Library suggests ways to celebrate National Poetry Month
April is National Poetry Month. Read on for our suggestions for at-home activities to celebrate.
By Kate Pritchard, MS/HS Librarian
Here are some poetry-related activities you can do at home with kids of all ages.
Create book-spine poems: Gather some books in your house with interesting titles and stack them up with the spines facing you, then think about how you can arrange them so that the titles will form a poem. (This blog post has some tips if you’d like a little more explanation.) We’ll post some examples of book-spine poems by our librarians (and a few of their children) to USN’s social media over the next week. Share your poems on Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter with the hashtags #beyondEdgehill and #bookspinepoetry if you’d like USN to feature your poems too.
Participate in Poem-in-Your-Pocket Day on Thursday, April 30: This event, which encourages you to carry a poem in your pocket and share it in public spaces like grocery stores and bus stops, will be different for many of us this year, so get creative. Put a poem in someone’s winter coat, and think about the nice surprise they’ll get next December. Parents, you can put poems in your children’s pockets for them to discover. An envelope is a pocket of sorts: why not mail a poem to someone you love?
Write a poem of your own: If you’re not sure how to get started, try a poem with a particular structure, like an acrostic or haiku.
Read some poetry: The Academy of American Poets and the Poetry Foundation have great free collections of poems online, and Book Riot recommends several other websites that provide poems and poetry-related activities for children and teens. You can also listen to poems read aloud through the Poetry Foundation or the Library of Congress. If you find a favorite, share it with someone else.
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Fax: 615-321-0889
Email: info@usn.org
River Campus
1200 County Hospital Road
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2000 Edgehill Ave.
Nashville, TN 37212
Phone: 615-321-8000
Fax: 615-321-0889
Email: info@usn.org
River Campus
1200 County Hospital Road
Nashville, TN 37218
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University School of Nashville models the best educational practices. In an environment that represents the cultural and ethnic composition of Metropolitan Nashville, USN fosters each student’s intellectual, artistic, and athletic potential, valuing and inspiring integrity, creative expression, a love of learning, and the pursuit of excellence.
University School of Nashville models the best educational practices. In an environment that represents the cultural and ethnic composition of Metropolitan Nashville, USN fosters each student’s intellectual, artistic, and athletic potential, valuing and inspiring integrity, creative expression, a love of learning, and the pursuit of excellence.