Poem in Your Pocket for National Poetry Month

Poem in your pocketApril is National Poetry Month, an opportunity to read and share poetry. Join the fun of sharing with our “Poem in Your Pocket” program at the Mira Costa Library. Find a poem you love and keep a copy with you to share it with teachers, friends, and classmates. Share your poem at the library any time this month and you will be entered in a drawing to win a bookstore gift certificate and be featured in a library READ poster. Come by with your poem today! Don’t have a poem? Ask me for help finding one!

Caroline Kennedy School Library Visit & National Poetry Month

At Horace Mann School with Visitor Caroline Kennedy and Teacher Librarian Sheryl Weiss

I had the privilege this Tuesday of spending a super afternoon at Horace Mann School in Beverly Hills, California, participating in a visit by Caroline Kennedy to the school library. The library visit was hosted by Sheryl Weiss, a super teacher librarian, former colleague in Las Virgenes USD, and friend. Caroline Kennedy’s visit was part of her tour as Honorary Chair of National Library Week. She joined a fourth grade class visiting the library, and she, Sheryl, and the students talked about favorite books, reading, poetry, and what the library offers.

Ms. Kennedy, who has authored a number of books and just published her fourth poetry collection, Poems to Learn by Heart, related memories of sharing and memorizing poems when she was young. She encouraged the students to read and memorize poems as something that would stay with them throughout their lives. She talked about how poetry goes straight to the heart, and how poems remind her of her family and friends and how they shared poetry together. Now, when she hears a poem, it reminds her of the friends or family and the poem. I certainly related to her message; I have many fond memories of reading poems with my family as a child, and I can still recite them and enjoy remembering when I first learned them.

Sheryl Weiss and Caroline Kennedy share their experiences with books and poetry with Horace Mann 4th Grade class

Caroline Kennedy and Sheryl Weiss also talked to the class about favorite books, why they like to read, what they can do to encourage other people to read, and why the library is a different from the classroom. One student shared how in the library she reads whatever she likes, while in the class they have to stick to specific class subjects. Caroline Kennedy agreed that the library is a place where you can follow whatever you are interested in, reading for fun.

April is National Poetry Month. Please share a favorite poem with your family and friends. Here is a recording of me reciting “The Swing,” one of my favorite poems by Robert Lewis Stevenson, from his collection, A Child’s Garden of Verse.