If you are like me, you’ve never heard of a Spine Story (or Poem) before. I hadn’t until I read Erica’s wonderful children’s blog “What Do We Do All Day?” about a Summer Literacy BINGO game.
In the game, some of the squares were titled; learn a new song, finish a crossword puzzle, read a book outside, listen to an audiobook, and write a comic strip. As the the kids do each thing, they cross off the square. Five in a row means a BINGO win.
The square that caught my eye was, create a spine poem.
I’d never heard of a spine poem before so I clicked on a link to her page that explained them. Of course, if you’ve viewed the photos in this post, you will already know what one is. I call them stories instead of poems. A real challenge would be to do a Haiku poem in Spines.
I’ve yet to create one myself, but by the end of this post, I promise to put one together to share. Meanwhile, here are a few in Erica’s post.
(In case you can’t read the above Spines, they say “How to Write Poetry” “Brainstorm” “Where do You Get Your Ideas?” “All the world.”)
At the end of her blog on Spine Poems, she added a link to 100 Scope Notes which had a slew more of these poems/stories, titled “2013 Book Spine Poem Gallery”. There are other years of galleries available too. Lots of laughs and some really good Aligned Spines.
Okay, here are a few I tried. (haha) It was actually more fun than I thought. Once I’d done two, I saw many more possibilities!
Now it’s your turn.
Gather some of the books on your shelves or TBR stacks and try to create a few stories or poems? I’d love to see a photo, or just write the titles in your comment below. Hey, you are very talented storysmiths. Let’s see what story you can tell… from your bookcase? Create a cool, scary, funny, mysterious, clever, or romantic “aligned spines” story.
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Erica’s Literacy Bingo page: https://www.whatdowedoallday.com/reading-bingo-for-kids/
Erica’s Spine Poetry page: https://www.whatdowedoallday.com/spine-poetry-activity-for-kids/
100 Scope Notes Book Spine Galleries: https://100scopenotes.com/2013/04/02/2013-book-spine-poem-gallery/
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The Writers in Residence 
Goodness, Jackie, you always find the most amazing ideas to do with writing. Spine poems are a great and simple way to inspire us. Each will be unique as writers’ tastes are eclectic and our piles will all be different as far as the order we pile the books into. It is also a great way to interest children in poetry. I hope a few teachers bring the idea into their classrooms. Thank you for telling us about this new (to me) kind of writing.
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This is new to me as well. Truly inspirational and a wonderful teaching tool.
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What an interesting way to start a story or poem. I can imagine doing that with a bunch of mystery book spines. They tell a bit of a story on their own. Thanks, Jackie, for the post.
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Especially liked Yawn and Good Night Virginia! Off to stack some spines! Love this…
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Madeline, did you notice that I used one of YOUR books in my first spine story?
Oh, and let me know how you do!
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No, I didn’t see until you pointed out! Duh, how wonderful…goes perfect with What Elephants Know! I’m not too good at the stacking, but brought to the front of my mind a lot of books I’d forgotten about. Fun…
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Wow, looks as if I’d better spend some time just sorting through my books to check out their spines! What a novel idea–and/or nonfiction. And potentially fun. Thanks for an enjoyable post!
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What a terrific idea! You really do find fascinating stories, Jackie. Of course you’ve given us another diversion: to rearrange our shelves of books into new story lines…. but such fun for our very creative imaginations. Thanks for a great post.
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Reblogged this on Here's How It Happened.
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How fun! I tried to assemble some spine stories but only managed to get phrases (two spines). I’ll keep looking.
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The first one is hardest, Miko. I know. But then, a bunch just started falling into place!
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