Poetry for Writing Workshop in Grades K-5: 10+Devices and Poems to Model Them All!

Many teachers and students are intimidated by poetry, including me! There is just so much you can do, it is a bit overwhelming. Some teachers might also feel that teaching poetry is just fluff. I completely disagree!

Meredith Dobbs, the founder and creator of teachwriting.org recently wrote a very helpful article, 10+Devices and Poems to Model Them All. In her article she organizes links to specific poems by writing device such as allusion, imagery and metaphor. It is a brilliant article and so useful to middle and high school teachers!

After reading Meredith's article I realized, yes teaching poetry can be overwhelming, but it can also be beneficial to English teachers who want to teach these writing devices but aren't sure how or want to do so with a quick read, such as a poem.

So, in this article, I've decided to do the same for kindergarten-fifth grade teachers. Below you'll find links to poems by device. My hope is that elementary teachers will benefit from having poems categorized in this way and plan to come back and add more as I find them.

Feel free to add some poetry titles you enjoy teaching and which devices they reveal in the comments! 

Alliteration

• The Football Game by Allen Loren

• Wendy Wise by Ken Nesbitt

• Maggie and Milly and Molly and May by E.E. Cummings

• The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes

Simili

• Precious Stones by Christina Rosetti

• Youth by Langston Hughes

• Some People by Rachel Field

• Digging by Seamus Heaney

• Me by Walter De La Mare

Metaphor

• Precious Stones by Christina Rosetti

• Youth by Langston Hughes

• Some People by Rachel Field

• Digging by Seamus Heaney

• Me by Walter De La Mare

Point of View

• Aunt Sue’s Stories by Langston Hughes

• Goldilocks and the Three Bears by Roald Dahl

• Theme in Yellow by Carl Sandburg

• Caged Bird by Maya Angelou

Personification

• Autumn Song by Hilda Conkling

• Winter Trees by William Carlos Williams

• Wynken, Blynken, and Nod by Eugene Field

• Child Frightened by a Thunderstorm by Ted Kooser

Mood

• A Vagabond Song by Bliss Carman

• In Time of Silver Rain by Langston Hughes

• The Winter Evening Settles Down by T.S. Eliot

• Buffalo Dusk by Carl Sandburg

Theme/Moral

• Jim Who Ran Away from His Nurse...by Hilaire Belloc

• Goldilocks and the Three Bears by Roald Dahl

• The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost

• The Vulture by Hilaire Belloc

Repetition & Rhythm 

• The Blind Men and the Elephant by John Godfrey Saxe

• The Tyger by William Blake

• Foxes by Mary Ann Hobberman

• Who Has Seen the Wind by Christina Rossetti

• Brave Boy Rap by Philip Ardagh

• Life Doesn’t Frighten Me by Maya Angelou

Onomatopoeia

• The Bells by Edgar Allan Poe

• Cynthia in the Snow by Gwendolyn Brooks

• Jabberwocky by Lewis Carroll

• The Rusty Spigot by Eve Merriam

Hyperbole

• Falling Up by Shel Silverstein

• Sick by Shel Silverstein

• Summertime is Here by Sharon Hendricks

• Dragon Eyes by Emily Pinet

About the Author

Amanda Werner is a full time English and History sixth grade teacher in the Bay Area. She has been teaching for ten years and still feels like a novice. Every year is a unique and exciting challenge to inspire a new group of students in becoming avid readers and writers. Amanda reads educational literature voraciously and writes about the teaching of writing on her website amandawritenow.com. She also writes curriculum for Teach Box, a monthly subscription service for creative English teachers. Amanda received her B.A. in English Literature with an emphasis in Humanities at Western Washington University. She has both an elementary and secondary teaching license and a mathematics credential. In her free time, Amanda loves being outdoors with her humorous husband and sweet and spunky two and a half year old daughter.