Elizabeth Joy Levinson

Tomorrow, for about 30 seconds, I’ll be talking to fellow teachers about why poetry belongs in all classrooms, not just the English classroom. I hope I can squeeze the following in:

1.  Poetry requires both concise and creative language.  This means that students really have to process the information they are taking in — they can’t just copy something off of Wikipedia and mince it into their own words.

2.  Poetry requires empathy.  Students, especially the adolescent kind, tend to have trouble looking outside of their own little worlds.  Poetry can help them stretch their thinking and broaden their world view.

3.  Poetry about curriculum content will help students understand that poetry can be (and should be) about more than someone cheating on someone else.

4.  Poetry works as a mnemonic device.  Students will retain more information if they have to read and write poems about that information.

5.  It’s fun.  Seriously fun.