{"id":11778,"date":"2025-03-26T10:15:00","date_gmt":"2025-03-26T14:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/teachersfirst.com\/blog\/?p=11778"},"modified":"2025-03-26T10:20:16","modified_gmt":"2025-03-26T14:20:16","slug":"everyone-is-a-poet-even-if-they-dont-know-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/teachersfirst.org\/blog\/2025\/03\/everyone-is-a-poet-even-if-they-dont-know-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Everyone Is a Poet (Even If They Don\u2019t Know It)"},"content":{"rendered":"
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On March 26, 1874, one of America\u2019s most beloved poets was born. Robert Frost, known for his New England settings and his colloquial poetic verses, created some of the world’s most well-known lines of poetry that continue to speak to readers today. Frost can tap into the emotions of the average person and leverage that to create an indelible image. With poems like \u201cMending Wall<\/a>\u201d and \u201cHome Burial<\/a>\u201d, readers connect with Frost\u2019s sentiments and work through these shared human emotions to create deep empathy with both the narrator and humanity as a whole. This is the very power of poetry that we all need to leverage to help our students realize their empathetic power, manage their emotions, and understand their world.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Robert Frost defines poetry as \u201cwhen an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words.\u201d Poetry has so many benefits for humanity as a whole, but the benefit to students is immeasurable. This Edutopia article<\/a> by author Elena Aguliar gives 5 compelling reasons for poetry\u2019s inclusion in schools, highlighting the educational benefits of reading, writing, rhythm, and speaking and poetry\u2019s ability to help students build community and empathy. This EducationWeek article<\/a> agrees and shares student perspectives on the connecting power of poetry during COVID and civil unrest and how poetry can help students and teachers through difficult times. Unfortunately, as Common Core has grown in popularity, poetry has lost ground to nonfiction readings in the classroom\u2014but poetry is useful and applicable at all levels and in all subject areas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So how can teachers\u2014even non-English or non-ELA teachers\u2014 easily incorporate poetry into their curriculum? Here is some advice and guidance from Robert Frost:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI took the one less traveled by.\u201d<\/h2>\n\n\n
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Poetry does not need to stay in the English or ELA classroom. We use poetry in early childhood and elementary education because it helps acquaint students with language, words, flow, rhythm, and rhyme. Why not use poetry in a foreign language class for the same reason? Poetry gives glimpses through the eyes of someone\u2019s lived experiences, so you can also leverage it in history and social studies. There are poems that cover all sorts of subjects, so find a poem that matches your lesson and take a moment to read it with the class.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For science classes, try the Drop the Mic: Science Poetry Slam<\/a> from Activate Learning. Discuss dissecting a poem before your dissecting unit in biology. Find science-specific poems in the Poetry Lesson Plans for Science Class<\/a> collection on Poets.org (reviewed here<\/a>). You could begin or end each unit with a poem to help students connect to class material on a new level.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Math educators can use poetry to help students count, identify patterns, and use formulas to create meaning. Check out the ideas from National Geographic Education Blog\u2019s post, \u201cHow Math and Poetry Intersect<\/a>.\u201d Have students write a poem to explain a concept or their reactions to a lesson. Lastly, watch Laken Brooks TEDx Talk \u201cPoetry: A Simple Solution to Math Anxiety<\/a>,\u201d where Brooks explores how poetry helped her overcome her own math anxiety. It could open a new world of understanding for students.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNothing Gold Can Stay.\u201d<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

As Frost highlights in this poem<\/a>, we all need to change with the season, and the traditional method of teaching poetry needs a little love. Many times poetry is either a unit the teacher plows through \u201cto get it over with\u201d because \u201cstudents hate poetry,\u201d or students read poems that fit with an anchor text and aren\u2019t taught more than basic comprehension and thematic connection. Students need both specific, targeted poetic lessons and poetry support texts to help them work through difficult concepts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Refresh your poetry teaching with school poetry slams. Specifically focus on public speaking and performance with a Poetry Out Loud (reviewed here<\/a>) competition. Even if you don\u2019t officially compete at an event, it\u2019s a great way to get everyone experiencing the power and beauty of performing poetry.\u00a0 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you aren\u2019t sure where to begin, look to Poets.org and their Materials for Teachers<\/a> (reviewed here<\/a>) page. The site also offers a Teach This Poem<\/a> option where you can receive a poetry lesson in your inbox every Monday. This is a great way to bring variety and spice to your poetry repertoire. To make this resource even more perfect, Robert Frost told Marie Bollock\u2014the founder of the Academy of American Poets, which backs Poets.org\u2014to \u201cget poetry into the high schools.\u201d How perfect is that?!\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBut I have promises to keep, \/ And miles to go before I sleep, \/ And miles to go before I sleep.\u201d<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

As teachers, we help students grow into strong, independent critical thinkers. With poetry, we can cultivate empathetic and analytical thinking as well. One of the best resources out there for finding fantastic poems is #TeachLivingPoets<\/a> (reviewed here<\/a>). This revolutionary movement in poetry education started with Melissa Alter Smith\u2019s dream of bringing diversity to the poetic cannon in her classroom. The site offers complete teaching units for poetry collections<\/a> and Hyperdocs<\/a>, which are collections of full units, poet- and poem-focused lessons, and lessons on poetic concepts. There\u2019s also a great lesson on Amanda Gorman\u2019s inauguration poem<\/a>. If you want to have a bit more focus before diving into the site, read or listen to the podcast \u201cWhy Poetry Is Making a Comeback in Schools<\/a>\u201d by Kara Newhouse of KQED (reviewed here<\/a>).\u00a0 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lastly, educators in every subject can have students write poetry. Needing to think about your words in a deliberate way to convey a specific message is a powerful practice. Verse by Verse<\/a> as an experimental AI that can get the creative juices flowing by having students write a poem with the help of the classics. Once students play with the AI, they have a little more confidence creating and sharing their own poetry. The poem below is an example of a Verse by Verse poem created with the help of Poe, Dickinson, and Frost.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Hopefully this inspired you to play with the potent power of poetry in your classroom. April is National Poetry Month\u2014why not try a poem with your classes? Don\u2019t miss this powerful opportunity to show students how poetry can unite us, help us understand one another, and tell our stories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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On March 26, 1874, one of America\u2019s most beloved poets was born. Robert Frost, known for his New England settings and his colloquial poetic verses, created some of the world’s most well-known lines of poetry that continue to speak to readers today. Frost can tap into the emotions of the average person and leverage that … read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[276,103,196],"class_list":["post-11778","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-classroom-application","tag-creative-writing","tag-english","tag-poetry"],"modified_by":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/teachersfirst.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11778","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/teachersfirst.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/teachersfirst.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teachersfirst.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teachersfirst.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11778"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/teachersfirst.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11778\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11803,"href":"https:\/\/teachersfirst.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11778\/revisions\/11803"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/teachersfirst.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11778"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teachersfirst.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11778"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teachersfirst.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11778"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}