Hi everyone,
As the blog tour for AFTER DARK continues, today I am delighted that Sylvia Vardell is hosting at PoetryForChildren https://poetryforchildren.blogspot.com Thank you, Sylvia!
If you’ve followed the first three stops on the tour, you know that each one is different. Many of you have been helping through your own networks and for that I’m very grateful too.
My thanks to all!
On another issue, we’ve all seen the posting of student poems by teachers fall from robust to zero most months, especially since the introduction of Common Core State Standards a few years ago, which took away nearly all of a teacher’s time and focused on analyzing over writing. Over the weekend I’ve had a conversation with Rachelle Burk, who wanted to add my blog site to her suggested list of places where students can get some attention with their writing, but Rachelle became discouraged by how confusing the instructions were on the Young Poets W.O.M. Poems page plus the lack of contributions she found there.
With all that in mind I’ve made an effort to rewrite the page as you see here. Please give my your thoughts about the new page plus — especially — how we might go about attracting teachers across the country (and elsewhere) to get back in the habit of posting their students’ poems here. Many thanks!
Young Poets W.O.M. Poems
Dear Teachers,
When you are looking for ways to inspire your students to write poems, this is a special place to show off some results. Every month I post a new word and invite students of all ages to write a poem inspired by that one word. Poets in the adult category write poems based on the same word.
Young poets have been featured here since 2009. Two of the first ones are now in college and one is going into journalism.
Getting your students “published” is easy and free. Here is all you need to do.
1. Choose up to three poems per classroom to post (per month).
2. If your kids are under 13, please have on file a permission slip signed by a parent or legal guardian.
3. To post a poem, scroll down to the box at the bottom of the screen where it says LEAVE A REPLY and paste the poem there.
4. Please include the student’s name, grade, school, and city in the post.
5. Hit button to submit.
Adults who follow my blog are primarily teachers, librarians, and children’s writers or artists. You can rest assured that your students will see notes of encouragement and appreciation posted about their work. This is above all a friendly BlogSpot!
At the end of each month I erase all poems and comments and we start over with a new word. I hope to see your students join the fun.
Sincerely,
David
PS: The word for February is AGE
David
Some words about the book.
Happy to say I’m in this one too. On October 23rd I’ll join other poets from the book for a ZOOM party celebration. I’ll read my poem from the book and you will see pictures of me hopping over a chair in our living room. And you know you can believe what you see in pictures.
Children's Author David L. Harrison's Blog 