ISO short Russian poem for beginners

[Devin Browne]

Greetings!  My upper level French students have to do occasional recitations
of French poems.  It's more to emulate a tradition in France of being able
to spout off random poems that all kids have to memorize at some point in
their childhood, but they generally have fun with it and I do 3 or 4
shortish poems each year.

That's the background.  Now my IB Russian 2 students (seniors, second year
of a two-year intensive beginning Russian program with each high school year
correlating more or less to a college semester) actually WANT to recite a
Russian poem.  So, I turn to you, my colleagues, to see if you have any
suggestions for short poems that have been used fairly well with beginning
level students.  It would be helpful if, for any poem you suggest, that you
can also point to a place on the internet where I can find an audio or video
version of the poem so that I can make it available to my kids on our class
website.

"Classic" Russian poetry is what I'm leaning toward, I'll add, since my
students have very little knowledge of ANY Russian writers.

And finally, if you can email me directly, I'd appreciate it.  If there's
interest, I'll be happy to compile the information and share it with the
list at a later date.

Many thanks in advance!

Devin (aka Диван)

Devin Browne
Pittsburgh Public Schools' International Baccalaureate Programme
Pittsburgh, PA

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