How to write poetry: Diamante poems

Diamante poetry is great fun and can be very decorative, so gather the kids around and turn learning this poetry into a great afternoon activity. Create some cards or posters for family members or for Christmas presents.

What you need:

• paper
• pencils or pens for writing

Decorative options:

• coloured markers
• coloured pencils
• paste
• glitter
• diamantes

Number of players:

Activity:

Diamante poetry is formally written with only seven lines. These lines are shaped like a diamante as the name suggests. To acheive this you should set your poem out in the following format:

One,
Two Words,
Three words together,
Middle line four words,
Back to three
Then two
One

Here is how to write a diamante poem:

• Think of a subject and then something that is the opposite or contrasting directly to that subject. For example – cat and mouse. These two words will make your first and last lines. 
• Your second line should be two words that describe your subject in first line. In this case, we are describing a cat so we would say "large" and "fierce".
• The third line should be words that describe what your subject is doing. So action words. A cat could be "prowling" "hunting" and "chasing"
• The fourth line refers to both of our subjects. The first two words will be about the cat and the last two will be about the mouse. These words will be *concrete nouns. For our diamante poem, we would use "white" and "claws". The last two words need to refer to the mouse, we would use "brown" and "quick".
• The fifth line refers to the last line in your poem. So in this case, the mouse. We follow the same formula as above with the cat, but this time, it is backwards. So the line would include words about what the mouse might be doing. "Hiding", "sneaking" and "dashing".
• The sixth line is only two words to describe the mouse. "Small" and "timid" are good examples of what a mouse is generally like.
• The seventh and last line in your diamante poem was decided long ago, and this is your mouse.

*Concrete nouns are words you can experience with one of your five senses. So, for fur, you could describe it as soft, you can see it and describe it as white, you can smell it and it may smell fresh. This is how we know it is a concrete noun, you can describe it by using either your sight, smell, touch, taste or hearing.

Our diamante poem will look like this:

Cat
Large, fierce
Prowling, hunting, chasing
White, claws … brown, quick
Hiding, sneaking, dashing
Small, timid
Mouse

From this diamante poem, you can read and almost imagine a large cat, chasing a timid mouse about a room, dashing and hiding from a white cat with claws out.

Try your own, illustrate as you have written the poem. You can make a diamante poem about anything, not just animals. You could write about a holiday, a season or even a place.

Good luck!

Image from Shutterstock.