YOU KNOW IT !

            Have you and your friends ever chanted this rhyme while jumping rope?
           
             Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear, turn around,
             Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear, touch the ground,
             Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear, show your shoe,
             Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear, that will do!
           
            Kids are great poets, but most don't even know it!  The rhymes we learn when we're very young stick with us for years and years.  This is because poetry makes our words more memorable.
            April is National Poetry Month.  To celebrate, The newspaper talked with an expert about children's poetry.

What is poetry?
            Poetry is not always rhyming words.  But it always uses language in a remarkable way.
            Ancient people believed that because poets could build a story or a thought in an interesting way, they had more power than ordinary people.  For instance, religious texts might be written in a rhythmic verse.  These words seemed inspired by higher powers.
            Even some words from the Hebrew Bible are written in verse.  For example, from the book of Genesis, chapter 8:
            While the earth remains,
               seedtime and harvest, and cold
               and heat,
               and summer and winter, and day
               and night
               shall not cease.

Not just religious
            People also made warnings and curses more memorable with verse, such as this saying:
             Red sky at night, sailor's delight;
                red sky at morning, sailors take warning.

Kids are natural poets
            Children make up rhymes all the time, even using nonsense words.
            That's what makes poetry fun!
            Poet JonArno Lawson plays withwords in his poem "Tickle Tackle Botticelli":
            Chomp alompa omphalos
               charber choparoo.
               Listen up and look around and
               think a little, too.

Favorite poets
           Some of children's favorite authors are poets, including Shel Silverstein and Dr. Seuss, who was famous for nonsense words like these (from "Bartholomew and the Oobleck"):
           Shuffle, duffle, muzzle, muff!