Christmas Poetry and Memorization

During Christmas past, as in last year, our children recited poetry in pairs at a local nursing home. The older two recited Robert Frost's Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening and the younger two combined efforts to present The Gift, by Christina G. Rossetti.


This year, I decided to have each child work on an individual poem or piece of memorization.

Three children are memorizing poems. Our youngest child, who is in Kindergarten, memorized the actual words to The Gift. Last year, he held up specific props for each line. This year, he now has the entire poem memorized. Though I am sure that hearing the poem multiple times last year helped his memorization. Our fourth grader is working on learning Christmas Everywhere, and our sixth grader is memorizing Christmas Bells.

Luke 2:1-20 has been chosen for our eighth grader to memorize. It is a bit ambitious, but worth the time and effort. Since the words are read aloud every year on Christmas morning, it is a passage he is very familiar with. We are pleased with his progress.


For Christmas future, as in next year, I am considering the following poems:
for memorization ~
Love Came Down at Christmas, Christina G. Rossetti
for reading and discussing ~
Christmas Trees, Robert Frost
Christmas in India, Rudyard Kipling
Christmas at Sea, Robert Louis Stevenson