8 poetry books to get children performing

As a children’s poet and actress, I love nothing more than seeing children perform poetry with joy and confidence. 

Feeling the words, sounding them out, and sensing the poem’s impact on an audience is a brilliant way for a child to very quickly understand the power and potential of poetry. 

This short (non-exhaustive!) list of brilliant poetry books for primary school pupils is therefore chosen with both accessibility and performance in mind.

All contain poems that are engaging and lively and will jump off the page and straight into a child’s mouth, and heart. 

This varied collection buzzes with bouncy, relatable poems for young readers and listeners. There is warmth, immediacy, and plenty of humour. 

Although there are some more thoughtful pieces, the overall tone is joyful, with poems that exuberantly celebrate books, bodies, spring, Saturdays, and wonderful wellies. Poems such as ​‘Nonsense Poem’, ​‘Our Weekend’, and ​‘Elephant Smellephant’ will encourage children to appreciate the magic of sound too. 

Cloud Soup is full of imaginative and witty poetry that encourages young minds to look at the world afresh. Kate is the master of the list poem, and ​‘Some Other Names for Rain’, ​‘Paean (or Eleven Uses for a Garden Pea)’ and ​‘The Baddies: A Miscellany’ will all surprise and entertain. 

I can imagine ​‘Goblins’ and ​‘The Absolutely Worst Food in the World’ being performed with real glee, and ​‘Free’, the final poem in the book, would be great for a class performance – I challenge eyes to remain dry! Illustrations here are by the very talented Elina Brasliņa. 

Energetic poems about dusty jellybeans and horrible hedgehogs sit alongside gentle pieces about night-time sounds, weeping willows, and the soft float of butterflies in this varied book, the first collection from the former Children’s Laureate of Wales. 

Daydreams and Jellybeans has the subtitle ​‘Poems to read aloud’, and that’s fair – each and every one of these poems works brilliantly for young listeners and performers. The reading experience is heightened by effective illustrations from Katy Riddell on every page. 

I Tell Myself I’m Awesome will spark lots of important conversations about gratitude, looking after yourself when things feel hard, twisting thoughts, and loss, but there are many comforting poems here too. 

There are also plenty of laughs to be had with lots of puns and word magic, and some of the poems like ​‘Racin’ Rover’ and ​‘Somnolent Solomon Simon’ will prove brilliant vocabulary stretchers for older primary school children. ​‘Backstage’ and ​‘Aeroplane Impression’ would be gorgeous to perform. 

This is a wonderfully inventive collection with real appeal for older primary school children. This is the book to buy for the child who is convinced that poetry is not for them. 

Simon held residencies at a number of primary schools whilst writing this book and it shows. The language feels honest and connected to day-to-day life for young people today, and is illuminated by Tom McLaughlin’s beautiful illustrations. 

So many of these poems would be fab in performance, but I imagine children particularly enjoying ​‘The Beat In My Brain’ and ​‘Us in the Car’, which encourage musical elements. The book can be happily snacked on, but the repeated ideas running through it also make it a very satisfying Poetry Pizza to swallow in one go! 

This is a varied collection of lively animal poems from Kate Williams with pitch-perfect illustrations from Hannah Asen. Most of the poems focus on a particular animal, making it a great way to explore the animal kingdom, especially as many of the poems, like ​‘Who, Me?’, ​‘Fox Trot’ and ​‘Dance of the Penguins,’ would lend themselves well to physical performance. 

There’s a great balance between playfulness and poignancy – young readers will laugh along with much of the collection, but there are quiet moments too. 

There are 52 poems here, one for each week of the year – and all will inspire young writers (the helpful section at the back gives further support on that front). 

The titular poem ​‘On Poetry Street’ would be great for performing, as would ​‘Still To Do…’ and a confident performance of ​‘A Mouthful of Words’ would bring the house down: 

A brilliant celebration of the power of poetry.

A really memorable debut collection full of wordplay and wit, ​‘Why Did My Brain Make Me Say It?’ is a must for Key Stage 2 classrooms and homes. 

There’s a really wide variety of forms at play here (haiku, shape poems, list poems, riddles, free verse, rhyming etc.) that will all serve as inspiring models for children’s own writing. Snippets of Welsh add to the wide range of voices in these poems, and ​‘Packed Lunch’, ​‘Medusa goes to the Hairdresser’, and ​‘Rumours’ are all begging to be performed! 

Fresh by Rhiannon Oliver, illustrated by Chris Riddell, is out now.