My First Poetry Friday!

 

     I've been wanting to participate in Poetry Friday for a long time, but haven't for various reasons.  No more stalling!  I'm going to jump in.  Visit Jone's blog to find the roundup.  Today I want to share my love for novels in verse.  I just finished Words with Wings by Nikki Grimes, and it reminded me how skilled a writer must be to write so sparely and yet say so much.  Here are my intermediate grade favorites in this genre:

 

Words with Wings by Nikki Grimes

 

I was rooting for Gabby, a daydreamer and outcast who just needed someone to believe in her when she moved to a new school after her parents' divorce. Grimes's words, like Gabby's, definitely had wings.     Home of the Brave by Katherine Applegate   "Fiction, it's been said, makes immigrants of us all." Wow. I sure wish I had read this before now. What a fabulous book! It would make a perfect pairing with Applegate's Newbery Award Winner, The One and Only Ivan since they have the same theme topics - hope and home. It would also pair up brilliantly with Inside Out & Back Again. Several of my students read this novel in verse during our unit and enjoyed it a lot. Applegate tells the story of Kek who comes to a Minnesota refugee center in...more "Fiction, it's been said, makes immigrants of us all." What a fabulous book! It would make a perfect pairing with Applegate's Newbery Award Winner, The One and Only Ivan since they have the same theme topics - hope and home.   This book would also make an excellent read aloud and a ladder to use in jr. high and high school reading classes to get ready for young adult and adult stories about refugees, The Lost Boys of Sudan, and child soldiers.     Love That Dog by Sharon Creech   What a masterpiece this book is. I don't know how Sharon Creech makes such an emotional story with so few words. It takes less than an hour to listen to the audio. This is a favorite in my classroom and has helped more than a few students after the loss of a pet.     Gone Fishing: A Novel in Verse by Tamara Will Wissinger, illustrated by Matthew Cordell     I thoroughly enjoyed this little book of poems that tell a story about a fishing trip from three points of view: Sam, the brother, Lucy, his annoying little sister, and their dad. Sam is so excited the night before his fishing trip with his dad. "Not Mom, not Grandpa, not Lucy...Just Dad and me." Lucy, however, has different ideas and talks her dad into letting her go, too. Matthew Cordell's illustrations show every dismayed and disappointed feelings in the expressions on Sam's face as he helps...more I thoroughly enjoyed this little book of poems that tell a story about a fishing trip from three points of view: Sam, the brother, Lucy, his annoying little sister, and their dad. Wissinger defines poetry techniques and poetic forms in "The Poet's Tackle Box" at the end. Cordell's illustrations capture each character's emotions and personality perfectly.     May B. by Caroline Starr Rose   This is one of my favorite novels in verse to recommend to kids new to the genre.  It grabs their attention right away, and readers can't help but be swept up in May B.'s struggle to survive on the winter prairie. Here are some videos with some of my favorite writers of novels in verse:   Margarita Engle     Thanhha Lai won the Newbery Honor and the National Book Award for Young People's Literature for her amazing novel in verse, Inside Out & Back Again in 2011.        I have some other favorites, but I'd love to hear about yours!  I love helping kids discover novels in verse.  It's important to give them strategies for reading this genre.  Kids tend to read them too quickly or abandon them too soon.  When they get the gist of how to read novels in verse, however, they can become an important and enjoyable part of students' reading repertoires.