Love That Dog by Sharon Creech

This book is about a boy named Jack who is telling a story through a series of short poems. However, he doesn't really think they are poems because he believes he doesn't understand poetry. His teacher helps him realize that everyone is a poet.
I love this book! I could completely relate to it, even now in college. Reading through the first few pages I knew exactly what Jack was saying. In my creative writing class in college we read the Red Wheelbarrow and I remember thinking, "I have no idea what this is about." As I was reading Jack's thoughts I couldn't help but laugh because it doesn't matter how old you are, sometimes you're going to feel like you just don't get it. What I loved about this book was that Jack's teacher keeps having him read poems and write poems and eventually Jack starts realizing that he can actually write poems. Throughout the entire book he keeps saying he doesn't understnad the poems they are reading and he doesn't think that his poems are that great because he doesn't really think they are poems. By the end of the story he is writing poems and putting his name on them for the entire class to see. I think this book is great for children because they can relate to it and it shows them that it's okay to not understand something right away, and also that not everyone gets the same thing out of what they are reading.