Page 1 of 2 12 LastLast
Results 1 to 15 of 23

Thread: What poems do you recommend for a young child to memorise?

  1. #1
    Registered User fajfall's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2016
    Location
    Adelaide
    Posts
    76

    What poems do you recommend for a young child to memorise?

    Reading 'How To Teach Your Children Shakespeare', Ken Ludwig instructs children to memorise and recite Shakespeare passages as the best way to truly appreciate the text. I want my young child to do this with poetry when he turns 5, but I don't know what poems to teach him. Can you suggest some?

  2. #2
    Maybe YesNo's Avatar
    Join Date
    Oct 2010
    Location
    Near Chicago, Illinois USA
    Posts
    9,420
    Blog Entries
    2
    There are the Mother Goose rhymes, but I suspect you want something deeper. I only know a handful of them myself.

    Memorizing short texts is good for the brain no matter what the age especially if one recites them throughout the day when the internal chatter starts. If it is used for that purpose, you would want those texts to be the as highly significant to you as possible. One text that I've memorized is Hopkins' "Spring and Fall" http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/173665

  3. #3
    Hmm difficult question, because 5 is pretty young, but here's some brainstorming:

    "Daffodils" ~ William Wordsworth (http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/174790)

    "Living Tenderly" ~ May Swenson

    My body a rounded stone
    with a pattern of smooth seams.
    My head a short snake,
    retractive, projective.
    My legs come out of their sleeves
    or shrink within,
    and so does my chin.
    My eyelids are quick clamps.

    My back is my roof.

    I am always at home. I travel where my house walks.
    It is a smooth stone.
    It floats within the lake,
    or rests in the dust.
    My flesh lives tenderly
    inside its bone.


    ~And maybe the animal poems by D.H. Lawrence?

  4. #4
    All are at the crossroads qimissung's Avatar
    Join Date
    May 2008
    Location
    Lost in the bell's curve
    Posts
    5,123
    Blog Entries
    66
    Maybe something by Christina Rossetti:
    http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/171952

    The Wind
    "The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its' own reason for existing." ~ Albert Einstein
    "Remember, no matter where you go, there you are." Buckaroo Bonzai
    "Some people say I done alright for a girl." Melanie Safka

  5. #5
    All are at the crossroads qimissung's Avatar
    Join Date
    May 2008
    Location
    Lost in the bell's curve
    Posts
    5,123
    Blog Entries
    66
    Or Robert Louis Stevenson:
    http://m.poemhunter.com/poem/the-swing/
    "The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its' own reason for existing." ~ Albert Einstein
    "Remember, no matter where you go, there you are." Buckaroo Bonzai
    "Some people say I done alright for a girl." Melanie Safka

  6. #6
    Registered User fajfall's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2016
    Location
    Adelaide
    Posts
    76
    Thanks for suggestions thus far, yes deep and meaningful poems are what I have in mind. Eg with Shakespeare, Ludwig recommends comedies because the themes are more innocent and children don't need to ruminate on death, sadness etc. even for myself, I find the comedies put me in a happier and funnier mood than when I read macbeth

  7. #7
    Registered User Delta40's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2008
    Location
    Fremantle Western Australia
    Posts
    9,902
    Blog Entries
    62
    Before sunlight can shine through a window, the blinds must be raised - American Proverb

  8. #8
    On the road, but not! Danik 2016's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jan 2016
    Location
    Beyond nowhere
    Posts
    11,117
    Blog Entries
    2
    "I seemed to have sensed also from an early age that some of my experiences as a reader would change me more as a person than would many an event in the world where I sat and read. "
    Gerald Murnane, Tamarisk Row

  9. #9
    All are at the crossroads qimissung's Avatar
    Join Date
    May 2008
    Location
    Lost in the bell's curve
    Posts
    5,123
    Blog Entries
    66
    Ahhh, Danik, I love that poem! That was in an anthology of children's stories and poems we had as kids. Good memories.
    "The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its' own reason for existing." ~ Albert Einstein
    "Remember, no matter where you go, there you are." Buckaroo Bonzai
    "Some people say I done alright for a girl." Melanie Safka

  10. #10
    All are at the crossroads qimissung's Avatar
    Join Date
    May 2008
    Location
    Lost in the bell's curve
    Posts
    5,123
    Blog Entries
    66
    And Edward Lear is awesome, too, Delta. My kids loved Shel Silverstein, also.
    "The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its' own reason for existing." ~ Albert Einstein
    "Remember, no matter where you go, there you are." Buckaroo Bonzai
    "Some people say I done alright for a girl." Melanie Safka

  11. #11
    Card-carrying Medievalist Lokasenna's Avatar
    Join Date
    Feb 2009
    Location
    In a lurid pink building...
    Posts
    2,769
    Blog Entries
    5
    Jabberwocky?
    "I should only believe in a God that would know how to dance. And when I saw my devil, I found him serious, thorough, profound, solemn: he was the spirit of gravity- through him all things fall. Not by wrath, but by laughter, do we slay. Come, let us slay the spirit of gravity!" - Nietzsche

  12. #12
    Registered User fajfall's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2016
    Location
    Adelaide
    Posts
    76
    I can't manage to thank and reply to each good recommendation above. I love how a subject as simple as a turtle or the wind can be made into such a vivid, joyful image deep in one's mind simply by the use of words. This is an excellent start to a love of literature, and a great start to life itself. I've never appreciated literature because non-fiction is 'real', factual, practical whilst literature seemed to have no tangible use. But i'm starting to see what all the fuss is about and I'll be happy see my children 'get it' at an age far younger than mine. Keep the recommendations coming if you like, I'm enjoying it!

    (Ludwig's first introduction to Shakespeare is like a poem too, from A Midsummer Night's Dream: "I know a bank where the wild thyme grows / where oxlips and the knifing violet grows / quite over canopied with luscious woodbine / with sweet musk roses and with eglantine. / etc...)

  13. #13
    yes, that's me, your friendly Moderator 💚 Logos's Avatar
    Join Date
    Feb 2004
    Posts
    6,508
    Blog Entries
    19
    http://www.online-literature.com/coleridge/646/

    Coleridge's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. Yes I know it's mega-long and I myself don't have it memorised but I know a very young person who knows it by heart and loves to recite it with her parents
    Forum » Rules » FAQ » Tags » Blogs » Groups » Quizzes » e-Texts »
    .
    📚 📚 📒 📓 📙 📘 📖 ✍🏻 📔 📒 📗 📒 📕 📚 📚 📚 📚 📚 📚 📚
    .

  14. #14
    Translator Mohammad Ahmad's Avatar
    Join Date
    Oct 2013
    Location
    Moussoul, Ninawa, Iraq, Iraq
    Posts
    778
    Blog Entries
    40
    All poems dealing with respecting parents and countries
    My country is the Home of Honour And
    Without honour I haven't Home
    MMA

  15. #15
    Registered User bounty's Avatar
    Join Date
    Apr 2008
    Posts
    3,425
    I think mohammad's suggestion above points to this---if you are going to memorize poems, the question of the worth of doing so, apart from a purely academic exercise would be "why do I want my kids or students to memorize them", which leads to the nature of the poems and then I would pick the poems accordingly.

    if I value x, y and z, then the poetry memorization is in keeping with that.

Page 1 of 2 12 LastLast

Similar Threads

  1. Which poems would you recommend?
    By hadeelkouta in forum General Literature
    Replies: 2
    Last Post: 12-29-2013, 08:32 AM
  2. Kindly recommend poems for an amateur
    By Nikhar in forum Poems, Poets, and Poetry
    Replies: 23
    Last Post: 05-06-2011, 12:10 PM
  3. Recommend me something!
    By MilksABadChoice in forum General Literature
    Replies: 15
    Last Post: 04-11-2009, 10:48 AM
  4. the poor young beggar child
    By moonchilddd in forum Personal Poetry
    Replies: 0
    Last Post: 10-31-2006, 06:47 AM
  5. can anyone recommend...
    By mel0112 in forum Philosophical Literature
    Replies: 7
    Last Post: 11-06-2005, 07:45 PM

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •