Using Multigenre Picture Books in Middle School

At first glance, it may seem that multigenre picture books that present nonfiction topics in poetry are best for young students. But I find that their layers of complexity make them perfect for middle school classrooms; the blend of nonfiction and poetry offers powerful opportunities that engage students in meaningful learning across content areas.

By combining facts with poetic elements, intentional word choice, and images, these picture books invite middle school readers to make connections to complex topics. They also provide a jumping-off point for deeper inquiry, research, writing, and skill development.

Encourage Vocabulary, Literary Analysis, and Information Synthesis

Multigenre picture books expose students to rich, content-specific vocabulary that is used intentionally and creatively within the text. I’ve found that as students experience academic language along with images and in the context of poetry, they internalize meanings rather than memorize definitions. Poetry is often filled with layered meanings and figurative language that create natural opportunities for students to slow down and reread the text to determine the full meaning. Many of these books also provide a glossary as part of their back matter for students to further explore words’ meanings.

These books are ideal for practicing close reading strategies of annotation, discussion, and rereading. Students can examine line breaks, figurative language, vocabulary, and structure, and explore the factual information. The ability to read these books more quickly than traditional nonfiction texts allows students to read multiple books on a similar topic and synthesize the information among them.

Because they naturally bridge English language arts with other subjects, nonfiction poetry books lend themselves to collaborative planning and cross-curricular projects. A single text can support reading, writing, science inquiry, art analysis, and discussion.

For example, Dream a Dress, Dream a Poem: Dressmaker and Poet, Myra Viola Wilds (by Nancy Johnson James, illustrated by Diana Ejaita) ties in perfectly with the eighth-grade social studies curriculum connected to the Great Migration. It provides an opportunity to teach history through poetry and encourage students to dig deeper into that time period and explore the lesser-known people who had an impact on history.

Sample Questions

Most of these types of picture books are written as one continuous poem about a topic or an anthology of poems around a central topic or idea. While there are always questions that can specifically align to the topic, after reading many of these books, I’ve found questions that can be applied to almost any of them.

If you’re looking to implement this type of work in your classroom, these questions can be applied to most books. In support of student choice, students could read different books based on their interest but answer the same questions.

• How does poetic structure (figurative language, imagery, repetition, format) impact your understanding of the information?
• How do the images deepen your understanding? Consider how the illustrations add meaning to the poetry.
• What lines in the poem stand out?
• What content vocabulary is present in the poem? What context clues help you determine the meaning?
• What facts can you pull from the poem; what questions do you still have about the topic?
• How was reading about this nonfiction topic different because it was written as poetry?

Sample Activities

There are also activities that connect well to these types of picture books—and can be chosen based on the learning goals.

For example, if I want students to practice writing poetry and make an interdisciplinary connection, I may use the book as a mentor text and ask students to write their own poetry to showcase their content knowledge or rewrite an article as poetry in a creative summary. When I want students to practice analyzing various forms of nonfiction text, one of these books can be selected for students to use in their synthesis of information.

If my goal is to have students examine different types of poetry such as free verse, haiku, sonnet, concrete, etc., it’s important for them to see how the forms convey factual information (while also examining the poetic structure). Part of reading nonfiction is knowing how to read graphs, charts, etc. A building block for that is to examine how images, layout, color, and white space come together with text to create meaning.

Book Recommendations

Multigenre nonfiction poetry picture books are especially effective for differentiation by offering multiple entry points of understanding. Students can access and engage with the content at their own appropriate level of complexity.

Reluctant readers benefit from shorter text, white space, and visual support through images, which reduces cognitive load yet maintains high academic expectations. Advanced readers are challenged to analyze poetic devices, make inferences, and explore the connections between symbolism and facts. These books also increase opportunities for student choice in book clubs and/or independent reading, allowing students to select based on their interests.

Here are a few books that I recommend:

Awesome Earth: Concrete Poems Celebrate Caves, Canyons, and Other Fascinating Landforms, by Joan Bransfield Graham, illustrated by Tania Garcia

This book uses concrete poetry to teach readers about various landforms. It lends itself to an introduction of landforms and/or having students create concrete poems to showcase their knowledge about any topic that lends itself to imagery.

Black Diamond Kings, by Charles R. Smith Jr., illustrated by Adrian Brandon

This book celebrates Black baseball players through powerful, historically accurate individual poems that showcases the players’ legacy and perseverance. This is a great mentor text for biographical poetry and high interest for students who enjoy learning about sports. The legends in the book also tie into various aspects of an American history curriculum.

You’re a Poet: Ways to Start Writing Poems, by Sean Taylor, illustrated by Sam Usher

This book uses a cute piglet to introduce different forms of poetry and provides examples and detailed directions on how to write specific types of poems. It offers a low-stakes opportunity for students to experiment with writing poetry.

The Power of Back matter

This valuable section is often overlooked in picture books. The back matter contains author’s notes, timelines, glossaries, source lists, photographs, and additional information that help students distinguish between fact and interpretation while giving them additional insight into a topic.

These books contain exceptional back matter:

Harriet Tubman, Force of Nature: A Biography in Poems, by Caroline Brewer

The Pine Cone’s Secret: A Life Cycle Poem, by Hannah Barnaby, illustrated by Cédric Abt

Up, Up High: The Secret Poetry of Earth’s Atmosphere, by Lydia Lukidis, illustrated by Katie Rewse

A Universe of Rainbows: Multicolored Poems for a Multicolored World, poems selected by Matt Forrest Esenwine, illustrated by Jamey Christoph

As they examine the back matter and poetry, students can compare poetic lines with the facts, use the additional information to support their own research, and analyze why an author made a stylistic choice, in addition to reinforcing skills on how to evaluate sources for credibility.

Nonfiction poetry picture books invite students to experience learning as both intellectual and emotional. They foster curiosity, deepen comprehension, and encourage creativity while supporting content knowledge and literacy skills. By intentionally integrating these texts across grade levels and disciplines, teachers can create classrooms where facts and feelings coexist, and where students also learn how to notice, wonder, and reflect.