Helping Kids Make Friends with Poetry
Resources for Homeschool Parents and Educators
Are you a homeschool parent who wants to introduce your kids to poetry…but feel intimidated when you consider the subject?
You wonder, “Don’t I need a special skill or degree to understand it? To read it? To write it? How can I teach it?“
Whether you want a simple, accessible way to include poetry lessons in your homeschool rhythms or simply want to discover good poetry books for your kids or grandkids, you’ve come to the right place!
Hi There, I’m Jody.
Author, Poet & Teacher
I’m Jody, a retired teacher, poet, and Nana of six, and I love helping homeschool parents and educators teach children how to make friends with poetry. Drawing on my 20 plus years of classroom experience as well as my own published work, I combine a love of poetry with helping others to make friends with poetry, too.
Using my how-to resources, accessible guides and curated lists, parents and teachers will have everything needed to tiptoe into the world of poetry, whether in the home or classroom.
Want a Quick Place to Begin?
Download my free “Poetry 101 Starter Kit” and have the tools you need to help your kids make friends with poetry. Includes 3 Ready-Made Lessons for students ages 5-17.
Intimidated by poetry?
How I can Help
Whether you’re a parent introducing poetry at home, a teacher building a lesson, or a homeschooler shaping your curriculum, I’m here to make poetry accessible.
You’ll find curated reading lists, step-by-step guides and poetic inspiration rooted in my 20-plus years of classroom experience and a lifelong love of words.
Poetry Resources
Curated reading lists, picture books, writing prompts, and downloadable guides to help you teach poetry with ease.
Teaching Support
Simple, classroom-tested strategies for helping kids read, understand, and enjoy poetry — no expertise required.
Inspiration
Thoughtful reflections, seasonal reading lists, and ideas that spark curiosity and “aha!” moments for kids and grownups alike.
What’s in the Resource Library? Lessons & activities for ages K-High School
- How to Write a Poem with Pictures
- How to use ‘Jabberwocky’ to teach reading, grammar & vocab
- How to use ‘Mary Had a Little Lamb’ to write a Rhyming poem
- 5 Things to Know about Poetry
- 10 Best Poetry Collections for Children
- 9 Reasons to Read Poetry
- And more!
- Note: If you are a home educator you know best what your childrens’ abilities are; ‘grade level’ does not always translate to age and vice-versa.
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9 Reasons to add poetry to your home school rhythms
And resources to get you started April is National Poetry Month… and if you are on the fence about adding poetry to your homeschool rhythms I am here as your Poetry Evangelist with Nine Reasons (points? facets? features?) to encourage you to make friends with poetry. It is no secret in my conversations with Home…
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3 Poems for Holy Week
Pressed into Joy Golden oil in rounded vessel liquid lightrefracting sun in shimmers. Mirrored shape reflects on glassy surface and I wonder at thedrop, drop, drops of light as theydrip, drip, dripdown. All this tastingjoyfulness becausesomething was crushedand pressed,leaving light. True Wood Pears thunk and plop on barren, yellow grass alone, not-gathered. The tree bore fruit but there…
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How to “Write” a Poem With Pictures
There’s more than one way to write a poem. Folks often feel intimidated about how to write poetry—I get it; I’ve been there. But Art journaling offers a way to venture into expressing oneself with words and pictures both and thus create a poem, a made thing, (the definition of poem from the Greek word poiema)….
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How I Came to Poetry
The first poems I ever saved are from Mrs. Appy’s Ninth grade English class in a folder labeled simply ‘Poetry.’ 50 years later I can’t for the life of me locate it but I can see its contents–the ditto ink is faded but still quite legible. There are selections by Richard Brautigan and e.e.cummings, of course,…
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Pilgrim Verse-A Short Rhyme for the New Year
To hear me read this poem, click HERE. I am the map, I will show you the way Landmarks, sideroads, the places you’ll stay. Then moving slowly, aware of the limits of speed that are posted; this journey-stay in it. I’ll reveal the direction, post signs that you need Aware of your…
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Frequency–Hearing God Speak Above the Waves
Frequency There was always a tune in the heart of God A song that He sang over us. The melody came with a note from above A chorus from the Father of love. But the tune met resistance-titanium, stone Even water that blocked all the notes. Was everyone drowning, message nullified, absorbed? Perhaps the enchantment…
