I recently used an opportunity to check in with some current and past students during the month of April. Seeing that April is poetry month, I thought it might be neat to virtually meet with students one-on-one to hear them either read a favorite poem from a published poet or one of their own. I have to say that besides just loving listening to the reading of poetry, my heart was overwhelmed with the amazing opportunity to hear my students’ question and make connections.
Now more than ever, we find ourselves in a time to really listen to each other and make the kind of changes in this world that could truly make a difference and create equity for all. I found that my students felt comfortable about talking about tough topics when we used themes and phrases from a poem to spark the conversation. Here are some examples:
POETRY SHOULD ALLOW US TO SEE OURSELVES IN IT
My dear Gabi has committed her education and self to the Army via West Point Academy. She chose the poem “The Negro Speak of Rivers” by the wonderful Langston Hughes. The first thing we notice is that the N-word is in the title. This is a word that I find makes me uncomfortable. It has been a word in our history that is derogatory and reminiscent of our horrific history of slavery. Since my content is literature, it is a word that comes up at least every school year in a book or poem. Although this is probably a blog for another day, I will say that I made sure my lesson plans allowed for a conversation in the classroom about the powers of words and how this word, for me, is unacceptable. However, every year, my students and I would agree that by ignoring that this word existed and has been published would be a disservice and that we need to be mindful of the meaning behind this word. I also found it to be an opportunity for my black and brown students to express their thoughts and feelings about the use of this word to an audience that needed to listen.
Gabi explains that she enjoys Langston Hughes’ poetry because it reflects “having a foot in both worlds”. For her, she feels she is existing in 2 worlds because she has one white parent and one black parent. She connects to Langston’s heritage and the themes reflecting such in his poetry.
POETRY SHOULD GIVE US COURAGE TO USE OUR VOICE
I can’t tell you how proud I am of Thamara for not only sharing her own poem but for also allowing her self to be vulnerable as she finds the strength to explain what it is like for her in this world. Her poem is titled “Que Difficult Puede se “or “How Difficult It Can Be” and is what she calls a Spanglish poem. We continue to hear that word difficult repeated as she pushes the motif of how hard it can be to have your “blood be strangers” and “strangers to be your blood”. Her feelings of trying to find a completeness amongst the people in her community and from her culture while finding more in common with She bilingual and from Venezuela. She was raised in the United States and finds it sometimes hard to feel a sense of belonging amongst a group that should be familiar.
Her poem and our conversation reminded me of the recent TED Talk that America Ferrera did within the last year. If you have not seen it, please check it out in a past blog that I wrote about having our students see themselves in our classroom.
POETRY SHOULD ALLOW US TO SHARE WHAT WE BELIEVE IN
There is no greater sunshine than my Miko. I find her to be so bubbly, full of life, and optimism. It was interesting to hear her talk about her connection to the poem “Bridge” by Donna Kate Rushin. Where we all think of a bridge as symbolism for making connections, this poem somewhat ironically talks about a the speaker not wanting to be that person who helps other feel like they “have a connection to the world” because of their relationship with him or her. Although Miko read this poem out loud for us before the recent protests sparked by the awful and wrongful death of George Floyd, it really speaks volumes to what we are hearing that we, as a society and definitely as white privileged,” need to be aware that we are doing more harm than good. I wish that I truly listened to Miko during this reading. I think that I did not completely grasp what she was expressing by choosing this poem. I am learning and I have re-listened to this conversation repeatedly.
POETRY SHOULD HELP US LEARN ABOUT EACH OTHER
This last example shows how we, as teachers, can really learn new things about our students and build on those relationship even if it is after they have left our classroom. Joseph has long agon graduated from high school, but he was still willing to connect with me through this poetry project and share something that I did not know about him. He picked the poem “I Go Back to May 1937” by Sharon Olds. This poem really let us both think about what we would do if we could go back in time and change a part of our family history. Joseph talks about his feelings when he graduated from high school and started to learn what is was like to leave home and start his more independent life. This poem gave him a chance to reflect on his parents when they were young, his age, and already having children. What a great example of an empathy exercise.
What was nice about this project was that I didn’t tell any one of these lovely people what poem or poet to pick. They each did it on their own and this student choice allowed us to have a more genuine and authentic conversation with each other. I learned something that was important to them and honestly found that we have a generation full of big hearts and humanitarian ideals.
See You Real Soon,
Erin
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