Poem of the Week is a beloved daily activity during my literacy block. Having engaging and fun poems for kids promotes reading, discussing, writing, and drawing about the poems each week.

Our poetry journal and poetry station are full of familiar poetry they can read independently or with a partner, which is perfect for Kindergarten and First Grade students!

Poem of the Week Activities for the Primary Classroom

I love poem of the week activities because of the above reasons, but also because it’s an easy way to learn new vocabulary and practice word work, grammar, and fluency. I love that my students have poems in our station and poems in their journal that they can read. It’s also perfect for repeated reading practice. Built in partner reading activities for all!!

Let me tell you about our daily, whole group routines with our poems! I also have the weekly schedule posted up front so my kiddos always know what’s coming up!

Monday-Meet Your New Poem

On Monday, I simply introduce the poem of the week. We read the title and poem together two or three times. Most of my poems aren’t very long, so this is a quick activity.

The first time through, I read the poem and they can read along with me or listen. This is perfect for those emergent readers who aren’t able to read independently yet…they have the choice to listen and absorb without feeling put on the spot.

I’ve used printed poems and I’ve also assembled large poster-sized poems for this…whatever works for you!

The second time through, everyone tries to read the poem together. Sometimes, we do a third time if it’s not too long.

That’s pretty much it for Monday! This generally takes 5 minutes or less.

Tuesday-Read and Chat

Tuesday, we do another read through of the poem of the week. On this day, we chat about (discuss) the poem. Students can ask questions, make comments, or ask for clarification or definitions. It’s student-driven, and if you’ve taught young students, you know they’ll always have something to say or ask!!

After our chat time, we read the poem one more time together. Tuesday’s poem of the week activities can take anywhere from 4-8 minutes or so.

Wednesday-Word Work

On Wednesday, we dive into word work. This varies throughout the year.

At the beginning of 1st grade, we look for…

word wall words
find rhyming words
words that start with the letter _____, etc.
Later on, we look for word families, count syllables, discuss parts of speech, and more.

This day is perfect for squeezing in some additional activities for your own language and grammar standards.

My display poems are laminated, so we often use a dry erase marker to circle, cross out, underline, or add words, depending on what our focus is that day. Sometimes, students answer and I write on the display poem…Other times, I call students up to do the writing.

These activities can take anywhere from 5-10 minutes.

Thursday-Fluency Fun

Fluency Fun day is always a hit with my students!! On this day, we really have fun with the poems, while the repeated reading improves their fluency.

At the beginning of the year, I introduce a few fun ways to read the poem. After a few weeks, they can come up with some pretty funny ones on their own.

A few examples….

Read the alternating lines loudly, then quietly. Or quickly, then slowly.
Read the alternating lines in “daddy”, “mommy”, and “baby” voice (always a fave!)
Pick certain words to shout out loudly (or whisper quietly)…maybe on Wednesday, you circled all of the high frequency words, so today, they will shout out those circled words.
Read it like a ghost, a monster, Santa, an old lady, sadly, etc.

Thursday’s activities are around 5-7 minutes….depending on how many times you want to read through the poem.

My Poem of the Week Pack has ideas for both word work and fluency activities in the primary classroom!

Friday-Read and Respond

Friday is another exciting day for us in our Poem of the Week journey!

First, we read the poem one more time. Then, we orally share responses about the poem. We use my Poetry Response Starter Stems for this.

Poem of the Week Poetry Response Starter Stems — I display this at the meeting spot
and students also glue it into their journals

Then, students move on to work in their Poetry Journal. I hand out the typed-up poem, which has room for their response activity, and they add it to their journal. I’ve used blank booklets where they glue it in or pronged folders where they put the poem in…it’s really your preference.

Poem of the Week Poetry Journal Response

From here, our routine varies, depending on the time of year….

For the first half of first grade (August-December), students must draw a picture that goes with the poem. Some students also like to mimic our word work activities…maybe they circle certain words or highlight with their crayon. Some students are ready to write and label, but I don’t require it at this point.

For the second half of first grade (January-May), students do a written response. They still have the option to draw, label, and highlight as well, but they must write a sentence or two using our response starter stems (some of my advanced readers/writers come up with their own responses, which is perfectly fine, too, but the starters are a helper option if needed). They are familiar with the routine of using the sentence starters, as we do them orally from the beginning of the year.

To help them, we glue in a list of the sentence starters on that first Friday back from winter break. That way, it’s always there for them to read over and choose from.

The other exciting part of Friday is that the display poem moves to the Poetry Station. It is available for students to partner read during their station time. I usually have 8-10 poster-sized poems hanging in our Poetry Station at a time. If you don’t have room for the big posters, you can use regular-sized poems in a three-ring binder or on a ring in your station.

Our Friday activity takes a bit longer, since they are writing a response. When they are finished with their response, they move right into a round of literacy stations.

So, some students may still be writing when others are starting stations and I’m pulling small groups, but that’s perfectly acceptable. I do set the timer for 10 minutes once they begin writing, so they will still have some station time.

Our Friday whole group time takes about 6-8 minutes and the writing time can take about 10 minutes.

There you have it! Those are my Poem of the Week activities that we love so much in 1st grade! You can also visit a past blog series I wrote about Poem of the Week ideas and activities and why I do it every week in my primary classroom!