In-Depth review (critique)

In-Depth review (critique)

Poets.org is an authentic website updated daily, developed by the Academy of American Poets, designed with a native English-speaking audience in mind, hence it is not an instructional website. Nonetheless, as a site with authentic language and useful culturally-based texts from English-speaking countries, poets.org is a valuable instructional tool.

Included in Poets.org are sections with texts, resources, audience and references.  In the Poets & Poetry section are subsections with extensive biographical and historical information on poets (going back as far as Virgil and and recent as Billy Collins), a listing of "currently most popular poets," essays, audio, etc.  There is also a subsection on writing, "donate" (about membership and publications, about us, for educators (with tips on teaching writing and poetry) and a "poetry near you" section that includes information on poets from each state in the US. The homepage also includes a searchable database (by poet or poem), a featured book of poetry (the current book at the time of this writing is Poems about the Underworld (as relates to Halloween), and a featured quote.

The site is extremely rich with resources that, if used well, can help students explore a poet, a theme, or reinforce reading, speaking, listening and writing.  Students can not only read poems by certain poets, but can hear audio where poets read their own poems, a powerful classroom tool to build reading and listening comprehension. This provides for a variety of accents, voices, and historical reference points.


As a teacher, I would approach this site in two ways -- one to use poems as writing prompts to get my own students to approach writing and poetry with some inspiration. They can read and hear poems and react to them with free writes.  I would choose poems with specific themes that we will introduce in class with some pre-reading and pre-writing activities, and then have students read and hear poems, react to them, and then write their own.  I would add to the technology use of this site by selecting audio files of simple poems and asking students to memorize them and recite them (this was a powerful tool for me when I was learning German and Spanish).  A second approach would be to study a specific poet and read about his/her life, place of birth, historical period, and poetry ( e.g. Langston Hughes, Harlem Renaissance, etc.) and use the site for resources.

Too often the texts we use with students are dry and textbook-based. Poets.org provides emotive, powerful language that is complex but not always syntax-bound. It helps students explore how English is used in creative ways, provides cultural background on some of the most important figures in American literature, and ....

On this site, an advanced search results in poems classified, by theme (mothers, love, death, love and passion) or by media type, poet, keyword.  This enables students to be able to conduct their own guided searches and do some research.

My concerns with this site are that the teacher be well-prepared and select poems with themes and language accessible to students, and that it be a bridge to students' own writing. I’m not entirely sure that a teacher who is not already a literature love will be able to navigate around this, but I believe that with the theme-based searching even poet-o-phobes would be able to find poetry that is fun and accessible and useful for incorporation into many thematic units. This site could be overwhelming, but with the resources on pedagogy, history, and practice, it would seem that almost any teacher could start and any point and come up with some good ideas and useful resources.

My greatest hope for this site would be that it will expose students to authentic literature in ways that are inspiring and accessible, and help classroom teachers move beyond tradebooks and worksheets. The use of web and audio technology can be great scaffolds for students and supports in listening, and likely inspire students new to technology.