Playing with Poetic Forms

These ideas on playing with poetic forms are taken from NCTE publications and from the ReadWriteThink Web site.

Exploring the Power of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Words through Diamante Poetry (ReadWriteThink)
Encourage your students to explore the ways that powerful and passionate words communicate the concepts of freedom, justice, discrimination, and the American Dream in Martin Luther King, Jr.’s "I Have a Dream" speech by paying attention to the details of King's speech as they read and as they gather words to use in their own original poems.

Expanding Vision: Teaching Haiku (English Journal, Jan 2002) 
Opening students to the wonders of haiku offers students the chance to focus on meaning and effect, to respond to the natural world, and to practice their use of concrete language.

Looking at Form: Haiku (Excerpt from Chapter 4 of Studying Poetry: Activities, Resources, and Texts) (NCTE Chalkface Series, 2001)
Studying a simple form such as the haiku can reveal a lot about the way in which
form influences the reading and writing of poetry.

For additional poetry resources, visit the Poetry area of the NCTE Store (http://www.ncte.org/store/books/poetry)