Customer Reviews

The Dog Ate My Homework

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Sara Holbrook, who is one of my favorite poets, presents a book full of school-related poems, many of them very humorous. I seriously reccomend this and other of Sara Holbrook's works for teachers, or students age 10-15.

I am an eighth grade English teacher, and I've worked in both Florida and Massachusetts. In both places, and in other places where I have had the fortune to work with children, Sara's poetry has captured their attention and wowed them with her understanding of their age. Her "silly rhymes" make them giggle and her "I am a teenager and my life is like this" poems make them jump for joy that someone knows what it is like to be in middle school (or elementary school, or high school). I have all of her books in my classroom, and have to replace them often because they are stolen: the highest compliment a student can make to a poet. I love Sara!

I use this book to teach idea and rhythm in poetry to middle schoolers. They enjoy reading the poems in this book and often select one of these poems for memorization. I like to have students add a stanza or two to one poem they select from this book. All of the poems relate back to the children,are easy to read, and the students can see themselves or someone they know in the poems. The book is just fun to read and work.

Prior to reading this book, I was not familiar with Sara Holbrook's work. My loss. Reading her poetry is such a joy! The poems in "The Dog Ate My Homework" are written from a child/teenager's point of view. They completely took me back to the thoughts and feelings I had growing up. A great addition to a personal collection or a classroom library.