To be honest, I’ve always loved poetry, but have never been a big fan of copywork.
As a teacher, I saw it as busywork to keep students occupied, so I tried to avoid it if I could.
But now, as a homeschooling mother, I opened up to the idea and we tried it once.
Wow, I can definitely see the value in it!
And the great thing about copywork is that it is so versatile!
Copywork can be used in any and every subject that is being studied.
I love that! I realized that there is value in copywork.
Let’s face it, it is a great opportunity to practice memory work, to review vocabulary, to revise past topics and most importantly (for our family) is to practice penmanship!
My son really needs to practice the latter skill, so I decided to make it interesting for him, instead of just writing words or sentences over and over.
Great Poetry Book List
The Poems of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow is a book for adults and it is quite old, but I found some really interesting stanzas that can be read aloud to children and they can even memorize them.
I found some good ones in the section called Earlier Poems.
More Classics to Read Aloud to Your Children is fantastic! I highly recommend it because it is specifically targeted to children.
What I love about this particular book has divided the book into sections by children’s age.
It is super easy to find poems for children that are age-appropriate in terms of content and level of reading.
Check out the prequel to this book, too.
Masterpieces of World Literature in Digest Form is a wonderful compilation of poems by great poets. The poems include critique paragraphs as well as stories behind the poems.
What I also like about this book is that the poems are listed in alphabetical order.
I can already see how it would be fun to pick a letter in the alphabet per week and read the list of poems that begin with that letter during that week.
To really bring poetry home and to study about great poets, copywork seems the way to go.
We enjoy reading poetry, but why not think about memorizing some of them or at least parts of them?
Well, using copywork can be a great way to practice.
The first copywork set we used focused on poems by Emily Dickinson.
You can see it HERE. We read the biographical information about her and then read the poems that came in the copywork pages.
My son picked his favorite one and began copying it on the handwriting lines.
For the first set, I decided to print the bigger lines (for younger grades) to let him begin writing his letter in a bigger size and to make it easier to trace letters.
Here is a book we read about Emily Dickinson.
The second poetry set we used to study great poets was on Lewis Carroll. You can see it HERE.
Again, for this set, we read his biographical information and then read all of the poems included in the set.
This time, I printed the set with smaller lines.
They are still the typical top and bottom solid lines with the dotted lines in the middle, but they are smaller, so the letters are closer to regular-sized font that we use on a daily basis.
This smaller line set requires more concentration and better fine motor skills coordination.
He did great, though. He picked his favorite poem from the set and he started with that one.
This is a book on Lewis Carroll that we read during this lesson.
These sets also include the same poems, but with simple lines for copywork.
You could say that children get to practice these poems three times overtime, as their skills develop. The first level was the wider, bigger guided lines.
The second level was the narrower, smaller guided lines and the third level was the one with regular single lines to write on.
And if that wasn’t enough, I had a blast watching my son recite his favorite poem out loud for his sister and me.
Isn’t it great that you get so much out of each set? You can take a look at the sets for other subjects HERE.
Interested in more poets and more poetry? Take a look at the sets above! You can find them HERE.
Go HERE to go see the sets below. You will love how much in-depth you can go with the wonderful topic of poetry.
Thank you for reading our “Poetry: Printable Copywork for Kids” post!
So tell us, have you gotten all kinds of fun ideas and inspiration for your unit or lesson on poetry? Take a look at some more ideas below! 🙂
Poetry Handwriting Worksheet from 3 Boys and a Dog
How To Write a Nature Poem like Roald Dahl from FrogMom
Silly Limericks for Kids from Schooling a Monkey
Fun Poetry Activities for Kids from iGameMom
Poetry Books for Children from The Jenny Evolution
Apps for Creating Poetry with Kids from Parenting Chaos
Poetry Printable Copywork for Kids from The Natural Homeschool
Mother’s Day Fingerprint Gift With Printable Poem from Play Dough & Popsicles
Poetry Writing for Kids: Using Metaphors from Planet Smarty Pants
Our Favorite Poetry Book for Kids from Our Daily Craft
Spring Haiku Poetry Worksheet from Something 2 Offer
Best Rhyming Books for Preschoolers from Kara Carrero
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