Melissa Mengos, Hannah Jones, and Riley Williams

Teaching Poetry
Research
Poetry in the Past
When our students think of poetry, they often see two polarizing views. One view insists that
poetry is flowery, romantic, and the vehicle we use to declare our inner most desires to the ones we love
the most. The other view insists that poetry is a grim look into the angsty, death-driven, heartbreak-filled
inner monologue that is only appropriate to share so long as it is captured through the artistic aesthetic of
poetry. What these views have in common is that they often imply that the people who write poems are
limited to being deep and uniquely intellectual. The narrow perceptions we have of poetry can affect our
ability to teach it, which in turn affects our students’ ability to learn it and produce it. Poetry is
stigmatized, and has been because of the way teachers in the past have taught it.
In the 1970s, poetry was approached from three different teaching methods: model approach,
where students simply read poems and wrote imitations; activities approach, where teachers prompted the
students to write poems based on specific suggestions; and models and activities approach, where students
read a model poem and wrote imitations based on teacher-specified content. (Jacobs, 1977) These
approaches, combined with a narrow repertoire of poetry written by dead, white men, have made the
experience of learning and writing poetry a painful one for our students. To help break down the stigmas
of poetry past models of teaching have created, we have pulled together a list of research-based
approaches that will make teaching poetry more valuable for our students.

Mentor texts
Students in the beginning stages of poetry writing tend to commit the same poetry errors.
Beginning poets can write work that is full of adjectives (instead of strong verbs and nouns), cliches, and
awkwardly forced rhyming schemes. According to Carol Jago, the use of mentor texts help her students
avoid these common beginner mistakes. (35) By providing her students with a strong mentor text from
which they can model their writing, she avoids these mistakes from the very beginning of the
reading-writing process.
This is especially true when it comes time for students to edit their poetry. It can often be difficult
to encourage students to revise their work because what they wrote is heartfelt and meaningful to them.
However, writing can almost always be improved with a second look. Choosing mentor texts allows
students to learn through example.
Using mentor texts also allows students to learn concepts through experimentation. Students “will
find imitation a more powerful way to understand,” how rhythm, meter, structure, etc. work. (Jago, 34)
Likewise, “Mentor texts provide the examples students need in order to...​ ​recognize text structure and...
read a wide range of text with different formats and purposes if they are to become critical readers and
writers.” (Gallagher, 2011)

Culturally Relevant Teaching

It is important to incorporate culturally relevant texts into curriculum. Many students do not feel
connected or inspired by “traditional” poems, resulting in them lacking interest in learning and engaging
in work. By incorporating culturally relevant poems, students begin to feel motivated and engaged in the
work. As stated from the National Council of Teachers of English, ​“​By including culturally relevant
pieces, students will feel motivated and engaged in the piece of work. When students are asked to engage
with a piece of work that resonates with them they are able to learn and immerse themselves into the
literature...if we pay attention to the needs of our students, if we give them the freedom to explore and talk
and watch and listen and teach themselves, they become excited,” (NCTE, 2017). As stated here, when
we pay attention to the needs of our students, they will be more willing to participate and apply what they
are learning to their lives. By using culturally relevant texts and teaching in the classroom, students are
able to use texts relevant to today, to help them understand traditional classic works of literature. Also,
NCTE’s article, “The Rose That Grew from Concrete”: Postmodern Blackness and New English
Education”, suggests, “It is not a movement to replace the canon or the classics, but to complement them,
to add to them in a way that makes today as significant as yesterday. It takes place in the pedagogical
“third space”,” (NCTE, 2008). Teaching students culturally relevant texts should not replace the
traditional, classic texts in the classroom. These texts should expand upon the classics and help students
connect to them in today’s current society. Educators need to expand and utilize the pedagogical third
space in order for students to connect with the piece of works used in the classroom. By connecting
students personal experiences and lives to the texts used in the classroom, they will want to engage and
understand texts because they feel connected to them.

Reading Poetry Aloud

One way to help students understand the poems they read is to ask them to recite poetry out loud.
Partnered with The Poetry Foundation and The National Endowment of the Arts, Poetry Out Loud is a
formal competition where students can receive scholarships for participating in their poetry contents.
According to their research, “everything about the recitation draws you into the language of the poem.
You’ll also notice that each student has profoundly internalized their poem.” (Poetry Out Loud, 2018) By
asking students to perform their own - or others’ - work, teachers not only aid students in their ability to
understand texts through internalization, they get them to deconstruct, consume, and reproduce language
in a way that is their own. As students recite poems, it also draws other students in to the language that
they are hearing.

Close Reading
Another way teachers can help students understand poetry is through close readings. Close
readings, according to The Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC),
“stress engaging with a text of sufficient complexity [to] directly examine meaning…[and] encourage
students to read and reread deliberately,” to draw their own conclusions about the meaning of a text.
(Boyles, 2011) As students focus on the reading and rereading of poems, their attention is drawn to the
central ideas, supporting details, word choice, syntax, and structure of the text. Combining these steps
progressively, students are eventually able to arrive at their own understanding of the poem.
Close reading especially applies to the reading of shorter texts, like poetry. Unlike longer texts,
poems allow for students to focus on and practice their reading skills so that they can have a deep
understanding of the text in front of them. Boyles has suggested that while, “we don't want to abandon
longer texts, we should recognize that studying short texts is especially helpful if we want to enable
students with a wide range of reading levels to practice closely reading demanding texts.” (Boyles, 2012)
It could take weeks or even months to read through a 100-page novel to identify a theme or concepts
related to the text as a whole. A short text of a page or two can be digested in one lesson.
Student Choice
Another strategy to help students’ understand poetry and get them motivated about reading poetry
is encouraging student choice. Penny Kittle emphasizes the importance of student choice in her ​Nation
Council of Teachers of English​ article “The Top Five Reasons We Love Giving Students Choice in
Reading.” Kittle believes that choice allows students to select pieces of writing they are interested in,
which boosts their levels of engagement. The top five reasons regarding student choice that she found are:
choice empowers students, valuing student choices values the student, choice leads to real and meaningful
conversations, choice helps establish and deepen relationships between students and teachers, and choice
leads to independence, (Kittle 2013). Through student choice, we want these top five reasons to spill into
our lesson. By allowing students to read and write poetry of their choice, we hope our students will be
more engaged with the lesson and can discover how poetry is beneficial to their own lives. Allowing
choice in our lesson will meet the diverse interests and needs of our students.

Works Cited
Boyles, Nancy. “Closing in on Close Reading.”​ ​Common Core: Now What? ​vol. 70, no.4, ​Jan.
2013, ​pp. 36-41,
www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/dec12/vol70/num04/Closing-in-on-Cl
ose-Reading.aspx.
Gall​agher, Kelly. ​Write Like this: Teaching Real-world Writing Through Modeling & Mentor
​ tenhouse Publishers, 2011.
Texts. S
Jacobs, Lucky. “Three Approaches to the Teaching of Poetry Writing.” English Education, vol.
8, no. 3, 1977. pp. 161-167. ​http://www.jstor.org/stable/40172187
Jago, Carol. ​Nikki Giovanni in the Classroom: the same ol danger but a brand new pleasure.​
NCTE, 1999.
Kirkland, David E. “‘The Rose That Grew from Concrete’: Postmodern Blackness and New
English Education.” ​The English Journal​, vol. 97, no. 5, May 2008, pp. 69–75.,
www.jstor.org/stable/30046887?seq=1&cid=pdf-reference#page_scan_tab_contents​.
Kittle, Penny. ​Book Love Developing Depth, Stamina, Passion in Adolescent Readers.​
Heinemann, 2017,
pennykittle.net/uploads/images/PDFs/Workshop_Handouts/JulyBookLovehandouts.pdf.
“Learning Recitation: Poetry Out Loud.” ​Poetry Out Loud​, 2018,
www.poetryoutloud.org/poems-and-performance/video-recitation-series​.
NCTE. “How Students Helped to Discover the Relevancy of Poetry in the 21st Century.” ​NCTE,​
2017,
www2.ncte.org/blog/2017/05/students-helped-discover-relevancy-poetry-21st-century/.
Skeeters et al, Keri. “The Top Five Reasons We Love Giving Students Choice in Reading.”
English Leadership Quarterly,​ NCTE, Feb. 2016,
www.ncte.org/library/NCTEFiles/Resources/Journals/ELQ/0383-feb2016/ELQ0383Top.pdf​.

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Lesson One​: How does the meaning of poetry change when it is expressed in different mediums?
Essential Question: ​How is language transformed based on who delivers it?

Learning Objectives: ​To create new meaning based on the medium in which poetry is delivered

CSS Standards Addressed:

RL.9-10.7​ Analyze the representation of a subject or a key scene in two different artistic
mediums, including what is emphasized or absent in each treatment (e.g., Auden’s “Musée des Beaux
Arts” and Breughel’s Landscape with the Fall of Icarus).

Opener/Anticipatory Set/Activator/Motivator:​ ​Text message miscommunication opener. Begin class

by asking students “​Have you ever misinterpreted a text message?” Have students share stories about any
miscommunication they have experienced when texting. Show YouTube example of this
miscommunication. Relate this to poetry and the different meanings people can create based on the
medium it is performed. ​https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sulDhnFBahs

Academic Language Required: ​medium, word choice, interpretation

Instructional Strategies/Learning Tasks:

1. We will introduce the idea that language can be transformed based on who delivers it. Just like
the text message activity, words can have completely different meaning when you are simply
reading it compared to hearing and seeing someone say the words. We are going to be focusing
on poetry and how its meaning can change based on its medium. To begin, we will give every
student their own copy of “OCD” by Neil Hilborn.
2. We will model the type of reading and annotating we expect the students to do as they read.
Using the doc cam, we will read out loud the first paragraph. We’ll underline parts we think
should be emphasized, write comments, questions, and confusion. We will also point out the
word choice, repetition, structure, and style that we notice.
3. Each student will be given their own copy of “OCD” by Neil Hilborn. Students will take a few
minutes to read this poem silently as a way to familiarize themselves with the work. They are
expected to annotate as the read, and come up with their own meaning of the poem.
4. In pairs, students will discuss what they wrote down and try to come up with a meaning for the
poem. Students will take turns reading the poem out loud to one another. While one student reads
the poem out loud, the other student is following along on their written copy, annotating the
words or phrases that the reading student has emphasized. The annotating student should also
record when the reading student uses hand gestures, facial expressions, vocal inflection, etc.
throughout their reading of the poem. Students will switch so that both students have the
opportunity to read and annotate. They will briefly discuss why they chose to emphasize certain
words/ phrases over others.
5. We will come together as a class and debrief what they talked about in pairs. We’ll have the
student point to specific language that caused them to make meaning of the poem. We will
provide feedback as students answer and point out our own impressions of the poem.
 6. After the whole class discussion, the class will watch Neil Hilborn, the author of the poem,
perform “OCD.” As they watch this video, they will grab a different colored writing utensil to
annotate on the poem which words or phrases the author emphasizes, when they use hand
gestures, facial expressions, etc. ​https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnKZ4pdSU-s
7. After the class listens to Hilborn read his poem, students will get into groups of four and discuss
the new meaning they have come up with the poem as a result of watching it be performed by the
author. They will discuss what they wrote down in their new colored pencil and what exactly
made them change their interpretation of the poem. They will note the differences between what
the partner did to recite the poem and what Neil Hilborn did as he recited “OCD.”
8. We will have another whole class discussion. Each group will share what they discussed and what
new meanings they have drawn about these poem. We will then talk about how impactful the
medium in which something is performed affects the meaning of the words. We will provide
feedback during the discussion and share our own thoughts of how the poem has transformed
based on how it is read or seen.

Resources and Materials: ​class set of “OCD” poem by Neil Hilborn, colored utensils, doc cam,
projector

Accommodations for Special Learners:

Auditory learners will benefit from hearing the poem performed two different ways, the class discussion,
and listening to the opener video. Kinesthetic learners will enjoy performing of the poem to their partner,
allowing them to gain new meaning from it. Interpersonal learners will thrive when they work in pairs and
small groups. Interpersonal learners will excel when they read the poem individually. Verbal-linguistic
learners will enjoy the class discussion, small group discussion, performing the poem, discussing the
deeper meaning, and writing about all of these things. Visual learners will benefit from watching the
opener video and seeing the poem performed by the author.

Formative Assessment: ​As the students read along with the poem in partners and small groups, the
teacher will travel around the room listening to the conversations. The teacher will listen for students to
defend their reasoning behind their interpretation of the poem with evidence from the poem or video. The
teacher can also informally assess students based on the whole class conversation and the level of
feedback students need to understand the poem.

Summative Assessment: ​The teacher will collect annotations to see if students were able to identify
differences in performance, based on colored annotations. Students will also complete a quick write at the
end of class that explains their new understanding of the poem based on the different mediums they have
experienced with it. They must explain the specific language, gestures, vocal inflections, etc. that caused
them to come up with a new meaning.

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Lesson Two - Close Reading of Microaggressions

Essential Question​: How do microaggressions affect the everyday lives of people of color?

Learning Objectives​: Students will analyze the effect that word choice has on the meaning of a poem
and create a main idea of a text based on evidence found in a close reading of the poem.

CCSS Standards Addressed​:

● RL.9-10.4​ Analyze the cumulative impact of specific word choices on meaning, mood, and tone
(e.g., how the language evokes a sense of time and place or an emotion; how it sets a formal or
informal tone)

Resources and Materials​: Printouts of “You and your partner” by Claudia Rankine, from ​Citizen

Opener/Anticipatory Set/Activator/Motivator​:
● Chalk Talk: ​ The teacher will write the question in the middle of the dry-erase board: ​What is a
micro-aggression?​
○ Students will be encouraged to generate their thoughts individually or make connections
to other student’s thoughts by writing them on the dry erase board. Students may not
have experience with this word, but they are encouraged to make their best predictions as
to what it means. They may look to their peers’ responses for help. Give them 2-3
minutes to generate ideas.
○ After each student has written their thoughts on the board, the teacher will use their chalk
talk to talk about the ideas that students wrote. It is likely that not all students will know
what a micro-aggression is, so the teacher should take this as an opportunity for students
to share their experiences with microaggressions, or clarify what the word
“microaggression” means.

Instructi​onal Strategies/Learning Tasks:

1. The teacher will pass out copies of “You and your partner” to each student. Once students have
a copy of the handout, they will be given a theme or idea. Possible topics the teacher will decide
that students can explore are aggression or race. During this part of the lesson, students will do a
close reading by underlining or highlighting any word in the poem that they feel relates to the
topic given.
a. Before the students start to underline their poems, the teacher will place their own copy
of the poem under the document camera and use think aloud protocol to underline words
or phrases related to the topic, explain why they believe they are related, and the effect
that those words or phrases might have on the meaning of the text.
2. After students have read the poem individually and note the words or phrases they feel relate to
the topic, students will get with a partner. In their pairs, they will discuss what they found, how
their findings fit into the topic, and the effect that those words or phrases might have on the
meaning of the text. As students explain why they underlined what they did, they should be
annotating their text with these reasons.
3. When students finish sharing their annotations, the class will come back as a whole. The teacher
will ask students to volunteer some of the words or phrases they wrote down in their groups. As
 students volunteer their findings, the teacher will write them on the board for the whole class to
see.
4. When the board is full of ideas, the class will use the ideas written on the board as evidence to
create and support several possible main ideas in the poem.
a. Considering that the poem, which is told from second-person narration, is about
experiencing a microaggression and that the two topics suggested at the beginning of this
lesson are aggression or race, creating a main idea(s) will ​help students see the purpose of
the poem and connect their emerging thoughts about microaggressions to the text. If
students appear as though they are not making these connections to the text during their
whole class discussion, the teacher needs to make these connections explicit.
5. Quick Write:​ On an index card or a sheet of paper, students will respond to how they believe this
poem relates to micro-aggressions using either their close reading or the main idea as evidence.
After making these connections in their writing, students will write about what they think it is like
to be on the receiving end of a microaggression.

Accommodations for Special Learner​s​:

Interpersonal learners – This lesson accommodates for interpersonal learners during the paired
activity, because students are able to clarify and gain a better understanding of the text through
conversation.
Visual learners - ​This lesson accommodates visual learners by allowing students to see the
evidence they find on the board. Annotations on the board (such as connective arrows and grouping
certain idea together) can help visual learners see connections between ideas.
Linguistic learners- This lesson accommodates for linguistic learners through the use of the quick
write. The quick write allows students to use their writing as a method of exploring the essential
question.

Formative Assessmen​t​: During class discussion, an informal formative assessment can occur as the
teacher listens to students share and explain how the underlined words or phrases relate to the topic (race
or aggression.) The teacher can also provide students with verbal corrective feedback and encouragement
based on whether or not they were able to create main ideas using the evidence they identified from their
close reading.

Summative Assessmen​t: An informal summative assessment can occur when the teacher collects the
quick-write notecards at the end of class. Teachers can provide feedback to students on whether or not
they were able to connect the thematic material of the opening activity to the text and use either their main
ideas or the findings from their close reading as evidence to support these connections.
An informal summative assessment can also occur if the teacher collects the annotated poems. Teachers
will be looking to see what students found in relation to the topic (aggression or race) and if they were
able to explain how those words or phrases related to the topic.

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Lesson Three: Mentor Texts

Essential Question:
What is the power of words to effect change?

Learning Objectives:
To analyze the structure of a poem and identify the effect it has on the poem.

CSS Standards Addressed:

RL.9-10.5 ​Analyze how an author’s choices concerning how to structure a text, order events within it
(e.g., parallel plots), and manipulate time (e.g., pacing, flashbacks) create such effects as mystery, tension,
or surprise.

W.9-10.4​ Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization, and style are
appropriate to task, purpose, and audience. (Grade-specific expectations for writing types are defined in
standards 1–3 above.)

Resources and Materials:

“He Asks Me What I Do” poem by Rupi Kaur, from ​Milk and Honey, ​6 different colored pencils

Academic Language Required:

Structure, ​Line Breaks, Stanzas, Rhythm/Meter, Rhyme Scheme, Repetition

Opener/Anticipatory Set/Activator/Motivator:
Students will be asked to write a 5 minute quick-write answering the following essential question, “What
is the power of words to effect change?” which will be written on the board. After the 5 minutes, students
will then discuss, as a class, their ideas about the power of words and their beliefs on how they invoke
change. The teacher needs to navigate the discussion to be sure to hit on why the students believe words
can or cannot effect change and why. The teacher, during the class discussion, will also focus on the
negative and positive impact words can have. Give examples of events where words helped evoke change.
(Ex. #MeToo movement, the hashtag brought awareness to sexual assault/violence).

Instructional Strategies/Learning Tasks:

1. Beginning the lesson, the teacher will introduce what poetry structure is. He/She will explain that
it is important to pay attention to aspects such as line breaks, stanzas, rhythm/meter, rhyme
scheme, and repetition. The teacher will then show a short PowerPoint explaining these terms and
what they mean, in terms of poetry. The teacher will then ask students why they think structure is
important in poetry and the effect it has on poetry. Teacher will then explain the importance of
poetry structure and how it helps convey the thoughts/feelings of a poem.
2. The teacher will then introduce the poem, ​He Asks Me What I Do, f​ rom the book, ​Milk and Honey
by Rupi Kaur. Each student will receive their own copy of the poem and it will also be displayed
on the SmartBoard. The students will also be given 6 different colored pencils which will come
into play later in the lesson.
 3. The teacher will model a think aloud of how to analyze a poem’s structure. The teacher will focus
on modeling the think-aloud with the first stanza of ​He Asks Me What I Do. H ​ e/She will focus on
each category of a poem’s structure: line breaks, stanzas, rhythm/meter, rhyme scheme, and
repetition while modeling the think-aloud. The teacher will focus on one category at a time, using
a different color to mark their thinking for each category. While modeling how to analyze each
component of a poem’s structure, the teacher will ask herself questions as to why this component
is important/ how it adds to the overall importance of the poem.
4. After modeling a think-aloud of the first stanza, the teacher separates students into predetermined
groups of 3 in order to analyze the rest of the poem’s structure using the 6 different colored
pencils for each different component. The teacher will wander around the room, monitoring
comprehension of the student groups.
5. The students will then come back together and have a class discussion about their findings of the
rest of the poems structure. The teacher will then ask how the poem’s structure affected how the
poem was read/conveyed, based on the students’ findings.
6. Tying in the Essential Question, the students will then be asked to write their own poems about
something they would like to see changed in society, focusing on the poem’s structure to convey
their point. They should use components such as repetition, line length, rhyme schemes, etc. to
develop the poems structure and meaning.
7. At the end of the lesson, students will be asked to volunteer to share their poems, in order to hear
how structure affects a poem, if they are comfortable with doing so. The teacher will collect all
students’ poems at the end of class as an assessment to monitor students’ comprehension.

Accommodations for Special Learners:

● Interpersonal Learners: Students will be placed in groups of 3 allowing students to have
discussions about their findings and ideas of the poem. This will allow them to talk through their
ideas through discussion and working with others.
● Aural Learners: Students will be able to read the poem aloud in their groups and listen to how the
structure affects the way a poem is conveyed and read aloud. Instead of just reading the poem
they are able to read it aloud, listening to the differences, before writing their own poems.
● Visual Learners: Students who learn well visually will be able to follow along with the
think-aloud following the color-coded components of a poem’s structure. By color-coding the
components students will be able to follow along easier and associating a color with a component.
● English Language Learners: ELL students will be placed in groups with students who are native
speakers. This will allow ELLs to get extra help understanding what is being focused on in the
groups. The color-coding of a poem’s structure will also help students follow along and see
exactly what is being analyzed in the poem.

Formative and Summative Assessment:

● Formative Assessment:​ For the Formative Assessment, the teacher will walk around the room
monitoring the student groups of 3. The teacher will walk around stopping by each group to make
sure they are understanding the importance of a poem’s structure. The teacher will ask them why
 they are annotating the poem the way they are and how that contributes to the overall
meaning/importance of the poem, monitoring the students’ comprehension.
● Summative Assessment:​ For the Summative Assessment, the teacher will collect the poems the
students wrote, modeling the “He Asks Me What I Do”​ ​poem. By collecting these poems, the
teacher can see if the students understood how the components of a poem’s structure affects the
way a poem is conveyed, adding to its overall meaning. If the student’s poem seems to utilize the
components in a correct way the teacher will the know student comprehension was successful.

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Lesson Four: Student Choice in Poetry

Essential Question:​ How does language help us understand ourselves?

LOGISTICS OF LESSON

Learning Objectives:​ Students will use close reading strategies to analyze the word choice in poetry to
understand its deeper meaning and present their poetry to the class.

CSS Standards Addressed:

SL.9-10.4​ Present information, findings, and supporting evidence clearly, concisely, and logically such
that listeners can follow the line of reasoning and the organization, development, substance, and style are
appropriate to purpose, audience, and task

Opener/Anticipatory Set/Activator/Motivator​: Students will begin class by doing a free write that
answers the following questions: Who am I? What do I value? How do I define my identity? Students will
be given 10 minutes to complete this activity. I will write one as well and share my free write with the
class. Using the doc cam, I’ll underline key words in my poem that help me find a theme about my
identity and values. I’ll then ask for student volunteers to share their free writes. All students will be
asked to underline key words or phrases that summarize who they are. They will use these underline
words to guide their research of a poem. This lesson centers on student choice. After completing the free
write opener, students will research poems of their choice that align with the underlined words used to
describe themselves and their values.

Instructional Strategies/Learning Tasks:

1. I will introduce the concept of presenting poetry in an effective way by reviewing the ​Poetry 180
tips on how to effectively read poetry and encourage students to follow these tips when reading
their poems to the class. I’ll motivate students by explaining how important it is to be able to
successfully present yourself to others, especially when applying to college or jobs. Students will
also be motivated by sharing a poem of their choice, that are meaningful to them and reflective of
their identity.
2. I will model how to effectively read a poem out loud. I will follow the ​Poetry 180​ tips and
explain how I applied these tips to my recitation of my poem. I’ll share how exactly I applied
 these tips to my speech. After reading my poem, I will explain how it applies to my life. I will
point of specific words from the poem that justify why it relates to my identity. I’ll write these
words on the board, and ask students to decide a theme for the poem based off these words.
3. Students will research poems that reflect that resonates with their own lives and relates to the key
words they underlined in their quick writes. The poems students choose are up to them, allowing
them express themselves and discover who they are.
4. In small groups of 3 or 4, students will practice reading their poems out loud. They should be
conscious of the ​Poetry 180​ tips as they do this. Each group member will read his or her poem out
loud to the group. Students will also share with their small group why they chose this poem and
which specific words relate to their lives. Peers will listen to each other present and provide
feedback based on the ​Poetry 180​ tips.
5. As a class, we will come together and review the skills that make for effective poetry reading in a
group discussion. Students will talk about their process of reading poetry out loud and share how
their poem represented their lives. We will listen for the specific words students point out in the
poem to defend their reasoning.
6. We will then have students stand in front of the class, read their poem and explain how this poem
relates to their lives. I will show students the rubric I am using to grade them as they present. I
will provide feedback as each student recites their poem and explain its significant. I’ll refer back
to the ​Poetry 180 t​ ips when giving feedback and ensure students are justifying their rationale for
using the poem through specific words from the poem.

Accommodations for Special Learners:

Linguistic students will benefit from the free write activity, writing their own poem, and verbally sharing
why they choose their poem. Intrapersonal learners will thrive when they research poems independently
and create their own original poems. Interpersonal learners will appreciate the group work and discussing
their poetry as a class. Visual-spatial students will excel when I write the words from my researched poem
on the board and when I underline words from my poem using the doc cam. Auditory learners will enjoy
hearing the poems read out loud and listening for the ​Poetry 180​ tips. Musical learners could use song
lyrics as their researched poem and write an original poem in a song lyric format.

Formative and Summative Assessment:

For a formative assessment, I will observe each small group as they practice reciting their poems and
explaining how it relates to their lives. I will listen for the students’ ability to follow the guidelines of how
to read a poem out loud by ​Poetry 180,​ and their justification of why the poem reflects their identity by
pointing out specific words in the poem. I will provide verbal feedback to each group as they practice.

To summative assess students, I will grade them as they present their poem of choice to the class. I’ll
grade students on their ability to recite a poem and their reasoning behind why their poem represents their
identity and values. I will fill out a rubric as the students present, write down feedback on the rubric, and
give students these rubrics the next day. I will also verbally give feedback after students have presented.

………………………………………………………………………………
 OCD – Neil Hilborn

The first time I saw her, everything

in my head went quiet. All the tics,
all the constantly refreshing images,
just disappeared. When you have

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder,

you don’t really get quiet moments.
Even in bed I’m thinking

did I lock the doors yes

did I wash my hands yes
did I lock the doors yes
did I wash my hands yes.

But when I saw her, the only thing

I could think about was the hairpin curve
of her lips or the eyelash on her cheek

the eyelash on her cheek

the eyelash on her cheek.

I knew I had to talk to her.

I asked her out six times.
In thirty seconds. She said yes
after the third one, but none of them
felt right so I had to keep going.

On our first date, I spent more time

organizing my meal by color
than I did eating or talking to her,

but she loved it. She loved

that I had to kiss her goodbye
sixteen times, or twenty-four times

if it was Wednesday. She loved that

it took me forever to walk home
because there are lots of cracks
in our sidewalk.

When we moved in together,

she said that she felt safe,
like no one would ever rob us
because I definitely locked the door
18 times. I’d always watch her mouth

when she talked when she talked when

she talked when she talked. When she

said she loved me, her mouth would curl up

at the edges. At night, she’d lay in bed
and watch me turn all the lights off and on

and off and on and off and on and off

and on and off. She’d close her eyes
and imagine that days and nights
were passing in front of her.

Some mornings, I’d start kissing her

goodbye but she’d just leave because
I was making her late for work.

When I stopped in front of a crack in the sidewalk,

she just kept walking. When she said
she loved me, her mouth was a straight line.

She told me that I was taking up too much

of her time. Last week she started
sleeping at her mother’s place.

She told me that she shouldn’t

have let me get so attached to her,
that this whole thing was a mistake,
but how can it be a mistake

that I don’t have to wash my hands

after I touch her? Love is not a mistake.
It’s killing me that she can run away
from this and I just can’t. I can’t

go out and find someone new

because I always think of her.

Usually, when I obsess over things,

I see germs sneaking into my skin.
I see myself crushed by an endless
succession of cars. She was the first
beautiful thing I ever got stuck on.
I want to wake up every morning
thinking about the way she

holds her steering wheel. How she turns

shower knobs like she's opening a safe.
How she blows out candles blows out

candles blows out candles

blows out candles blows out
candles blows out candles
blows out –

now, I just think about who else

is kissing her. I can’t breathe because
he only kisses her once. He doesn’t care
if it’s perfect. I want her back so bad,

I leave the door unlocked.

I leave the lights on.
“He Asks Me What I Do...” by ​Rupi Kaur
(​Milk and Honey)​
 From ​Citizen,​ by Claudia Rankine
You and your partner go to see the film ​The House We Live In.​ You ask your friend to
pick up your child from school. On your way home your phone rings. Your neighbor tells
you he is standing at his window watching a menacing black guy casing both your
homes. The guy is walking back and forth talking to himself and seems disturbed.

You tell your neighbor that your friend, whom he has met, is babysitting. He says, no,
it’s not him. He’s met your friend and this isn’t that nice young man. Anyway, he wants
you to know, he’s called the police.

Your partner calls your friend and asks him if there’s a guy walking back and forth in
front of your home. Your friend says that if anyone were outside he would see him
because he is standing outside. You hear the sirens through the speakerphone.

Your friend is speaking to your neighbor when you arrive home. The four police cars are
gone. Your neighbor has apologized to your friend and is now apologizing to you.
Feeling somewhat responsible for the actions of your neighbor, you clumsily tell your
friend that the next time he wants to talk on the phone he should just go in the backyard.
He looks at you a long minute before saying he can speak on the phone wherever he
wants. Yes, of course, you say. Yes, of course.