Tennyson’s "Locksley Hall" isn’t the Victorian poem I like the most, but it is the one that gave me the publication bug. For a survey class, I was asked to write an analytical paper on something we’d read. I had…
Author: Traci Gardner
Poem 4: “Those Winter Sundays”
Robert Hayden’s "Those Winter Sundays" is one of those poems that can be very easy to teach. It’s short. The diction is lovely. Its narrative is easy to understand, even for younger student. It’s an easy success in the classroom, but…
Poem 3: Green Eggs and Ham
Weren’t expecting this one next, were you? I confessed my love for Dr. Seuss a couple of years ago, so I may as well admit that Green Eggs and Ham is one of my favorite poems. How can you look at these…
Poem 2: The Waste Land
Because of the opening lines below, the other poem that everyone expects to hear at the beginning of April is T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land: APRIL is the cruellest month, breeding Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing Memory…
Poem 1: The Canterbury Tales
It’s terribly obvious to begin with Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, but it’s not here for the obvious reasons. This is the poem I think of every April. It doesn’t matter that I haven’t opened my Chaucer texts in years. These are…
Daily Poetry Musing
If you’re a teacher, you probably know that April is National Poetry Month. It’s that month when we pretend that we haven’t been reading poetry all year long and for some reason we need to champion rhythm and rhyme. Charles…
When Students Power Down
Last week, Education Week published a story that revealed that students are typically asked to "power down" at school, leaving their 21st century literacy skills behind. It’s an ironic reality for the state of out-of-school literacies—learned "out of school" and condemed…
Classroom Essential Series
Ever see an advertisement for something and want to cry because you had a similar idea and someone beat you to it? That’s how I felt today when I pulled my copy of the NCTE Council Chronicle out of my post office box…
Using Wordle Images to Hear What’s Said
Elizabeth Alexander’s inaugural poem "Praise Song for the Day" didn’t really impress me. It was what it was: an occasional poem that tried very hard to sum up a moment of emotion and history. The poem was quite suitable, but…
Manuscript Scraps
I’ve spent the evening getting ready for a conference call tomorrow morning. Part of the work has been logistical–rearranging things in the room so that I can set up a printer. Online documents are great, but I still rely on…