Spreading the Gospel of Poetry

So I found out yesterday that my proposal to present at the Michigan Reading Association 2011 Conference in Grand Rapids has been accepted. My topic will be poetry instruction for all grade levels. I'll be combining my own experiences from my classroom with knowledge I've gained from books, mentors, and other resources to present a program of poetry immersion for teachers. The purpose of the immersion, naturally, is to get students (regardless of age) to enjoy poetry.

I'm pretty proud of being accepted. I've worked hard over the last year-and-a-half to incorporate poetry reading and writing into my teaching. And I have come to be a believer in the power of poetry when it comes to helping students to become stronger readers and writers. I hope that I'll share my successes, my failures, my ideas, and the ideas I've gathered with other teachers so that they, too, can make poetry a part of their everyday classroom routine.

I've presented a couple times before at the Michigan Association of Public School Academies conference, but both times that was about educational technology, my other passion. This will be a slightly scary venture into brand new territory. At the very least, I hope to inspire a couple of people to immerse their students in the world of poetry (and to subscribe to this blog!).

The thought of presenting my ideas at a statewide conference is a bit intimidating, to say the least. But I am pretty excited about it. I'll keep you posted as the event draws nearer and I'll share my notes and handouts, too.