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Poetry/Scripture Memory
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I have to confess that we have not done much with memorization. We are going to begin this year with scripture memory. I was wondering if you could convince me of why it is important to memorize poetry as opposed to just scripture. I know that the Word of God commands us to meditate on the scriptures but why do you think our children should memorize poetry? I’ve asked my boys what they think about memorizing poetry and they sigh. 🙁 Any thoughts or ideas?
Also, how do you all go about memorizing scriptures and/or poetry?
I know so many questions……
Hugs!
I don’t do much in the way of poetry memorization either. I would rather spend the time on scripture. We are memorizing the book of John this year, and until it is done–which may take years. My kids have less trouble memorizing in order than they do with disjointed passages. In the past we have memorized all the chapters from http://www.thywordcreations.com including the cd on Romans 6-8. My younger ones learn as the older ones review the songs. It makes it painless and fun, plus they seem to really enjoy it anyway. We are memorizing the book of John with notecards in little plastic boxes. The kids add a verse or two each morning and memorize them throughout the day. They recite at evening devotions after supper.
I read that above and it sounds like a lot, but we have been doing this for at least eight years now. Car rides are wonderful for scripture songs.
Anyway, I hope this helps and God bless!
Caroline
Here’s how we do Scripture memory.
I haven’t required poetry memorization from my kids. They seem to memorize the poems they like anyway. Thinking back on it, I don’t recall their starting to quote poems on their own until probably 7th or 8th grade.
As to why you might want to have your children memorize and recite poetry, Charlotte wanted the children to learn to recite beautiful words in a beautiful way. She also thought that recitation (which starts with memorization) was a great foundation for public speaking. It’s good to recite Scripture (and necessary to memorize it!), but some poetry will offer a more varied subject matter and more opportunities to practice different inflections and moods when reciting. So if you think your child may be a public speaker some day, reciting poetry may be a good stepping stone.
We do about 90% of our memorization as scripture. It is much more important to me as well. However, I do occasionally assign a poem, and I’ve assigned some short pieces of Shakespeare. We do it for variety and for practice in reciting poetry. (it bugs me how no one knows how to read or say poetry anymore, lol) I don’t do a lot of it–maybe a short piece or two each year. If one of the boys really likes a poet, I might choose to do some. For example, my boys loved Rudyard Kipling and both willingly memorized a bit of his poetry. Obviously, if you have boys, stay away from flower or fairy poems. LOL I could give you an idea or two if you told me which poets you are thinking of reading this year if you wanted, but if you don’t really want to do it, I don’t think anything awful will happen. 🙂
Michelle D
I must say that, it seems to me, if I had boys I would want them to memorize “If” by Rudyard Kipling. What think ye, Michelle?
LOL, yes, my oldest memorized all of “If” and my middle son did part of “If” and added a silly poem from Just So Stories.
I agree with everyone that scripture is more important to memorize so we have focused on that more then poetry but I must add that memorizing poetry is just so fun. Atleast with my aged children 8ds,6dd,4ds,2dd. They love the poem The GOOPS and now we recite it at the table everytime someone makes a mess or chews loudly. The kids just crack up when it is Daddy or Mommy who turns out to be the Goop of the day. I really enjoy reading the book entitled Read-Aloud-Rhymes for the very young, by Jack Prelutsky. There are poems about every season and about different animals and lots more. Even though the title says for the very young..I have to admit I love reading them so I bet even older children would love to listen or read them too.
As for how we memorize scripture or poetry I just write it on a piece of paper and put it up on the wall near our table so everyone can see it and during our meal times I just read it to them..after our first reading my oldest will normally have it and then just a few times later all the other children have it memorized too. Then I add the next section to be memorized. It is painless and the children don’t feel pressured.
Hope that helps.
Shelly
I keep the scripture we’re working on, on the table where we eat all our meals. We practice it over breakfast daily. Same thing with poetry. With scriptures, I tend to use a lot of sign language to help remember them. With poetry, I’ll only work on 2 lines at a time. I read them and everyone repeats after me. I’ll also have everyone close their eyes while I read a stanza or the whole thing if we’re towards the end. At first, they recite back to me with eyes still closed. The next day, we’ll do the same thing, but they stand up and recite it with eyes open.
I have 4 kids (11. 9. 7, 7) working on memorizing The Bluebird by Emily Dickenson- a hard poem! When we had learned it all and were just working on recitation, I had each of the four stand in turn and recite it. Then I jokingly said: Ok Daniel (3) your turn. He recited the WHOLE THING! Lydia (also 3) could do it all too. They just learned it by osmosis.
In my reading of McCullough’s book “John Adams”, he and Abigail use much poetry in their correspondence with each other. They memorized much poetry and it was highly valued. What I noticed, though was how they used it. John Adams even recited it to himself as a child.
Recitation in their letters was used to express their feelings for each other; love, friendship, and loneliness; their feeelings about their circumstances, reflections on human nature (which affected views on gov’t and power), and Abigail esp. used poetry to express her opinions on people.
I think knowing poetry rounds out a person and makes a person more literate; not to mention encourages their appreciation for beauty in all areas of G-d’s world. I agree that it helps with public speaking but I think it helps you express yourself more fully, even if the words aren’t originally yours. Reffering to the Goops above, poetry can support what your trying teach out of Scripture, just like copywork, but I think is more memorable, due to its rhyme.
YOur mind is full nof discriptive, word picture words and phrases that flow out. That’s a tremendous value in the mind and ability to communicate; and lends itself to concentration, too.
Of course, I want my children to always have more Scripture in thier memory than poetry, just the same. So it’s a matter of priority. But I do think the tongue that recites virtuous poetry can co-exist in the same mouth that praises the L-rd!
Rachel
Last year I had some success with poetry memorization. I read the same poem every day at lunchtime for a week. I was always amazed when the kids knew the poem by heart on Fridays without much effort other than listening. (My own mind rarely accomplished the memorization task, and the kids got a kick out of my fuzzy memory.)
If they didn’t like a particular poem, I noticed they had trouble memorizing it, and I never pushed it. We just moved on to the next poem. But they liked many poems and found them rather easy to memorize.
This year for poetry, I’ve been reading a different poem every day rather than the same poem. We haven’t accomplished any memorization at all this year with that faster pace, but we’ve been exposed to a greater number of poems and types of poetry.
In addition to the great reasons why to memorize poetry that are listed above, I will add another reason: it’s fun.
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