It’s so much fun to see students exploring new ways to use words and learn vocabulary. That’s why poetry is so exciting! We’ve put together this list of sweet 1st grade poems for kids to use in your classroom or at home. You’ll find great options of various lengths for all reading levels. Your students will love them!
“There’s a lot to do!”
“Not on a plane! Not in a ship!”
3. My Lunch by Kenn Nesbitt
“A candy bar. A piece of cake.”
4. Play by Lill Pluta
“I jump. I shake.”
“Growing on a tree.”
“The cat and the fiddle.”
7. Happy Thought by Robert Louis Stevenson
“The world is so full of a number of things …”
“Who said, ‘It is just as I feared!’”
“Have you any wool?”
“In the grass. / Fly away.”
“The day to do things / in the opposite way.”
“She had so many children, she didn’t know what to do.”
“When I was One, I had just begun.”
“How I wonder what you are!”
“I never saw a Purple Cow.”
16. Colors by Rebecca T. Besser
“Red, blue, yellow, and green.”
17. Scarecrow by Lauren Shirk
“Made of hay.”
“Down on the ocean floor …”
“Belly, belly, belly beans.”
“My dog and cat are friends somehow.”
“If you have to dry the dishes …”
22. The Lion by Hilaire Belloc
“The Lion, the Lion, he dwells in the Waste …”
“How doth the little crocodile / Improve his shining tail …”
“He snapped at a mosquito.”
“In the dark of December …”
“And I hope you love me too.”
“There once was a silly raccoon …”
“I am yellow …”
“Dan likes spring. / Spring is green.”
“Said the Duck to the Kangaroo …”
31. Magic by Shel Silverstein
“Sandra’s seen a leprechaun, / Eddie touched a troll …”
“I’m going out to clean the pasture spring …”
“On the top of the Crumpetty Tree …”
“Whose woods these are I think I know …”
35. The Tyger by William Blake
“Tyger Tyger, burning bright …”
“Wynken, Blynken, and Nod one night / Sailed off in a wooden shoe …”
37. Bed in Summer by Robert Louis Stevenson
“In winter I get up at night / And dress by yellow candle-light.”
“When I was sick and lay a-bed, / I had two pillows at my head …”
39. A Thought by Robert Louis Stevenson
“It is very nice to think / The world is full of meat and drink …”
40. The Eagle by Alfred, Lord Tennyson
“He clasps the crag with crooked hands …”
“He works for Pa; / An’ he’s the goodest man ever you saw!”
“‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves …”
43. At the Zoo by William Makepeace Thackeray
“First I saw the white bear, then I saw the black …”
44. Moon by Robert Louis Stevenson
“The moon has a face like the clock in the hall …”
“Bye, bye classroom.”
