Poetry in Our Classroom

I love using poetry in the classroom, but sometimes it feels like there isn't enough time!  I started by giving each student a poetry journal for their book bag:

Each week we cut out our poem, color it in and then glue it in our notebooks.

We would practice the poem when I handed it out and that would be it.  The students could read the poems during Independent Reading.

This year, I decided that wasn't enough.  I am going to create a poster for each poem and we now recite the poem together during Morning Meeting. 

 On a random note,  I decided to clean out underneath my kids cubbies.  They haven't been cleaned since I moved into the classroom 4 1/2 years ago.  Talk about wasted space!  And talk about your dusty materials - eww!

Here's the before picture:

And the after:

I was prompted to do this when my students were trying to put away their Fun Friday materials above the cubbies (and wayy above their heads).  I was so impressed and proud of them for taking care of their materials!  But I was a little nervous that the game boxes were going to pop open and rain down on their heads.  Right then, I decided I wanted to dedicate the bottom of these cubbies to materials that they can use during this free time:

So much better!  Way cleaner and much easier for my students to reach.