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Poetry cafes invaded a courtyard and several second grade classrooms Friday at Winfield L. Morse Elementary School in Sleepy Hollow.
Signs above classroom doors made teachers the proprietors of their own Poetry Café and welcomed parents to the school.
Teacher Anne Bakalas café, located on the second floor, featured four student tables decorated with bright tablecloths. A fifth table was set in the center of the room, decorated with a vase of flowers and several colorful books.
A few parents lined the walls of the classroom as Bakala handed out menus. The café specials listed poems that the children had composed on their own.
The program began with a video of students reciting memorized poems. Bakala had told her students to pick out a poem and try to memorize it.
After a short break for refreshments, Bakala showed a video anthology of students own poems.
Poems used a variety of techniques, such as alliteration, acrostics, similes and repetition. Second grader Francesca Puleo used alliteration in her Flamingo Poem.
Second grader Michael Auquilla used shape poetry in his poem Soccer:
Play soccer in the
summer or in the spring.
Always pass the ball to
teammates.
RUN, KICK
MAKE A
GOAL!
Other poem topics included spring, the color red and a hamster named Harry. Books featured each students poem with accompanying illustrations. Bakala said the Parent-Teacher Association helped the class get the books.
The poetry café was the culmination of a poetry unit, Bakala said. The unit lasted six weeks. An ebook of the students poems will be available on the district website this weekend, Bakala said.
Journals were handed out to each student at the end of the café so that they could continue writing over the summer.
Do you read your children's poems at home? Care to share some of them?
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