Pick-a-Poet Program

WU: SHANGHAI HIGH FIVE By Karren Alenier five urban cow boys in Shanghai ride motorcycles in a filigreed bird cage trace dizzy loops up down around create a daring geometry unparalleled to truck bus car traffic on the public streets even the sky scrapers dressed in flashing neon hold their breath cannot sing pardon me boys is that the Chattanooga choo choo.

Karren Alenier has worked with Pick a Poet since 2001. 2006 to 2011 she worked with the Moving Words Contest. For The Word Works, she created the Jacklyn Potter Young Poets Competition, which invites high school students to read with an established poet in the Joaquin Miller Poetry Series.“Children have a natural ear for poetry. Teaching children to read and write poetry will enhance their overall writing skills.”

Offered Programs:

Picking out Words & Tuning the Ear (Grades: 1-5)
Tailored to the grade, this poetry writing workshop teaches perfect and slant rhyme to make the student aware of the music in words.

Is My Friend a Cat or a Person: Learning the Art of Metaphor (Grades: 3-5)
This workshop explores simile, metaphor, and personification in writing poetry.

Telling Fibs: Working Poetically with Fibonacci Numbers (Grades: 3-5)
This workshop teaches how to write a poem called The Fib which is based on Fibonacci sequence.

Inspired by Gertrude Stein (Grades: 7-12)
In this writing workshop, we explore what made the People’s Modernist poet Gertrude Stein an American icon, the characteristics of her writing, and how her work can inspire new work. Emphasis is on experimentation and thinking outside the box.

CHECK ONE (excerpt) by Regie Cabico I could give you an epic about my ways of life or my look  and you want me to fill it in “one square box.”  From what integer or shape do you count existing identities,  grant loans for the mind, or crayola white census sheets-  There’s no “one kind” to fill for anyone.You tell me who I am, what gets the most money  and I’ll sing that song like a one-man caravan.  I know arias from Naples, Tunis, and Accra-  lullabyes from welfare, food-stamps, and nature and you want me to sing one song?  I have danced jigs with Jim Crow and shuffled my hips  to a sonic guitar of Clapton and Hendrix,  waltzed with dead lovers, skipped to bamboo sticks,  belleted kabuki and mimed cathacali  arrivedercied-a-rhumba and tapped Tin Pan Alley-  and you want me to dance the Bhagavad Gita  on a box to small for a thumbelina-thin diva? I’ll check “other”

Regie Cabico is one of the country’s leading innovators and pioneers of The Poetry Slam having won 3 National Top Prizes and winning The Nuyorican Poets Cafe Grand Slam. Bust Magazine ranked him in the 100 Men We Love & The Kenyon Review called him the Lady Gaga of Poetry.

“I would like to introduce the elements of Spoken Word Slam Poetry to youth. The idea of being able to perform my poetry and give students fundamental basics on how to write a ‘slam’ poem and develop ‘performance’ technique. In the process I hope students celebrate difference and cheer the poet in all of us”

Offered Programs:

“WHEN I SAY POETRY! YOU SAY ROCKS!”: GETTING YOUR STUDENTS TO UNLEASH THEIR POETIC PASSION 
In these workshops, participants will use “imagery” to create poems that incorporate pop culture & autobiography to celebrate “who we are” by exploring our dreams and our most fanciful urges. We will combine outrageous lies into hyperbole and use sense memory and experimental word play to invigorate our language. We will look at the poem as one explosive haiku and use the things that “drive us crazy” to propel us into performance. We will unlock the basic elements of poetry slam performance: vocal, physical gesture & eye contact—demystifying the page from the stage.
This workshop is for middle and high school students and adapted for each group’s special needs. Each session will include a 5-7 minute performance from the poet, two writing exercises, and several students coached on performance technique. It is recommended that the workshop take two sessions. One for writing and the other for the poetry slam. The poet will speak with the teacher prior to the session in order to make the best use of the time.

WHO WANTS TO BE A LUNE-INAIRE?! AN INSTANT GAME SHOW OF WITTY POETRY
This 1 hour workshop will take students through an entertaining image-driven lesson of the LUNE: an American cousin of the haiku. We will explore character, voice and mood as we pick the most engaging similes and hyperboles to compose 3 to 5 short poems. Students will discover a 3 part structure and perform them in rounds as judges from the school hold up colors of the lunes they loved best. An introduction to delivery, competition and critique as well as a winner crowned LUNE POET IDOL of the year! Finalists receive 11 pennies: 1 cent for every word! In these economic times, who says, Poetry doesn’t pay!?

For My Nephew (Excerpt) Your father is not perfect; I know.  He is my brother. He is heavy.  In moments of love infused anger, he will act out  in a manner that may seem rash, harsh, even judgmental.  Just as he did with his father,  forgive him. He will not ask. Do it anyway.  For until you look down the barrel of a bassinet,  God to a life you created, you will never comprehend  the sacrifices made for you to be able to read this poem  and understand it. We will always be half winged angels;  imperfect and incapable of flight.  My angel, jump anyway.  Dive every day  for the possibility of feeling  the wind of greatness across your face  just once before you die. Love, Uncle Joe

“It is my organization’s mission, and my life’s work, to cultivate the power of the voices of young people through the mediums of literature and performance.”

Offered Programs:

Slam Poetry- A New Oral Tradition
Students will learn about the history of Slam Poetry in America. Through viewing and discussing videos of popular Spoken Word Artist students will discover the power of poetry in performance. Participants will be then be guided in a writing and performance workshop where they will create and share their own spoken word poem.

“Ode to…Personification”- Traditional Form/New Spin
Students will be introduced to several ode poems, both classic and traditional. Participants will then be led in a multistep writing workshop, incorporating elements of personification, eventually guiding them to the creation of their own ode poem. This workshop will also place strong emphasis on imagery and diction.

“Ekphrasis and Empathy”- A Thousand Words
Students will choose from preselected photographs. The source photos will range topically but will all deal with global issues. Students will then be led in a writing and discovery exercise from the inside out. They will create the story of the photograph and then learn truth behind the photograph, people involved, and global issue being addressed.

“Dealers Choice”- Create Your Workshop
Teachers will be able to choose from over 40 preselected workshops and writing prompts organized by literary term and/or social issue. From there, depending on the needs of the students, the teacher can discuss with the facilitator personally tailored workshop.

RUNNING BACK by Jacqueline Jules He’s on the big screen again, with padded shoulders, and shiny tight pants. The number on his jersey identifies him clearly for the cameras and the crowd, as he clamps a strap under his chin, without ever looking up. I watch from my living room, sometimes booing, sometimes cheering, but always wishing I could put on a helmet and run like that— past all those guys trying to knock me down— not caring a bit who’s booing or who’s cheering, ’cause I’ve got the ball in my hand.

Jacqueline Jules is an award-winning poet and author of 40 books for young readers including the Zapato Power series, the Sofia Martinez series, Duck for Turkey Day, Feathers for Peacock, and Never Say a Mean Word Again. Her poems for young people have appeared in The Poetry Friday Anthologies, One Minute Till Bedtime, Cicada, Cricket, YARN, and Germ Magazine. Jacqueline is also the author of Tag Your Dreams: Poems of Play and Persistence, a poetry book for readers 8-12.

“Words, arranged in just the right order, can provide a breathtaking moment for a reader. A good poem illuminates emotion the way a soap bubble reflects rainbow colors. Sharing the power of poetry with students offers a lifelong medium for self-expression and reading enjoyment.”

The poet will speak with the classroom teacher prior to all of the above sessions to fully understand the needs of students and goals of instruction. If the technology is available, poems will be projected on a screen for classroom reading. 

Offered Programs:

GET ACTIVE: WRITING POEMS ABOUT SPORTS  (3RD-8TH)
In this workshop, I will share poems using imagery from sports and athletic activities. Students will then create their own free verse poem about a favorite sport. To read some examples of students who tried this in their classroom, see the work of Mrs. Skelly’s and Mrs. Luke-Byk’s Fourth-Grade Students at https://ow.ly/rXmzA

THE POETRY FRIDAY ANTHOLOGY WORKSHOP:  (1st-8th)
The Poetry Friday Anthologies edited by Sylvia Vardell and Janet Wong offer a set of 36 poems for grade levels K-8 in two separate volumes. These poems written by over 70 different poets, including Jane Yolen, X.J. Kennedy, Betsy Franco, Jack Prelutsky, Kenn Nesbitt, and Jacqueline Jules connect to standards for poetry instruction and include classroom activities. This workshop will use poems from the anthologies as writing models and introduce the concept of Poetry Friday—enjoying a poem a week every Friday of the school year. For more information visit:  https://ow.ly/rXmJJ

THE MUSIC OF ALLITERATION: (3rd-8th)
This workshop explores alliteration in depth, showing how this poetic device can be used to increase the musicality of poems. Writing activities encourage students to use alliteration in place of rhyme and demonstrate the power of alliterative language.

THE POWER OF A FEW WORDS: (4th-12th)
In this workshop, we will discuss economy of language—how every word in a poem must contribute meaning. Students will examine models and analyze the poet’s careful word choice. Writing activities will emphasize revision techniques for tightening poems and making strong word choices.  POETRY WORKSHOP TAILORED TO CLASSROOM NEEDS: (1ST -12)  As an experienced teacher and presenter, I can craft a poetry lesson based on an individual classroom teacher’s needs and subject matter.

DESPITE SPRING By Michael C. Davis The inner light of the gallery is muted. The long scroll of jonquils  is brushed in ink, without color. Color is in it though. The blossoms in radiant grays; the leaves black and blown gloriously by unseen breezes on some undulation the artist had just found and executed for us all. The scroll calls all other things of the world into question. Each blade, each corona deliberately formed, bright with being in the gallery’s tempered light.

“I have been working with the Pick a Poet program since 1999…I particularly like working with children in the earlier grades and getting them to think outside of themselves, see the world in a new way, and express what they find.”

For each workshop handouts with poetic examples are provided. Each workshop opens with a free association word exercise and closes with reading to give students the opportunity to share. 

Offered Programs:

Persona/Point of View (1-12)
We eye a world that looks right back at us. In this workshop, we will invent creatures and things around us with their own poetic lives: the clock, the blackboard, the ball on a field, the television hanging from the wall. Possibilities surround us. How can we make them speak? Observation, imagination, and metaphor are emphasized.

Words and Magic: Pulling a Poem Out of Your Hat -NEW (1-12)
Writing is the only occupation that has its own malady – writer’s block. There is no carpenter’s block, or painter’s block. How do we start to write a poem from nothing and have a draft within an hour? A free association on a word will give us a start. A universe of ideas and objects will give us a subject. What we gather through our senses and emotions will give us an approach. Metaphor and simile will guide our senses and emotions to give the poem an arc. And what we know of the rhythms of words and speech will suggest a form. Poetry as meditation with a pencil is emphasized.

Counting Down; Counting Up (K-2)
During this workshop, students work on a group poem. Borrowing from the poet Paul Janeczko, we write a poem of two-line stanzas that start with 1 or 10 and count up to 10 or down to zero. The students propose and vote on the subject for the poem and its setting and then work on the rhymes for the poems. So the subject could be lizards, the setting could be the woods. If the number is four, the stanza could be: ”Four large lizards climbed a tall pine tree/One stubbed his green toe, and then there were three. “ Arithmetic, rhyming, description, and group participation are emphasized.

Wishes and Dreams (K-2)
In this workshop, students’ wishes and dreams become poems. We write a group poem in which each student contributes a line. Then we turn to writing our own poems, developing our wishes and dreams. Imagination, metaphor, and group writing are emphasized.

The Five Senses (1-12)
How can we involve all of our senses in a poem? How can we use simile and metaphor to make our poems taste, feel, look, sound, and smell? How can this work for a poem about baseball, a swing set, or a pizza? Tell me what the pepperoni feels, what the baseball hears as it lands in the glove, etc. Memory, imagination, and metaphor are emphasized.

Letters and Odes (1-12)
An ode is like a letter to a loved one: “Dear June 5th…”, “O bird …”, “Bee! I’m expecting you!…” In this workshop, we use simple forms of address to fashion odes to what we like most or like least in order to tap our emotions and harness them for a poem. Observation, imagination, and metaphor are emphasized.

Planting My daughter and I are planting seeds. It’s early spring, the long Covid winter behind us, more uncertainty ahead. We’ve stopped numbering our griefs, started holding tighter to the loved ones still with us. I dig small holes with my fingers and my daughter drops in seeds then we both smooth dirt on top. When she was younger she worried when the seeds disappeared; she’d try to dig them up again to make sure they were okay. Now she’s older, patient. She knows to leave them alone, to water them and wait. Every day she goes out with the watering can to check and one afternoon about a week later she’s jumping by the window, motioning for me to come outside and see the small green sprouts that will become lettuce or peas. Wow, she whispers, and because her wonder is contagious I allow myself to be amazed, too, by how the earth keeps going, putting forth its tiny seeds after every long winter having faith some of them will dig in roots and grow.

Holly Karapetkova is the current Poet Laureate of Arlington, Virginia. She is the author of two award-winning books of poetry, Towline and Words We Might One Day Say. She is also a translator and the author of a number of books for children, and her research interests include the use of writing to heal from trauma and the power of literature to engage with social issues. Her current creative projects grapple with the deep wounds left by our history of racism, slavery, and environmental destruction. She lives in Arlington and teaches literature and writing at Marymount University.

Offered Programs:

Poems of Gratitude 
The past several years have been difficult for everyone in our community, including our children and young adults. Loss of loved ones, quarantine and social isolation, and general anxiety about the future have caused mental health challenges that we are only beginning to understand. Research has shown that gratitude can be a powerful tool in managing stress and anxiety and giving us a positive, empowered approach to our lives. (This brief article summarizes some of that research: https://www.self.com/story/gratitude-benefits.)

In this workshop, we’ll begin by taking a few minutes to reflect on and then list all of the things we are grateful for in our lives (people, places, events/experiences/memories, animals, things in nature, things in the world). Then we’ll choose three items from our list and begin to brainstorm a list of concrete senses that describe each of our items. We’ll focus on conveying our appreciation in sensory details and images that paint a clear picture of our items for others. Then we’ll decide which of our three descriptions (one, two, or all three) we want to keep to use in our final poem. We’ll work on titling our poem, formatting lines and stanzas, and turning our poem into a complete first draft. The workshop will include sample poems and a brief discussion of how imagery and figurative language can help us convey our ideas.

Fountain Grass Today, I am soloist, lone dancer on a backlit stage. I’ve been waiting all night, poised, my silver feather plumes curled forward, resting. Then sunrise, my cue to wake, to stretch my slender waver- ing stalks: body must become one-with mind, with wind and rain and breath, with love- the graceful arch in the small of the back

“I find that helping young children appreciate poetry to be a truly rewarding experience. They are so open to hearing about poetry, to hearing poems read to them, and, especially, to using their imaginations to create their own work. They are so pleased to realize that they really do have something important to say and enjoy the challenge of writing a poem.”

The goal of each of the workshops listed below is for each student to have at least a draft of a poem that they may finish in school or at home. Many will have finished poems. If there is time at the end of the workshop, I ask for volunteers to read their poems aloud to the class. They take great pride in their creative works.

Offered Programs:

Finding the Poet Inside of Us (Grades: K-4)
Each workshop begins by reading a few poems to the students that help them to become familiar with various tools of the poet: images, similes, metaphors, and rhythm (as opposed to rhyming). Students are then led through some warm-up exercises, such as “clouds taste like…” or “my brother’s feet are as large as…” and are asked to fill in the blanks. With a bit of prodding, their creative thinking takes over, and they begin to find their poetic voices. The collaborative effort builds their confidence and frees up their thinking.

Which Came First, the Poem or the Painting? (Grades: 4-12)
Students will explore the relationship between poetry and painting, experimenting first with composing a response poem from a painting I provide. The response poem can be inspired by a feeling, a narrative of what seems to be taking place in the painting, or written in the voice of a character or color in the painting. Then, students will compose a drawing in response a poem(s) I read. Similarly, the drawing may reflect a feeling, a narrative, or colors the poem inspires. Art materials should be provided by the school.

Using Our Senses to Find Our Poetic Voice (Grades: 2-12)
I encourage the students to use their senses in poetry writing. When using the senses in a poem, just about any topic will work, so consider this for having the students write about nature, the environment, or even social studies topics.

Let Poetry Take You by Storm (Grades: 4-12)
A workshop for any ages (elementary through high school) that can easily be tied into a lesson on weather, but does not rely on that. Most students have been in some type of storm before, even if a rain or thunderstorm, so they can write from personal experience. Storms make excellent topics for poetry. In this workshop, I first read some poetry about storms and lead discussion about what is being described and why the poet chose certain images and words. Then I divide the class into groups and have each student write a short poem (about 5 lines) on the storm they have been assigned, e.g., snowstorm, tornado, thunderstorm. I circulate around the room, ensuring each student is able to come up with something. They then rewrite the poem on a small piece of paper and illustrate it. Then, each student glues their short poem onto a banner that reads, “Let Poetry Take You by Storm.” The banner makes a wonderful visual for the classroom or hallway. Each student contributes to the “banner,” yet each student also has his/her own poem.

Squeeze Wherever you are is somewhere sour or sweet— a lemon heaven full of juice to squeeze. Some days sting and others pour like sugar from your spoon. This lemon heaven isn’t high or blue but here, and yellow, and you, only you, are holding it in your hand.

 Heidi Mordhorst writes for children and adults and is the author of two collections for young readers: Squeeze: Poems from a Juicy Universe and Pumpkin Butterfly: Poems from the Other Side of Nature. Her work appears in several of The Poetry Friday Anthologies, One Minute Till Bedtime, the professional book Poems Are Teachers, The Poetry of US, and the middle-school anthologies Imperfect I, Imperfect II and Rhyme & Rhythm: Poems for Student Athletes. She currently provides multi-arts workshops and afterschool programs through her organization WHISPERshout Writing Workshop.

“Poetry is the perfect genre for young readers and writers; it’s art class using words.With a handful of juicy words, kids can experience the power of putting their whole selves on paper—intellectual, social and emotional. As an ESOL-certified early literacy specialist, I bring the tools, strategies and supports that enable all children to unleash their creativity.”

Offered Programs:

WHAT DO POETS DO? (PreK-2nd)
In this workshop, beginning poets will learn what a poem is—an art project made of words!—and 3 ways that poets work. First, poets choose juicy words that sound good together. Second, poets choose how to arrange their words. Third, poets try to create strong feelings. We’ll observe this by sharing 3 short poems on a topic that connects with your curriculum, and then we’ll build poems collaboratively or individually as determined by the developmental level of the students. Movement and rhythm are a big part of this experience! Read more here: https://bit.ly/whatdoKpoetsdo

A LITTLE SLICE OF EARTH (PreK-5th)
Every day is Earth Day, and every day offers a new opportunity to get intimate with our planet. In this workshop students will step outside to collect a nature object, if possible, or select one from my collection. We’ll use all our senses to get to know this little slice of Earth and, working collaboratively or individually, write poems that begin with color and shape and expand to employ metaphor and simile. Read more here: https://bit.ly/littlesliceofearth

POEMS FOR TWO VOICES/POEMAS A DOS VOCES (2nd-5th) Thisworkshopexploresthe imaginative possibilities of writing a dialogue between two characters in a setting. When children put on the mantle of another character—also known as pretend play—they can access voice, emotion and authority that might not usually be available to them. Two voices can also mean two languages! We’ll begin with 2 or 3 short poems, at least one bilingual, and work with a printable that helps young writers organize their dialogue. Read more here: https://bit.ly/poems42voices

DIVING INTO THE DEFINITO (3rd-6th)
I am the creator of a poetry form called the Definito. It’s a free verse poem of 8-12 lines that demonstrates the meaning of a less common word, which always ends the poem.This workshop is all about the sound and sense of individual words and how we learn, understand and explain meaning. It’s ideal for gifted students and classes who might be studying word roots and origins or language tone and register. Read more here: https://bit.ly/definitohm

POETRY WORKSHOP TAILORED TO CLASSROOM NEEDS (PreK-5th)
Using my combination of teacher and poet skills, I can design a custom poetry workshop based on your class’s needs and curriculum. Read more here and let’s talk! https://bit.ly/2ndcoralreefpoems

SECOND BORN By Lori Rottenberg You are the day of short sleeves in March, the bouquet held behind the back, the giggling group waiting in the darkened room. Named only for yourself, you carry no weight, gliding in the glorious center of your own moment. With your sunburst face, you teach that love is not a cup, but a window: hearts cannot overfill, instead they open to the infinite we are willing to admit.

“…I enjoy showing children how magical poetry can be and how easy it really is to start to view the world with the eyes of a poet.”

Offered Programs:

These Are a Few of My Favorite Things: Simile Games (K-1st)
In this workshop, the very youngest students will learn about the magic of similes and how they can turn one thing into another! While we get students moving as quickly as a cheetah and as gracefully as a ballerina, we will explain the special use of “like” or “as” and give students the chance to come up with their own magical comparisons! Depending on student level and teacher preferences, students will create their own similes to write an “I am” poem or a poem about one of their favorite things.

The Magic of Poetry (Grades 2nd—5th)
In this workshop, children will learn to see the world through the eyes of a poet. Students will learn how to make “magical comparisons” using metaphors, and delight in the power of changing one thing into another! After we read some famous children’s poets who use cool examples of these types of magical comparisons, kids will get to test-drive their word wizardry using fun props and writing prompts that they will really enjoy. Depending on the season and your curriculum needs, we use spring blooms, seashells, or other materials as launching points for the children’s writing, and close with a chance for the children to share the results of their spells!

Poetry in Music (Grades 6th—8th)
Looking for a way to make poetry cool? In this workshop, students will get to discuss the power of poetry by using popular music lyrics as texts. We will talk about the special way that good poets and singer-songwriters see the world by analyzing the “magical comparisons” used in the music of current pop artists. The music will show the power and expressiveness of similes, metaphors, and personification, and give kids a chance to use these tools in their own writing. Middle-school children often already understand these concepts but hesitate using them in their writing, so it’s a fun way to reinforce the concepts you have been teaching in your poetry lessons. The workshop will include time for students to practice using figurative language to create their own poems or lyrics and will require a CD player for the use of the instructor’s music.

Love Is a Battlefield…or Is It? (Grades 9th-12th)
By high school, students are very familiar with figurative language, but may not realize what a big part metaphors play in the way we understand the world or even our lives. In this workshop, we will examine the metaphors used to describe romantic relationships as presented in popular song lyrics, and then discuss how the metaphors chosen help us understand the way the author sees the world. Teachers may ask students to prepare for this workshop by bringing in relevant song lyrics to supplement those brought by the instructor and to ensure that the workshop is maximally current and relevant to students’ lives. After discussion, students will have the chance to write their own original metaphors in poems to describe love.

Driving to Juniata for David Hutto Up there’s the interstate, peeping through trees. Down here among hollows, satellite dishes, a man on his deck guzzles beer, wishes he were driving that highway. His fancy speeds past the graveyard of riding mowers, the three- foot ceramic gnome squatting on the lawn beside a cabin whose mailbox reads “Yablonski” – speed’s his algorithm for life, for freedom. I don’t know where America lives, but I know in my bones she’s down here, among red-lacquered barns, weed-choked byways, plank bridges. She bleeds through the landfills, the tiered ridges of doublewides, the hand-lettered placards with directions to Jesus: be patient. Go slow.

Katherine E. Young is the author of Day of the Border Guards, 2014 Miller Williams Arkansas Poetry Prize finalist, and two chapbooks. Her poems have appeared in Prairie Schooner, The Iowa Review, Subtropics, and many others; her translations of contemporary Russian-language poetry and prose have won international awards. Young was named a 2020 Arlington County Individual Artist Grant recipient and a 2017 National Endowment for the Arts translation fellow. From 2016-2018 she served as Arlington’s inaugural Poet Laureate

“Regardless of the age group, I start all workshops with questions: what is a poem? Why write one? What tools can you use to write poems? I love going into classrooms where kids are excited to host a visiting poet, “but I particularly enjoy the challenge of going into classrooms where kids expect to be bored by poetry”

Offered Programs:

POETRY SPEAKS OUT (Grades 10-12)
Incorporating examples from contemporary poetry of witness and provocation, this workshop encourages students to write their own truths in poems that respond to current events (political, social, cultural, environmental — can be tailored to the issues that interest your students). Special emphasis on what distinguishes poetry from sloganeering. Best suited for students who respond well to perspectives that may differ from their own.

WISHES, LIES, AND DREAMS (Grades K-5)
Using sample poems that incorporate nonsense words, rhyme, repetition, chanting, personification, and other poetry tools, this workshop challenges students to write wish, lie, or dream poems.

POETRY OF THE SENSES (Grades K-5)
Using sample poems that highlight the senses, as well as visual and tactile prompts, this workshop encourages students to write poems about a given topic (a person, place, season, or event) that start with the five senses.

Where I Live (Grades K-12) NEW!
Family, home, neighborhood, school, community, suburb: it’s easy to look right past the people and things we see every day! Using techniques ranging from metaphor to personification to humor and irony (where appropriate), students will use poetry to get reacquainted with people and places they think they already know and explore just how extraordinary everyday life in Arlington can be.

POETRY TO ORDER (Grades K-12)
Tell me what you’d like to highlight and I’ll build a lesson around it. All workshops include discussion of what makes a poem (and how poems differ from prose), attention to the tools poets use, and a writing exercise for students.