By Tracy Boyes, Charlotte Mecklenburg Library
It’s April, and we’re celebrating more than budding flowers and trees! April is National Poetry Month, the perfect time to celebrate the power of poetry and its integral role in building early literacy skills. Even from birth, young children can learn to hear the sounds in spoken language through chants and rhymes. Listening to poetry builds phonemic awareness (how sounds in words work) and is key to building vocabulary. Poetry aids emerging readers by helping to increase reading fluency and teaching children to use expression as they read. Poetry is the perfect mentor text for older children as it exposes them to different forms of expression that encourage creative thinking and inspire writing. Poetry provides the perfect teaching tool for children to see figurative language in action and learn how to implement it into their own speech and writing.
Here are 5 poetry book suggestions to get you started at your Library:
Wee Rhymes by Jane Yolen
Perfect for baby’s first poetry book, this collection of short rhymes celebrates the parts of baby’s day, from morning to night.
Hard-Boiled Bugs for Breakfast by Jack Prelutsky
Jack Prelutsky doesn’t disappoint with his newest book of poetry. From haiku to concrete, his humorous poems and engaging artwork will make this a new favorite book.
Mirror Mirror by Marilyn Singer
Award winning author Marilyn Singer has created a clever book of fairytale poems using reversible verse. Each poem contains two different versions of the same story which can be discovered by first reading the poem forward and then reversing the lines to get an entirely different viewpoint.
I’m Just No Good at Rhyming by Chris Harris
Chris Harris’ debut poetry book features a humorously illustrated collection of laugh out loud poems that will be enjoyed by readers of all ages.
Science Verse by Jon Scieszka
Jon Scieszka has done it again with a series of poems that somehow make science humorous (and memorable). You may even recognize parodies of famous poems and songs tucked inside.