Books and Resources for National Poetry Month
Plus, the Weekly Poetry Challenge kicks off on Monday!
April is National Poetry Month, and here at Read, Discuss, Do we like to observe the occasion by challenging our readers to read, discuss, and write poetry with the children in their lives. Of course, you’re welcome to follow along even if there are no children in sight. Everyone’s welcome here!
Before we get the month-long poetry party started, we thought we would share some poetry books and resources that might be helpful to you as you explore poetry during the month of April. And any time!
Note: Some links will take you to the Read, Discuss, Do bookshop.org storefront. Purchasing a book from the storefront will support independent bookstores and help maintain Read, Discuss, Do at no additional cost to you.
Poetry Books
Rose, Where Did You Get that Red? Teaching Great Poetry to Children by Kenneth Koch
This book is a wonderful resource for any adult who would like to teach poetry, particularly some of the classics written mainly for adults, to children. Now, that may sound intimidating, but the author shares a lot of insight and helpful tips about teaching children, and lays out some simple lesson plans based on his experience teaching children. Adults can learn a lot from this book themselves too. Highly recommended!
Mari in the Margins by Rebecca J. Gomez
Twelve-year-old Marivel is the middle child in a family with nine children, and she often feels overlooked and overshadowed by her siblings. She longs to be seen, but at the same time doesn’t see anything in herself worthy of notice. She’s always writing poetry in her journal, so when she hears of a poetry contest at her school, she decides to enter, hoping that she will win the contest and finally move from the margins to center stage. This middle grade novel in verse is not only an engaging read, but it can be a good introduction to various poetic forms (not to mention the verse novel format) for readers of all ages.
The Poet’s Dog by Patricia MacLachlan
This middle grade novel tells the story of a dog named Teddy, who rescues two children from a harsh winter storm. As the two children and the dog hole up in the cabin once shared by Teddy and a poet named Sylvan, Teddy shares memories of his poet friend. A friendship grows between the children and the dog as they wait for the storm to pass and the children’s parents to find them. But what will happen to Teddy when the children go home? This is a great book to read during poetry month not only because it’s about a poet, but because of the way poetry is woven into the story.
The Death of the Hat: A Brief History of Poetry in 50 Objects, selected by Paul B. Janeczko, illustrated by Chris Raschka. This book gives the reader a glimpse of the history of poetry by sharing poems from the early middle ages until contemporary times.
A Foot in the Mouth: Poems to Speak, Sing, and Shout, selected by Paul B. Jeneczko, illustrated by Christ Raschka. This book is full of poems that are full of word play and sounds and rhythm, making this book especially great for reading aloud.
Poetry Resources
Joyce Sidman’s Poetry Now - Mini poetry lessons from poet Joyce Sidman.
The Dirigible Balloon - Read lots of poems online!
Poetry4Kids - Lots of poetry lessons and examples from former children’s poet laureate Kenn Nesbit.
The Poetry Month schedule
For National Poetry Month our newsletter schedule will be different. We will be sharing twice a week rather than every other week. Starting on Monday, March 31 we will be sharing a weekly poetry challenge for our readers! Each Monday we will feature a different poetic form and related poetry books, along with writing tips for poets. On Fridays we will share general poetry articles.
At the end of April there will be a round-up of all the poetry fun. We will also share poems from readers. See last year’s round-up here!
How can you participate?
All you have to do is follow the weekly posts and get to writing. If you’d like to share your poems with us, here are a few options:
Share on Instragram. Be sure to tag us (ReadDiscussDo) and use the hashtag #RDDPoetryChallenge when you post.
Email us!
Reply to the weekly newsletters
Comment on the weekly posts
When you share poems with us, be sure to let us know if you’d like us to feature them in the round-up post at the end of April, and how you would like us to credit the poet.
That’s it! We hope you will join us in reading, discussing, and writing poetry in April! Follow us on Instagram for more inspiration and ideas.