Lucy Calkins inspired a poetry unit for our students in grades K-3. Starting in September, each week of this unit inspires children to consider a new “ingredient” or strategy. The unit began with experimenting with looking at ordinary things in a new way. Subsequent classes explored looking at patterns in poetry, music, line breaks and the use of honest and precise words to convey thoughts. We also learned that poets find a big topic that gives them big, strong feelings, and also small objects or moments that hold that big feeling. Finally we compared ordinary language with poetic language.