"Poe, A Tree"

April is National Poetry Month for 2015 

Children absolutely love sounds that flow, float, sizzle and slide off the tongue. It helps to make words attractive. Beauty is in poetry. (The four poems inside the pictures are Mr. Shel Silverstein creations, true inpiration for Papa Green Bean.)

An excellent way to creating your first poem with your child is to make it an acrostic poem. This is when the first letter of each line spells out a word. As this link Poetry for Kids states, the first word can be the child's name or a friends name, like papa.

Poetry does not have to rhyme
And
Prose can be beautiful lines.
All you need is paper, pencil, and time.

The lovely and talented Amy Heath writes a blog Unraveling Y . She is currently in her second year of writing one acrostic poem a day. Now here is a really cool aspect of her fun poetry challenge. She willingly accepts readers words for future poems. Amy adds her own title but always gives full credit to the word's originator. It would be a lovely exercise to explain to your child that their word will be made into an acrostic poem and published! Just click on the link above. I gave Amy the word,  foible, defined as -

Foible: a minor weakness or eccentricity in someone's character. 

"they have to tolerate each other's little foibles".

Here is Amy's terrific poem:

Flexibility

Flaws and quirks we may
Observe as endearing traits 
In loved ones; they might
Bend quite far 
Like a fencing foil, but we 
Embrace them as they are.

For children a little older, Haiku poems are a good challenge. The Haiku style of poetry, in America, is considered three lines with 5 syllables in the first line, 7 in the second , and 5 in the third. I wrote a Haiku here and also made it in acrostic form, with the word toy.

Tantilizing play.
Over, under, everywhere.
Yearning, learning, joy.

"Babbling baby's beautiful banter bubbles n' brushes beyond" 

For more ideas, The Book Chook's Susan Stephenson has an outstanding list of poetry activities for children of all ages on her POETRY WITH KIDS page.

Happy imaginating and creating, Papa Green Bean