How Poems For Kids Boost Reading Skills?

In this day and age, we don't give much time to poetry. Unfortunately, this branch of literature is being overlooked and ignored so much that we expect our children to be introduced to poetry in school, but we have no dealing with it beyond that.  

However, it's important that our children grow to know and love poetry because, throughout time, poetry has been a powerful medium for expressing emotions, ideas and beliefs.  Whether you're a poet at heart, a sceptic or a curious spectator, you will be amazed by the wondrous benefits of poetry on children in and beyond the classroom. 

Poetry motivates children to read, builds phonemic awareness and builds essential skills. Each of these skills is crucial for children to become strong readers. In this article, we will look at how poetry helps kids improve their reading skills and a few examples of the most popular poems for kids.

How does poetry help kids improve their reading skills? 

Below are a few benefits of reading poetry: 

Develops reading fluency  

Reading poetry engages more reluctant readers and encourages more confident readers to pay attention to the words in the poem, thus developing their reading comprehension. Also, the tunes and patterns of poems help children develop reading fluency. 

Helps them become better with spellings  

Poetry helps children develop a good awareness of rhyme and rhyming skills. This makes them better spellers and readers. Poetry nudges them to look at patterns hidden in the words, which supports spelling and word recognition. 

Makes it easy and fun to memorise texts  

When children recite poems, they learn to enunciate and pronounce words better. By memorising the poem, kids learn to recognise patterns of the sophisticated language, providing them with the flexibility to read and speak the language better. 

Builds vocabulary  

Poetry has words that kids usually don't encounter, but the short text nature of it makes it easy for them to figure out the meaning from the context. This prepares the kids to tackle longer texts in the future. 

Creates awareness of words  

In a poem, each word matters. The place of a word in a poem and the sound of it plays an integral part in conveying the emotions and message. Moreover, poems for kids expose them to different types of phrases and figures of speeches, such as alliteration, similes, and metaphors. Additionally, each word in the poem has a meaning, and as your child reads the poem over and over again, they begin to understand the meaning of the words and why that particular word was used instead of another.

Short English Poems for Kids 

Below are some popular poems for kids: 

1. Snowball  

I made myself a snowball

 As perfect as could be.

 I thought I'd keep it as a pet

 And let it sleep with me.

 I made it some pajamas

 And a pillow for its head.

 Then last night it ran away,

 But first it wet the bed.

 2. Baa, baa, black sheep 

Baa, baa, black sheep

 Have you any wool?

 Yes sir, yes sir,

 Three bags full;

 One for the master,

 And one for the dame,

 And one for the little boy

 Who lives down the lane

3. Jack and Jill 

Jack and Jill

Went up the hill

 To fetch a pail of water,

 Jack fell down

 And broke his crown

 And Jill came tumbling after.

 Up Jack got

 And home did trot

 As fast as he could caper,

 Went to bed

 To mend his head

 With vinegar and brown paper.

In Conclusion

It's time that you give importance to the benefits of teaching poetry to your children; otherwise, they might miss out on it completely. If they haven't been exposed to poems in their early years, they might not choose books of poems to read. So, break the barrier and share the goodness of poetry with them. Together, you can help your child expand their horizons and love for the written word.

Author Bio:

Samidha Raj works as part of the content marketing team at PlanetSpark, a platform that provides online classes to K8 learners on "New Age Skills" like English Communication, Public Speaking, Grammar, Creative Writing, Debating, etc. She is passionate about empowering the youth by educating parents about the importance of 21st-century skills. In her free time, you can find her watching documentaries or animated movies and organizing game nights (board games are her thing)!