The Power Of Poetry By Salina Beattie

For my capstone, I wanted it to be about something that I am passionate about! Or else, I know I wouldn't be able to put my all into it. Since 6th grade, I had a love for poetry. As I got into high school, my love for poetry grew like a wildfire. While working with the Philadelphia Poetry Youth movement, they inspired me to want to widen my audience of listeners. So I came up with the idea of teaching kids (middle school) and teenagers (high school) about "The Power Poetry" and what it can be used for! Throughout my slides, you will see both of the breakdowns for high school and middle school.  I got an extraordinary chance to be able to work with kids from SLA middle school with the supervision of their teacher, Ms.Hamilton who welcomed me like I was her own. Then I taught two tenth grade classes in my school.

My capstone mentor challenged me to cater to both audiences without losing the "it factor" of using poetry to make a difference. So that's what I did! I wasn't able to put the recordings of each grades performances in but I do have them and they performed amazingly! I have to be honest, I was scared that the kids wouldn’t want to participate in the open mic at the end. But overall most people did because they were intrigued by the prompts that I gave. I made sure that we made the room a safe space before sharing. So everyone had a understanding that nobody including the teacher and myself wouldn’t judge the student about what they wrote. After all I was always taught that writing has a mind of its own and will take its course no matter who’s listening. Thank you for viewing my Capstone. Hopefully, you can find a love for poetry and use it to tap into your creative side and be a voice for the voiceless. Maya Angelou once said, “ I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”