How much do we love poetry? Let us count the ways! April is National Poetry Month, and we have lots of fun activity ideas to help you celebrate. Here are suggestions for contests, projects, papers, assignments, and videos that are sure to get students excited and deepen their appreciation of poetry.
Engage Students with Bloom’s Literature
Bloom’s Literature, an essential go-to source for poetry assignments and projects, features 3,000+ full-text poems, each with a corresponding analytical entry that allows students and researchers to enhance their understanding of a poem’s power by reading the poem alongside criticism of it. Bloom’s also features a Literary Classics eBook shelf with the full text of many books of classic poetry, including ones written by Emily Dickinson, Geoffrey Chaucer, H.D., John Keats, Lord Byron, Charles Baudelaire, Robert Frost, Christina Rossetti, Robert Browning, William Butler Yeats, and more.
Ideas for project, papers, library, and classroom use:
- Ask students to select a poem and “rewrite” or update it for today’s audience.
- Use poems to illustrate or emphasize events in history, such as Tennyson’s “The Charge of the Light Brigade” on the Crimean War, Dickinson’s “I Like to See It Lap the Miles” about the Industrial Revolution, Howe’s “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” about the Civil War, or Emerson’s “The Concord Hymn” about the American Revolution.
- Ask students to write an essay comparing and contrasting the way two poets have presented the same idea or theme.
- Use the relevant Essay Topics on selected poets or Topic Centers on poetry movements as starting points for papers and research, to spark discussion, as lecture launchers, or as assignments.
- Ask students to read a stanza from a poem of their choice each day in April and to explain why they chose it.
Subscribers: Log in today to start using Bloom’s Literature in your lessons.
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Get Creative with Credo Reference’s Mind Map
One of Credo Reference‘s key features, the Mind Map, is an interactive visualization tool that teaches students how to develop subject vocabulary and identify connections between and across topics. The Mind Map feature is embeddable in course pages, LibGuides, and websites!
Use Credo’s Mind Map to host an online (or in-person) poetry slam or contest for students.
- Have users log in to Credo Reference or Credo Source and use Credo’s Mind Map to search for a word, phrase, person, etc.
- Encourage teens to compose a poem using at least five of the words that make up the resulting map.
- Request that poems be emailed to you with the search term or phrase that was used.
- Poems can include words not found in the Mind Map.
- Determine who will judge the entries.
- Celebrate the winners and finalists through social media posts, posts of winners recording themselves reading their poems, prizes such as T-shirts, coupons, or donations from local businesses.
The Mind Map uses content from the hundreds of searchable, full-text titles from the world’s foremost publishers that you can find on Credo Reference, including reputable, trustworthy reference sources such as The Oxford Companion to Modern Poetry and Wiley’s A Companion to American Poetry.
Need a little help with the contest? This PDF shows you how to have a fun and engaging online poetry slam for your students using Credo’s Mind Map tool.
Learn more about the Mind Map feature in:
- Credo Source for K–12 schools and districts
- Credo Reference for higher education institutions and public libraries
Credo subscribers: Log in today to see the Mind Map (and more) for yourself!
Not a subscriber? Why not take a FREE trial?
Supplement Your Lessons and Lectures on Poetry with Streaming Video
Streaming video is a great way to teach, introduce, and enhance poetry instruction and learning. Turn to Infobase’s streaming video and media platforms—including Learn360 for K–12 schools and districts, Classroom Video On Demand for secondary schools, Access Video On Demand for public libraries, and Films On Demand for colleges and universities—for a wide range of videos about poetry and the influential poets we’re still reading today. Here is just some of the content you can find. We have included searchable item numbers for each title for your convenience.
(Not all titles are available on all platforms or in all countries; some of these titles contain mature themes or content—viewer discretion is advised.)
- Literature Kids: Studying Black Poets—And the Five Essential Elements of Poetry (Wonderscape Entertainment®, 2022, Item #289537; grades 4–6)
- Emily Dickinson (DK Timelines series) (Makematic, 2023, Item #290913; grades 5–12)
- Jason Reynolds (Untold: Authors That Changed America series), Makematic, 2024, Item #293635; grades 6–12)
- Amanda Gorman (Untold: Authors That Changed America series), Makematic, 2023, Item #291448; grades 6–12)
- Pauli Murray: Breaking Barriers of Race and Gender (Untold: Women and the American Story series) (Makematic, 2023, Item #285576; grades 6–12)
- Novel in Verse (Literary Genres series) (Makematic, 2023, Item #291470; grades 6–12)
- Gwendolyn Brooks (Untold: Authors That Changed America series) (Makematic, 2023, Item #291443; grades 6–12)
- Sonnets of William Shakespeare (Academy Media, 2021, Item #280883; grades 9–12)
- Tagore Poems (Academy Media, 2021, Item #280884; grades 9–12)
- Poetry on Fire: Teacher’s Workshop (EPF Media, 2020, Item #285094; grades 9–12)
- Poetry on Fire: Igniting Students’ Passion (EPF Media, 2020, Item #285093; grades 9–12)
- The Divine Comedy by Dante (Academy Media, 2020, Item #280889; grades 9–12)
- Poetry in America seasons 1–4 (PBS, 2017–2024, Item #168666, 210666, 279432, and 293772; grades 9–Academic/AP)
- In Search of Walt Whitman (Andrew Kaplan, 2020, Item #210884; grades 9–Academic/AP—watch our interview with director Andrew Kaplan to learn more!)
- Beowulf (PBS, 2016, Item #151165; grades 9–Academic/AP)
- Dante: Inferno to Paradise series (PBS, 2024, Item #293022; Academic/AP)
- Alexander Pope: Rediscovering a Genius (Shaftesbury Investments, 2021, Item #281079; Academic/AP)
Learn360’s Poetry Topic Center
Learn360 subscribers will also find a Poetry Topic Center that brings a variety of editorially curated videos and printables for the classroom. Acquaint students with literary devices such as onomatopoeia, alliteration, metaphors, and similes; introduce students to famous poets such as Maya Angelou, Dr. Seuss, and William Shakespeare; and find worksheets, activities, and other classroom ideas right at your fingertips. Subscribers, log in to check out the Poetry Topic Center now!
Subscribers, log into Learn360, Classroom Video On Demand, Access Video On Demand, and Films On Demand today to watch these videos now!
Not a subscriber? Why not take a FREE trial?
See also:
- FREE webinar: Community Competitions at the Public Library! Engaging Teens with Infobase
- Celebrate 30 Days of Poetry with Bloom’s Literature
- Hosting a Meme Contest for Your Library? Give It a Try!
- Using Bloom’s Literature in the Classroom: Theme & Summary Guide: PDF
- Four Keys to Using Credo Source in Instruction: A Guide: PDF
- FREE webinar: Slam into Poetry Month with Contest Ideas from Infobase
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