My mother-in-law worked at a museum of natural history. She curated the Native American collections and took particular interest in the Passamaquoddy tribe in northern Maine. For several years, she took trips to Maine collecting handmade sweetgrass baskets and writing about the women who made them. She knew this was a vanishing art that would be lost soon.

When my sons were 8 and 4 years old, they each got a sweetgrass basket for Christmas. No 8- or 4-year-old boys on the planet would ever wish for such a gift. No matter. Every Christmas for several years, each boy got another basket. It never occurred to her that maybe they had enough baskets. The boys did not appreciate the baskets and had no interest in getting them.

Were the boys ungrateful? Probably. But what was the thought behind the gifts? To increase the boys’ awareness of Native American traditions? Maybe, though that wouldn’t need to be an annual lesson. To give the boys an odd savings account? When the basket-makers vanish the baskets will go up in value? Maybe, but I don’t think so. I think it was simpler than that. She loved baskets and thought that everyone else must love baskets, too. She never for a second tried to get into the heads of young kids. Her love of baskets blinded her to seeing different things that might have been more valuable to the boys. Legos. A kit with science experiments. Sporting equipment. Funny socks.

And so it is with English teachers and poetry. We love poetry and believe that every child must love poetry, too. Every year, conferences such as NCTE have many sessions about poetry. Every year, all students get poetry lessons. Often it is a poetry unit where students read and write poetry, but sometimes poetry embedded in each topical unit—a short story, a novel, and a poem about man vs. nature, perhaps. Either way, every year for every student, there will be poems. We never stop to wonder if there might be something more valuable for students. We never have the thought that maybe students have had enough poetry. How many poems do you need to read or write before you graduate? Indeed, the slightest hint of a suggestion of that poetry might be overdone is very upsetting.

We ask students to be open-minded and entertain different points of view. Let’s ask that of ourselves, too. Take off the blinders for a moment. Are we missing something? Does our bias keep us from seeing different things that might be as valuable for students, or, heaven forbid, more valuable?

Let’s be clear: I am not suggesting an end to poetry. I am not suggesting that poetry has no value. I am not saying teachers are wrong for loving poetry and desiring to instill that love in their students. I am saying that poetry does not to be a part of every English class. I am saying that NCTE et. al. have HUGE blind spots. What are we failing to teach because of the obsession with poetry? How to read images and sound? How to speak well? How online reading differs from print reading? How to critically evaluate AI produced products? In life, those will be more important than knowing iambic pentameter and haiku. If you have specific lessons about how to write haiku poems and no specific lessons about how to speak well, for instance, you are shortchanging your students. (And no, an assignment that makes kids talks IS NOT TEACHING the skills needed to talk well.) They will talk every day of their lives often in critical situations. They will never haiku.