Poetree

Written by Shauna LaVoy Reynolds

Illustrated by Shahrzad Maydani

Awards: 2020 Crystal Kite Award

Summary:

Olivia loves spring and loves to write poems celebrating the season. When the snow melts, she writes a poem then ties it to a birch tree in the park. The next day she sees another poem tied to the tree, which she believes has come from the tree. The next day she goes to school, but daydreams about the tree and is bothered by Walt's mean words about her. Olivia learns about haiku in class and writes a new poem for her new friend.  She delivers her work to the Poetree and finds a new poem there. This poem confirms her friendship with the tree. Olivia finds Walt pondering her connection to the tree. Both children learn that have a shared friend in the Poetree and find that they both love writing poetry. Their friendship blossoms as they look for words to describe their experience. 

Grade Level and Unit:

I would use Poetree in kindergarten to third-grade classrooms. I think that these students would enjoy the description of the seasons through the creative language in this book. This book can be used in a unit about the progression of seasons for early education classrooms. Second and third-grade classrooms could use this in a unit about descriptive language and sensory details. This could also be used to demonstrate appropriate classroom behavior for younger students.