Poetry Friday: More Than a Number (lyrics by Amy Ludwig Vanderwater)

Last week, I shared lyrics, and this week, a song about kids, assessment, and our educational system popped into my inbox. Doesn’t sound that poetic, does it? But the song More Than a Number (words by Poetry Friday regular Amy Ludwig Vanderwater and music by Barry Lane) is a poem, and it’s one that will be especially meaningful to parents of struggling kids and to all the educators out there who are working so hard and so passionately to connect with and to teach kids, despite all the demands and restraints of our assessment systems.

Here’s my favorite part:

I am more than a number.
Watch me fold this plane.
I snuggle with my beagle.
There’s music in my brain.
Someday I’ll go to Egypt.
I will never be a ‘2’.
I am more than a number.
I’m a person just like you.

If you think I can be measured
by numbers on a screen…
…if my whole school becomes a test
where will I learn to dream?
I love to do hard problems.
I write stories, and I laugh.
My gifts are so much greater
than the data on your graph.

You can listen to the whole song and read the lyrics here.

And I just learned that Amy is hosting today, so the Poetry Friday Roundup is at The Poem Farm today!