National Poetry Month 2015: Activities, Ideas To Celebrate Your Favorite American Authors

National Poetry Month is upon us. The celebration of American poets and their works runs for 30 days, which is enough time for teachers, students, bloggers and authors alike to try multiple literary activities. The whole month of April, make sure to track the conversation on Twitter -- follow the hashtag #npm15 -- and read a lot of poetry. Here are a few of the best National Poetry Month ideas on the Web:

1. Make a poet's favorite recipe. Try Walt Whitman's cranberry coffee cake, Emily Dickinson's coconut cake or Maya Angelou's buttermilk biscuits.

2. Watch some famous poetry slam sessions. Neil Hilborn's "OCD" and Taylor Mali's "What Teachers Make" are among the videos with the most views on YouTube.

3. Attend a poetry slam event in real life. Use this map to find a performance near you.

4. Let Jack Prelutsky walk you through writing a poem, then publish it online.

5. Write your favorite poet a letter and mail it to the Academy of American Poets, 75 Maiden Lane, Suite 901, New York, NY 10038.

6. Learn about different types of poems: Haikus, limericks, couplets or free verse.

7. Use the online Name Poem Generator for an automatic acrostic.

8. Host a screening of "Dead Poets Society" or "Shakespeare in Love."

9. Sign up for tinywords, a service that sends you a text message every day with a short poem.

10. Create your own magnetic poetry tiles with these instructions.

11. Go to a museum and write a poem describing a painting.

12. Check out some unintentional haikus in New York Times stories.

13. Write the "Please Don't Read This Poem" poem in invisible ink -- lemon juice -- on paper. Let it dry and send it to someone in secret with instructions for them to warm it under a lamp.

14. Jump rope to famous children's rhymes. Extra points if you can do double Dutch. "Cinderella, dressed in yellow, went upstairs to kiss a fellow..."

15. Play the online "Pen is Mightier than the Sword" game to sharpen your typing skills.