). When she found an "Instant Poetry Forms" website and asked me if I was interested in trying it out with my students I jumped right in. I have to say, that even before introducing the website to my students, Angela and I were sucked into the website, laughing hysterically at some of the poems we created. After about half an hour, the students meandering in and out of the library stopped watching us skeptically and ventured over to investigate. We especially liked the One Inch Tall form.
The kids were hesitant about writing poetry at first. Once they started navigating the website and experimenting with the different forms, they became more confident. Angela and I were very impressed with what our students were able to create in a short period of time. Now, several times a day, students ask me if they can get on the computer and write some poetry.


Forget It

Forget it
You must be kidding
the monster will tear it up
I can’t sit down for a long time
I will forget what i wrote
the teacher will say it is a boring poem
it will get it dirty my tiger will eat it
I will fall asleep
my book will eat it
Time's up? Uh oh!
All I have is a dumb list of excuses.
You like it? Really? No kidding.
Thanks a lot. Would you like to see another one?

Ny'Lasia


Butterfly
I am a butterfly
Orange and red as a peach
I eat nectar
I like nectar
I can fly
I can be beautiful
I am a butterfly

Daisy