April is such a lovely month! As the cold of the winter turns into the heat of the summer, April is there to make the transition smooth and to delight us with the scent of endless blossom. The whole scenery gets somehow too poetic and refreshing. Probably this is why in 1996, the Academy of American Poets launched April National Poetry Month to remind the public that poets have an integral role to play in our culture and that poetry matters. Over the years, it has become the largest literary celebration in the world. K–12 teachers and students have joined the celebration and dedicated the month of April to studying and creating poetry.
If you are one of the teachers who is looking for inspiration, we have collected 18 memorable activities you can use to celebrate April National Poetry Month Pack.
1. Poetry Analysis Graphic Organizers
The One Pager Poetry Analysis facilitate in-depth response to meaningful and engaging poems. The students learn to concentrate and focus all their knowledge and understanding in just one page. It is a fast and graphic friendly approach to poetry.
It doesn’t have to be Valentine’s Day to write love poems. Offer your student easy to use poem templates to stimulate their imagination and writing skills and to increase the sense of love and affection in their lives.
3. Quick Writes In 5 Minutes Daily Practice
Use poem prompts to encourage a whole writing experience in the shortest possible time while exploring poetry response, imaginative and critical thinking. It takes only 5 minutes to expose your students to quality poems.
The Poetry Puzzles are poem reading activities that encourage literacy and reading in a fun and cooperative way. The poem lines are mixed up and the students need to find the right order. It is a quick way to start any poetry lesson.
5. Poetry Bracket Championship
It doesn’t have to be March to organize a Poetry Bracket Championship. The focus of this activity is poem personal response and it offers students the possibility to encounter different poems while giving them the competitive edge.
6. Poetry Writing Honoring Women
If Women’s History Month has passed and you did not get the chance to celebrate in your class, you can still do it in April. Besides stimulating your students’ imagination and writing skills, they get to honor the women from their lives.
The Graphic Poems Creation Activities use the power of famous poetry mentor texts and drawing to stimulate poem creation with your students. Poems can be transformed into graphic elements by paying attention to the images conveyed in our minds.
Rewrite This Poem! uses the power of famous poems to stimulate poem creation. The students will rewrite the poem by keeping the message and also learning to express themselves in a poetic manner.
The Acrostic Poem Templates use the power of strong words to stimulate poem creation and encourage vocabulary acquisitions. Even if acrostic poems might seem easy, challenge your students to write their poems by paying attention to the message transmitted by the given word.
10. Reverse Poetry Analysis and Writing
The Reverse Poetry Analysis and Writing activities facilitate annotation techniques and analysis while stimulating poem creation. Reverse poetry is one of the most powerful ways of writing poems because the message of the poem has to be different depending on the direction you are reading it.
Book Spine Poetry activities use the message behind book titles of various genres to stimulate poem creation. This is such a fun activity and it also gives students ideas for the next novels they might want to read.
12. Blackout Poetry Inspired By Short Stories
Blackout Poetry Inspired By Short Stories uses the power of stories and visual art to stimulate poem creation. Instead of random pages, you will use real stories with complete instructions and engaging themes to enrich your students’ imagination, analysis and writing skills.
13. Poem of the Week
Poem of the Week can be used throughout the 36 weeks of school and for poetry annotation and analysis activities with meaningful and engaging poems. It is a way to celebrate April National Poetry Month all year round.
14. Poetry Writing Paint Chip Templates
Poetry Writing Color Palette Templates use the power of pictures and colors to stimulate poem creation. The students are invited to be free and let the colors speak to them in a refreshing manner.
15. Poetry Analysis HEX Choice Board
Poetry Analysis Choice Board is designed around analyzing poems through a variety of well structured prompts and tasks. This resource covers title, theme, tone, mood, effect, creative reader’s response, pairing and alternative writing.
16. Poetry Analysis Choice Board Bingo Game
The Bingo Game Poetry Analysis Choice Board helps your students stay engaged by responding to the poems they have read and enhancing in a formative way the learning process. The competitive side of bingo games will stimulate the students to complete as many tasks as possible.
17. Haiku Writing Template And Guide
Haiku Picture Prompts Poem Writing Templates are a creative way to introduce this wonderful Japanese poetry to your students. You should offer vibrant pictures to stimulate your students’ imagination and help them be inspired into creating these interesting poems.
Poetry Writing Templates are amazing because there is NO PREP required beforehand. You can use 45 templates for alphabet poem, acrostic poem, It’s all about me poem, My animal poem, Simile poem, Biographical poem and many more.
In order to celebrate this special month, we have put all these 18 ideas in one special bundle for April National Poetry Month. It offers over 260 individual activities, tasks and ideas for the entire year.
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