New Children's Poet Laureate named

The next Children's Poet Laureate was announced today by the Poetry Foundation.  
It's Kenn Nesbitt. 

Kenn's recent works include:
Nesbitt, Kenn. 2009. My Hippo Has the Hiccups with CD: And Other Poems I Totally Made Up. Naperville, IL: Sourcebooks.
Nesbitt, Kenn. 2010. The Tighty Whitey Spider: And More Wacky Animal Poems I Totally Made Up. Naperville, IL: Sourcebooks.
Nesbitt, Kenn. 2007. Revenge of the Lunch Ladies: The Hilarious Book of School Poetry. New York: Meadowbrook Press.

His web site, Poetry4Kids has been a go-to site for poems, activities, and fun for kids.

FYI
The Children’s Poet Laureate was established by the Poetry Foundation in 2006 to raise awareness of the fact that children have a natural receptivity to poetry and are its most appreciative audience, especially when poems are written specifically for them. The Children’s Poet Laureate receives a $25,000 cash prize and a medallion that includes the inscription “Permit a child to join,” taken from an Emily Dickinson poem. The Children’s Poet Laureate serves as a consultant to the Foundation for a two-year period and gives at least two major public readings for children and their families, teachers, and librarians during his/her term. He/She will also serve as an advisor to the Poetry Foundation on children’s literature, and may engage in a variety of projects and events to help instill a love of poetry among the nation’s youngest readers.

Previous Laureates

2011 J. Patrick Lewis

2008 Mary Ann Hoberman

2006 Jack Prelutsky

Sharing poetry in Bali (Part 2)

playing soccer in the courtyard

While I was in Bali for the IBBY conference, I also had the opportunity to visit a small school-- always an eye-opening experience. This was a school that served a population of some 40 children, most of them with special needs (learning disabilities, cerebral palsy, autism, etc.). The headmaster picked me up and drove me out and I toured the tiny building with its half dozen small un-airconditioned rooms with small homemade wooden chairs and tables.

moms hanging out with toddlers

 

the school library and library volunteer

 Moms sat outside in the open area and were welcome there. Children played-- some babies and toddlers there with their mothers. It was a relaxed and happy environment. I went into each room and smiled and chatted-- including a tiny library with a few shelves of paperback books and a small crate of toys.

Most of my time was spent in a small classroom with the oldest kids-- about a dozen-- working alongside their regular teacher-- she told me she was a former hotel worker whose English was good, so she volunteered to help out at the school. She was a natural and had a real knack in taking every moment and making it a language learning lesson.

practicing English words

a boy with autism adept on his notebook computer

I brought a pile of poetry books to share (and donate) and a copy of The Poetry Friday Anthology (or course). Although their knowledge of English was extremely limited, I did share the first stanzas of several poems-- as their teacher helped translate each key word. I shared:

(K-1) "Happy Song for the First Day of School" by Patricia Hubbell
It's my
Happy
Snappy
Tip-top
Day

(K-14) "Mrs. Betty" by Rebecca Kai Dotlich
Knock, knock!
Who's there?
It's Mrs. Betty!
She brought us a pot
of homemade
spaghetti!

(One bright little girl recognized the "knock, knock" formula for jokes and pointed that out to me!)

(K-27) "Animal Talk" by Charles Ghigna
Ducks quack
Doves coo
Dogs bark
Cows moo

(They loved making the animal noises for this poem!)

Then we sang a variety of songs in English that were familiar to them and I joined right in. Plus, I chatted at length with the kids, answering questions and asking them questions.

this same boy thought of using his computer to take our photo while the teacher used my camera

her English was amazing!

The little girl who knew the "knock, knock" formula was quite adept with English and eager to converse-- she told me about TV programs she had watched about Sasquatch, ghosts, and zombies! The kids were eager to show off and were high energy!

a classroom for the younger children

What a privilege to spend a few hours with them and see the dedication of the staff and the eagerness of kids to learn new things. It's a good reminder of the heart of teaching-- caring about kids and helping them learn.

P.S. Two days later I came down with a bad cold-- just a little sampling of what teachers face every day in working with children! I remember getting sick at the beginning of every school year when I was a classroom teacher, as I built up my immunities for the year. Looks like that's another universal part of teaching!

Sharing poetry in Bali (Part 1)

My fellow presenters and me (at my session)

Our host, Murti Bunanta

I recently attended a conference in Bali that drew 125 teachers, professors, publishers, authors and others from Japan, Korea, Indonesia, India, Cambodia, Thailand, China, Australia, New Zealand and beyond.

IBBY ASIA OCEANIA CONGRESS
May 2013
Bali

It was a wonderful event and I met many people doing fascinating work often with very limited resources. I heard several interesting speakers-- on storytelling types, on the value of the trickster story for truth-telling, on the depiction of girls in Indonesian comics, on the importance of karma in eastern folktales, on the Korean diaspora, and so much more.  My own presentation was about poetry (of course):

The World in Verse: Multicultural Poetry for Young People

I began by highlighting some of the special benefits of poetry, in particular:
*Special succinctness of poetry in providing an introduction to other cultures
*Poets use the language, experiences, and images of their cultures
*Poets make powerful points about prejudice, identity, and cultural conflict
*Poems show children firsthand both the sameness and the differences across cultures

I shared a bibliography of poetry books and a paper which they had all already received, so I read actual POEMS to them-- and there was a spontaneous and positive reaction. (This was a conference with several storytellers and even a shadow puppet performance!) Since my time was short, I chose about a dozen poems to read aloud to convey the breadth of styles and topics represented in contemporary multicultural poetry. Here's a glimpse.

African American Poetry for Young People
African American writers have been creating poetry for many generations with new poets emerging all the time like Charles Waters and Jaime Adoff alongside the award-winning Nikki Grimes, Marilyn Nelson, and Eloise Greenfield, among others. Consider some of these outstanding examples of African American poetry.
I read aloud:
“I, Too”
 By Langston Hughes and “At the Library”
 by Nikki Grimes and “Things” 
by Eloise Greenfield (a BIG hit!)

Asian Pacific American Poetry for Young People
Asian and Asian American poetry for young people is not just haiku; there are many lovely, ancient and contemporary works to share with children by poets such as Janet Wong and Linda Sue Park. Here is a sampling of poetry for young people by Asian and Asian American poets.
I read aloud:
“Speak Up”
 by Janet Wong and “1975: Year of the Cat” 
by Thanhha Lai, the beginning poem from Inside Out & Back Again


Hispanic/Latino/Latina Poetry for Young People
There are more and more poets of Hispanic/Latino background writing poetry for children. Some are of Hispanic heritage and others collect poetry from Latin American countries. Here are a few of my favorites for sharing with young people by poets such as Pat Mora, Gary Soto, Carmen T. Bernier-Grand, Guadalupe Garcia McCall and Margarita Engle.
I read aloud:
“Ode to Family Photographs” 
by Gary Soto
 and “Potato”
 by Pat Mora and “Juan”
 (one poem from The Poet Slave of Cuba) by Margarita Engle

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Native American Poetry For Young People
Voices from Native American or Indian tribes and traditions offer poetry in many forms. Here is a selection of these poetry books for young people.
I read aloud:
“I Rise, I Rise”
 from an Osage prayer 
before a young man’s first buffalo hunt, collected by Virginia Driving Hawk Sneve and "Who Am I?”(excerpt) 
by Dusty Black Elk from Walking on Earth & Touching the Sky

International Poetry for Young People
As we seek poetry for children from many cultural perspectives, we can expand beyond the cultures in the U.S. and include poetry from other countries by poets such as Graham Denton, Avis Harley, Monica Gunning, Carol-Ann Hoyte, JonArno Lawson, Holly Thompson (living in Japan) and Renee M. LaTulippe (living in Italy). Some of the following works are imported from across the oceans and others are anthologies of global poems collected by poets within the U.S. Sharing poems from these collections can put a face on a news story from far away lands.
I read aloud:
“The Bridge” 
by the Lebanese poet, Kaissar Afif, 
translated by Mansour Ajami from The Space Between Our Footsteps and “Sleep”
 by Michio Mado from The Animals

One note-- most of the people at this conference made no distinction between multicultural and international literature, since many of the books they share are imported from other countries and their own indigenous publishing may be limited (particularly in English). It's all just "literature" to them without the VOLUME of books we have in the U.S. and the distinctions that we make in authorship and culture.

I also made some practical connections, talking about "Poetry Friday" and the "Take 5" strategies that we introduced in The Poetry Friday Anthology.

Take 5: Strategies for Poetry Sharing
#1: Read the poem aloud (vary your approach in multiple readings).
#2: Read the poem aloud again with student participation and involvement.
#3: Take a moment to invite students to discuss the poem; have an open-ended question ready as a prompt.
#4: Make a subtle skill connection with the poem—just one.
#5: Connect with other poems and poetry books that are similar in some way.

I ended with two sample poems from The Poetry Friday Anthology, showing how "multicultural poets" can express both culturally specific as well as universally understood themes and subjects:
I shared 
“Grandfather’s Chopsticks”
 by Janet Wong
 as well as “The Do Kind” also 
by Janet Wong.

I concluded by emphasizing how contemporary poets of color produce poetry that:
*Is both individual and universal, about childhood and about culture
*Captures themes of identity, society, heritage, power, wisdom
*Uses a variety of elements from memoir, facts, repetition, slang, rhyme to free verse

The session was well received and I was so pleased at the enthusiastic response to HEARING poems (although why should I be surprised?)! I spoke with several people afterward-- people who want to go home and promote poetry alongside storytelling (which is a bigger emphasis), people who want to encourage indigenous poets in their home countries, and even a middle school teacher in Bali who wants to introduce poetry jams and slams! So fun to make these poetry connections!

Ms. Neeland's Green Screen Mo Po Poetry Project

One of my fabulous former students is Carol Neeland, a teacher at the American School of the Hague (in the Netherlands). She is doing really creative things with kids incorporating technology in promoting and responding to poetry-- she calls it "green screen poetry." I've shared some of their gems before and have permission to do so once again. Here are very clever poem movies that her students created for two poems by Shel Silverstein.

"Crazy Dream" was created by 6th graders Amanda and Anna and it features some special guest stars:

Dr. Richard Spradling, Superintendent
Ms. Mary Russman, Middle School Principal
Mr. Doug Teter, Grade 6 Science Teacher
Mrs. Rochelle Slachta, Grade 6 Language Arts teacher
and Mrs. Carol Neeland, Middle School IT Teacher

Amanda and Anna's interpretation of poem gave them the "power" to make the Superintendent and Principal stand on their heads and to send their teachers to outer Mongolia!

"Ickle Me, Pickle Me, Tickle Me, too" was created by Kevin and Jakob, but they needed someone to play Tickle Me, so Jin joined them as well. They used Photoshop to create the flying shoe and then used green screen to put themselves inside of it. Don't they make flying in a shoe look like fun?

This was all part of their big Mo Po celebration for National Poetry Month. (Mo as in "MORE" and Po as in "Poetry!") Way to go, Carol! And thank you for sharing their work with us. Keep the MoPoMomentum going!

The poetry of shoes

I'm currently in Bali (yes, THAT Bali) for the IBBY Asia Oceana Congress to talk about poetry, what else?  (More on my presentation, "The World in Verse," later.) But first, I've done a bit of touring and ran across this and I had to share!

Since I am a shoe lover (although I just can't manage the way-high heels I wore in my "youth"), I get  that shoes and bags do have their own kind of poetry! Don't you agree?




(Also, my apologies for being AWOL. Bali is blocking Gmail and Blogger, but I stumbled upon a "back-door" today, which will probably slam shut any moment! If not, I'll post more nuggets soon...)