Kicking off our 50th with lots of press! Chicago Reader – Featured Article on CPC’s Legacy and Current Moment NBC – 3 Minute Feature on NBC Chicago for Exhibit and Event Poetry Foundation: Essay […]

What TV shows did we cherish when we were young? What did we learn from them? What makes a hero (both real or imagined), and how can we learn from them (even the villains) […]

I was back for another week with Waters 7th graders, this time talking about the stanza. Maggie Smith’s “Good Bones” was our poem for the day, a poem particularly prominent around the time that […]

Greetings greetings! For our second week with Waters 6th graders, we talked about our commonalities: each student table came up with the longest possible list of things they have in common (such as being […]

Students wrote and talked about kindness before reading the poem, ‘Small Kindnesses’ by Denusha Lameris. In crafting their own poems students focused on one idea, one stanza and small ways they have been kind […]

This week the young vikings read Brigit Peegen Kelly’s “The Leaving” and were tasked with writing a poem in an epic manner describing something they are proud of. This is a fantastic group of […]

This week the young Vikings read Rachel Richardson’s “Questions” and wrote lyric poetry exploring their own questions about poetry, life, and the world. I am so proud of the poets below. “Content” by Dawan […]

This week Twain 3rd graders read and discussed “What is Brown?” by Mary O’Neill; then worked to combine sensory details, similes, and metaphors to describe color. Ms. Lee3rd Grade Liam E. Bright lime is […]

The Chicago Poetry Center presents BLUE HOUR, a free monthly in-person reading series and generative writing workshop at Haymarket House, 800 W. Buena. Our January featured readers are Christian J. Collier and Maya Marshall. […]

For their 7th week of poetry, Twain 4th graders thought about different ways they communicate with others. A few students mentioned learning sign language and even signed words for me with their hands. Other […]

I’m so excited for this batch of young Viking writers. This week the poets read Brigit Pegeen Kelly’s “The Leaving” and were tasked with writing a poem in an epic manner about something they […]

Week two at Lawndale was all about rhyme. After a classic game of Concentration 64, students used their rhyming skills to write poems about their city, the good and the bad, the happy and […]

This past Monday I was excited to be back for another residency at the O School. I taught poetry during the summer session and I’m looking forward to having twenty weeks to share and […]

This past Monday I was excited to be back for another residency at the O School. I taught students during the summer session and I’m looking forward to having twenty weeks to share and […]

Students crafted visual and then poetic Exquisite Corpses! Afterward, they were challenged to create a clay figure of one of their collective group drawings! Below is one such sample. Students created topics around which […]

How exciting to be back at Waters for another year of poetry! Last year’s sixth graders are now seventh graders, and I look forward to building on our poetry knowledge from last year. As […]

How exciting to be back at Waters for another year of poetry! To lay a good foundation with the two 6th grade classes I’m working with, we started with some community agreements and discussed […]

In September, the Poetry Foundation hosted a closing event for CPC’s 50th anniversary exhibition. The afternoon included a screening of A Bigger Table: 50 Years of the Chicago Poetry Center, a short documentary about […]

A common household object became the focus of this lesson  while studying Joy Harjo’s poem, Perhaps The World Ends Here.  The poet James Merrill once commented, ‘we understand history from the family around the table.’ […]

In our first class meeting, Waters 6th and 7th graders read “Self-Portrait with my hijab” by Noora S. a 7th grader at Peterson Elementary. In class students discussed the use emotion and the idea […]

After not meeting last week because of Parent-Teacher Conferences and Election Day, it was good to return to Twain 3rd grade classrooms this week! The key term this week was imagery, which many students […]

For their sixth week of poetry Twain 4th graders learned about making a “To Do” list. This type of list helps someone keep track of all the tasks they have to complete. I asked […]

This past Monday kicked off Lawndale Community Academy’s Poetry Residency with Ms. Barker’s 6th and 8th grade ELA classes. Our first session was an opportunity to get to know each other; thus, the day’s […]

Students crafted visual and then poetic Exquisite Corpses! It’s a great way to work with one line at a time, which was the goal! Afterward, they were challenged to create a clay figure of […]

Things got louder and noisier for Twain 4th graders during their fifth week of poetry. Students discovered Onomatopoeia, when poets use words that imitate sounds from everyday life. I had shown examples of onomatopoeia […]

Week 4 of our 3rd grade residency was during the final week of October, and many students were looking forward to overflows of Halloween treats! We warmed up by verbally creating similes that were […]

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“Writing poetry makes me feel like I can see myself, like I can see my reflection, but not in a mirror, in the world. I write and I know I can be reflected.”
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