Poetry is good for youth development.

Poetry may be seen as too wordy or complex for youth, but I believe that poetry is a good way of self-expression and letting a creative flow go. I started doing poetry when I was seven years old. I felt it was freeing to let myself experiment with words after realizing they could be used for so much more than the already-made storybooks I was taught. Writing is seen as something that young people dread but more youth other than a privilege that they can use to create and express themselves. So here are six reasons why you should add poetry to your repertoire and how it can be incredibly beneficial to their well-being.

Language Development

Poetry exposes children to enriching vocabulary, rhythm, and rhyme, helping them expand their language and speaking skills. It is incredibly common for children to already have more speech difficulties and it’s much more common for kids of the ages 3-17 to have speech disorders. According to the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders, the highest number of children with speech disorders ranges around the ages of three to six. This is significant because the lack of speech and confidence can cause a significant amount of damage to the voices of young children who lack the opportunity to be heard. It should be heavily encouraged for children to voice their opinions in ways that can be safe and stress-relieving. With poetry allowing children to have the opportunity to speak and be listened to can be just the push they need to make them feel secure in themselves.

Creativity and Expression

Poetry helps children think creatively and use their imagination to visualize creative pieces, dialects, and concepts. With this, allowing children to experience reading complex poems of all sorts could help the mental development of teens in a positive and intellectual manner. Through poetry, children can creatively express their feelings and emotions. Poetry helped me express so much about myself and learned how to care more for others. Poetry is a good way of promoting self-awareness and empathy. Poetry is an amazing and simple way to challenge children and allow them to have freedom in what they write and how they write it.

Memorization Skills

Poetry and reciting poems is a good way of helping young and flexible minds expand and become productive, creative, and functional people with good memory skills. Reciting and memorizing poems enhances memory skills and helps children develop confidence. It is good to encourage children to be confident so they can become confident adults. When I was younger, repeating my poems and songs over and over again stuck with me and to this day I can remember phrases I wrote from when I was seven years old. 3+ Ways to Memorize Your Poems for Performances.

It can teach children to appreciate different cultures

Poetry exposes children to different cultures, traditions, and perspectives. Fostering a love and respect for diversity and promoting inclusivity is important for not only young children but also for the betterment of our society. Poetry can change the faulty society in which we already live. For teens to read or hear alternative ways of living so they grow up with mutual respect with other people of different backgrounds. 

It can serve as a branch to new hobbies or career experiences

Poetry gives teens a lot of new choices on what to do in the future or what career they would like to pursue. Poetry gives children a lot of freedom whether or not they would like to be a writer, artists, or even musicians. Poetry should be instilled in young minds as soon as possible, there is no too early or too late to start writing. Poetry is good for a lot of things but what’s most important is finding out what is good for you as a person. It is good to find new hobbies and experience new things so that you can develop in many different criteria.

It can calm the mind and body

Last but not least, poetry is good for your mind and body. To express yourself freely with no limits or boundaries on what to write or how you write it, can promote so much positivity to yourself. Caring about yourself is incredibly important so to implement these behaviors on a child can be an incredibly amazing thing not just for them but for the world around them. To feel good will allow you to behave well and share that positivity and this should be wanted in the world that we live in. We should allow all teens the ability to express themselves and feel free.