Neighborhood Odes

I love this book! The poems and the illustrations are fabulous! I have really enjoyed reading these poems with my 8 year-old son, he especially likes the one about "Pablo's Tennis Shoes". These poems are sweet and funny and great to read out loud. I highly recommend this one!

This is a delightful collection of odes to ordinary things, in the tradition of Neruda, but written in language much more accessible to elementary and/or middle school students and accompanied by charming woodcut designs. This book would be useful in introducing poetry, especially to native Spanish speaking students, in that most of the vocabulary is fairly unintimidating and many of the subjects spring from experiences as universal as eating snow cones in the summer, watching fireworks, tennis shoes, and visiting the library. Also useful is the short glossary of terms for the Spanish-impaired ;-)

I love this book for so many reasons! The poems are great and students will be able to relate to them. Teachers will have so many ways to incorporate these and should be able to come up with great activities to do with the poems. The papel picado-like artwork is great, too!

This book was a fantastic support when teaching 5th graders to move beyond "recipe" poetry. The ode structure helps them find the poetry in their day to day experiences. They thoroughly enjoyed listening to Gary Soto's odes, and were eager to write their own.