Poem of the week 
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Icon by Luis Prado and Joe Harrison (The Noun Project)
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‘Please do not feed the animals…’
Poem Activity
Have fun with the poem by trying this...
This poem is full of lovely funny rhymes. Every two lines rhyme. They are called rhyming couplets.
Notice that the poem is in blocks of four lines, ending with a full stop. To learn the poem for a performance, start with the first rhyming couplet, and then learn the second. When you have those four lines, start on the next block, two lines at a time. Keep going a block at a time!
Make sure your audience can enjoy all the funny pairings. If two rhyming words are next to each other, like bear and eclair, leave a little pause between the words.
To explore the poem further, make up some more rhyming couplets to add to it. For example here are two we have made up:
Do not feed the kangaroos
Hot spicy stews
Do not give the bears
Big squashed pears
We're sure you can do better!
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Please do not feed the ostriches
sandwiches
or the polar bears
éclairs.
Do not offer the wombats
kumquats
or the rattle-snakes
fruit-cakes.
Remember that piranhas
are not allowed bananas
or partridges
sausages.
Never approach a stork
with things on a fork
or the bustard
with a plate of custard.
No leopard
likes anything peppered
and meerkats
dislike Kit Kats.
Remember that grapes
upset apes
and meringues
do the same for orang-utans.
Most importantly–
do not feed the cheetah
your teacher.