Find more Poetry Friday with Irene at Live your Poem.
The shells went to school this week. Children are fascinated by shells. They loved picking out their own special shell to write about.
In her book Awakening the Heart, Georgia Heard writes about spinning metaphors, “Spinning metaphors and similes has the effect of spinning a kaleidoscope around to see the beautiful and multifaceted color variations.” On a clean notebook page, let’s see how many metaphors we can think of for our shells. Then we started spinning.
Wonderopolis has a number of seashell-oriented Wonders. We explored two of them: How Much is a Sand Dollar Worth? and How are Sea Shells Formed?
After enjoying the Wonders, shells, and discussion, we had a “sacred writing time.” During this time, I gave them the option to write a Deeper Wisdom poem introduced by Joyce Sidman at Today’s Little Ditty, Michelle H. Barnes.
The steps are:
1. Choose a subject. It can be anything: an ant, the Empire State Building, your father. Your poem will be called “What Does [your subject] Know?
2. Think about the greater Truths that this particular object knows, whether it is alive or not.
3. State these truths—six of them—in two stanzas, repeating your question before each stanza.
4. If you want, rhyme each final word—but this is not necessary. (Joyce Sidman)
My student Matthew met this challenge with an amazing result.
What does a seashell know?
It doesn’t know the Pythagorean Theorem
Or how to count by fives,
But it knows the ocean’s feelings.
It’s felt the sea god’s cries.
It knows it has an owner.
It knows that it’s a shield.
It has one life purpose—
to make the sea assassins yield.By Matthew, 5th grade
I struggled with this form. Rhyme stumps me up every time. After quite a few tries, I tweaked the form a bit to write the poem I wanted to write.
Reflections on the Teche 
Oh Margaret, you and and Matthew have done beautiful work here! Seashells are perfect for this “wisdom” work. I feel so inspired now. Kudos for Matthew for getting Pythagorean Theorem in a poem…. and your “carvings of years gone by” is lovely. xo
I love this Margaret. It reminds me of Pam Munoz Ryan’s book in rhyme Hello Ocean. Beautiful poems and lesson for students. Thank you.
Wonderful! I absolutely love that Matthew tweaked the form to write the poem he wanted to write.
Glad you felt free to tweak the form! I like Matthew’s “shield/yield” rhyme, and, like Linda, I really like “carvings of years gone by.”
Margaret, your choice of giving children sacred writing time is such a powerful image for me. I can see a band of writers huddled over paper or devices trying to compose and craft their thoughts. I can hear the conversations and read the flow of thoughts that are laid out in stanza form. Matthew gave flight to his thoughts and your last line still lingers with me.
The sea has much wisdom to offer… as do you and your fab student poets! Thanks to both you and Matthew for making this form your own. I have learned much from your efforts, not the least of which is to be wary of sea assassins!
Terrific to hear about this lesson, Margaret & then to read the result. Both poems show the inspiration of shells. I too love that ‘sacred writing time’, can hear the pencils scratching!
“the sea assassins yield”
I love, love, love this!
I’d like to join your class sometime! When I read, “see how many metaphors we can think of for our shells,” I had a complete brain freeze. I think that’s why I like haiku so much–no metaphors and similes!
These are both lovely, Margaret. I especially love your lines “What does the seashell hear…the beat of your heart.” I have to tell you, though, you know what they say about great minds? I’ve been thinking a lot about seashells lately and when I read Joyce’s challenge on Michelle’s blog last week, I immediately thought of shells. I’ve been working on something all week, but it’s not finished. The beauty of poetry is that it’s completely different from the poems you’ve shared today!
Both are lovely, and I like that you both modified the form in a way that made your poem work best!
Luv how you’ve reversed the trope about listening to a shell, & you have the shell hearing the precious heart. Serene shell memory. Thank you.
Such beautiful poems here Margaret – I especially loved the one written by your 5th grader – such talent, and it seems so effortless too! 🙂
I also love the image of the seashell quietly listening to years gone by – must be a beautiful sound.