Hello teachers! We know you work hard. Besides ninjas, you have the hardest job in the world. Between the teaching, the testing, the grading, and the nurturing it’s difficult to seek out new materials for your classroom. We are here to help. As poets and teachers, we know the power of the spoken word in the classroom. All you have to do is attend a youth slam or find a clip of one online and you will see the positive impact modern poetry has on our young people. It is able to engage students from any background in a way that classical poetry simply cannot touch. A complaint we’ve heard from many teachers is that they would love to use spoken word in their classrooms but they are afraid of getting in trouble with rough language and themes. So behold! We asked some of the best contemporary spoken word and slam poets to give us poems that would be appropriate for the classroom. This means you will not have to sift through this book with a highlighter to try and find the F’s and the S’s and the B’s and the Z’s. We’ve provided poems from national slam champs, world slam champs, fellow teachers, and poets we feel are the best of what’s around. We’ve also included some amazing lessons in its companion book for the teacher, sold separately.