Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Archive for the ‘Poetry’ Category

Please use this button on your site for DigiLit Sunday posts

Please use this button on your site for DigiLit Sunday posts

Button created by Leigh Anne Eck for sharing Digital Poetry.

Button created by Leigh Anne Eck for sharing Digital Poetry.

A_bee_and_a_rose

For the month of April, National Poetry Month, my students were totally absorbed in poetry, reading and writing poems, even singing poems. As a second grader, Andrew needed more support for his poetry project. He had never made a video before. I sat with him as he produced an Animoto video of his original two voice poem after the book Seeds, Bees, Butterflies, and More. But hands off. I never touched the keyboard. He expertly traveled from one tab to another, choosing images, downloading to the computer, and uploading into Animoto. Sometimes I marvel at how adept students can be at the computer.

https://animoto.com/play/ZrabDZGPMWBmJ4DCAsNTAg

Sometimes when creating the video, my students will let the image and sound lead to revision. I know this is true for me, too. I’ll write a rough draft and when I get to the movie making stage, I revise and adjust to create a visual as well as a written poem. Emily did this with her poem “Cammy, the Elderly Camera” which she wrote after a poem in Cat Talk by Patricia MacLachlan and Emily Maclachlan Charist.

https://animoto.com/play/G1TT5mJqQtl0AutGxfQLUg

Jacob wanted to write a poem after God got a Dog by Cynthia Rylant. He wrote that God got a genie. He chose the video of a surfer crashing into the waves from the Animoto video files to show that the genie lost his powers. To me, that is creative thinking.

https://animoto.com/play/wFGWauN1C78WB3ZujFQa4A

Animoto is really easy to use. The videos look professional when they are complete. I encourage you to give Animoto a try.

Link up your Digital Literacy posts. Read and comment.

Read Full Post »

Michelle is hosting today at Today's Little Ditty!

Michelle is hosting today at Today’s Little Ditty!

Poets are some of my favorite people. I want to be one, so sometimes I try on their clothes. I shared this confession with my students. One of my poet-heroes, Laura Shovan, tried on Naomi Shihab Nye’s list poem, Words in my Pillow, that you can find in Georgia Heard’s collection Falling Down the Page. I shared Naomi’s poem as well as Laura’s with my students.

My students are smart kids who are really stubborn about wanting to break the mold, but I told them, “This is the form we are trying on today.” When the third student asked about breaking the form, I turned to them and said, “What did I say?”

“We are trying this one on today!” Sometimes when you try on another poet’s form, it is confining and doesn’t fit at all. Not this one. I was surprised at how well this poem fit.

Words in my Bathroom

I keep words in my bathroom,
Words that keep me clean.

SOAP
TOWEL
SHAMPOO

No one sees them
Until I put them on,
But I know they’re there.

BATHROBE
FACE CREAM
BODY WASH
HAND SOAP
LEFTOVER CLOTHING
TOILET PAPER

TOILET is in there.
BATHTUB is in there.

The words wish they were something else
When I’m not looking.
This TOWEL and that RACK
like being together.
CANDLES brighten up my bathroom
TOILET yells NO
in my bathroom.

My friends the words
know better than I do
what makes me feel good.
–Tobie

Words under the Couch Cushions

I keep words under the couch cushions.
Words that make me cool.

HANDSOME
BLACK
STYLISH

No one sees them until
I put them on.
But I know what’s in there.

REMOTE
TOYS
PAPER
FEATHERS

WHITE SOCK is in there.
GOOGLY EYES are in there.

The words make a PUPPET
when I am not looking.

TISSUE
GUM
CARD

My friends the words know how to fluff a cushion
better than I do.
But I love them.
–Jacob

Words in my Closet

There are words in my closet that say “you’re chic!”
                       OLD NAVY
                            GAP
                         JUSTICE
  “No one sees them until I put them on, but I know what’s in there–”
                     SILK
                 SPARKELS
              POLKA-DOTS
               RHINESTONES
                  “DENIM”
                 FLOWERS
   SHOES are in there.
EXTRA LACES are in there.
 The words choose my outfits.
I’m just not around when they do.
This SHIRT those SHORTS                                                           Already pieced together.

NEON colors brighten up my closet.
LSU shirts shout “GO TIGERS” in my closet.

My friends the words
know me the best.
–Emily

Words in my Journal

I keep words in my journal.
Words that dance from
my thoughts to the page.

BUZZY
PATIENCE
BOUQUETS

No one sees them
like LOVE LETTERS I hide in a box,
but I know what’s in there.

PURPLE
SKY
VICTORY
UMBRELLA

STARLINGS flit in there.
Even DILLY-DALLY trots a page.

The words make poems together
when I’m not looking.

LAKE
MAZE
WONDER
RUSH

My friends the words know better than I do
how to sing songs.

–Margaret Simon

This form fit reluctant poets as well as confident ones. Laura Shovan is posting student poems, too, from a writer in residence program. Check them out here.

Read Full Post »

Join the Spiritual Thursday round up at Reading, Teaching, Learning.

Join the Spiritual Thursday round up at Reading, Teaching, Learning.

When you take the time to be truly still, how do you feel? Do you keep multiple tabs open so if one website is taking its time loading, you can be reading another one? Do you multi-task? While you are eating, do you read or watch TV?

More and more our society demands our constant activity. When I work out at the gym, I can plug my headphones in and watch TV or listen to my iPod. When I am driving, the radio plays. I have a little notebook in the console of my car to make lists on. I am rarely without my cell phone.

I crave quiet and stillness but in all honesty, rarely do I allow myself this luxury. What I need to understand is that God will not come in when it’s noisy. The Spirit wants my quiet time. The Holy One begs me to slow down and listen.

“Be still and know that I am God.” Psalm 46:10

Writing poetry also requires my silence, my listening, my opened and uncluttered mind. I love to take a walk in the park and absorb the colors, the scents, the fresh air, and make it poetry. In the spirit of stillness, spring, and digital poetry, here is an original poem movie entitled, “Come Out, Green.”

Use this button created by Leigh Anne Eck to post your Digital Poetry this month.

Use this button created by Leigh Anne Eck to post your Digital Poetry this month.

Read Full Post »

Please use this button on your site for DigiLit Sunday posts

Please use this button on your site for DigiLit Sunday posts

Use this button created by Leigh Anne Eck to post your Digital Poetry this month.

Use this button created by Leigh Anne Eck to post your Digital Poetry this month.

My students are enjoying Amy Ludwig VanDerwater’s poetry month project, Sing that Poem, over at The Poem Farm. This week a group wrote their own verse to a popular tune. I posted the poem here. Here is the recording of them singing it.

I have challenged my students with a poetry project this month. For the assignment, they must read 3 poetry books, TPCASTT one poem from each book, write a reader response to each book, write an original poem using a form from one of the books, and create a video presentation of a poem. Only a few have gotten to the video presentation stage.

I talked to them about what I expected to see in the video. The design and the music would reflect the tone and theme of the poem. Design is where digital literacy comes in, to be able to evaluate the poem and represent it through image and sound is the highest level of critical thinking. It is important for me to push my gifted students to use their highest levels of thinking. Both Tyler and Tobie got it. Animoto provides enough choices that my students were able to find what they were looking for in design and music.

Tyler presents a haiku by Issa from Cool Melons Turn to Frogs. Tobie presents House by John Frank from Lend a Hand.

https://animoto.com/play/hrNlFKJcyGgAmGNmddrLIg

https://animoto.com/play/1lAA2TFxsqQ20JA0lNZvYQ?autostart=1

Link up your DigiLit Sunday posts.

Read Full Post »

writing and art

Join the roundup with Renee at No Water River

Join the roundup with Renee at No Water River

Use this button created by Leigh Anne Eck to post your Digital Poetry this month.

Use this button created by Leigh Anne Eck to post your Digital Poetry this month.

Every year we gather all the elementary gifted students at our local city park for a day of playing strategic games and combining nature, art, and poetry. This year our 6th grade students led the day. They’ve been working together once a month all year to plan a day of wonder for all our students. They performed a play about the Wonders of New Iberia. Written, designed, and performed by students, the play led the audience on a tour of the wonders of our area.

The 6th grade students led an art and poetry activity. Their instructions were to think of something you wonder about and write an I am poem about it. The form was simple. The students wrote and tore paper to create an art piece to accompany the poem. I participated because I wanted to sit next to students and be one of them. I thought about my diva cat, Mimi. One of the students helped me with my torn paper art.

Torn paper Mimi by Margaret Simon

Torn paper Mimi by Margaret Simon

Mimi I am poem

Galaxy by Kaiden

Galaxy by Kaiden

Air by Matthew

Air by Matthew

Nature by Vannisa

Nature by Vannisa

Lani writes

This post is my 600th post. I never would have thought I would get here when I started this amazing journey. Thank you, friends and readers!

Read Full Post »

Join the Spiritual Thursday round up at Reading, Teaching, Learning.

Join the Spiritual Thursday round up at Reading, Teaching, Learning.

Use this button created by Leigh Anne Eck to post your Digital Poetry this month.

Use this button created by Leigh Anne Eck to post your Digital Poetry this month.

Holly Mueller leads us to spiritual reflection each week. This week the theme is family. I didn’t think I could write a poem about family without being trite or cliché. Sometimes cliché just happens, and this is one of those times.

Family is a full cup
overflowing
with nourishing water
a twist of lemon.

Family is a dog,
four cats,
an occasional frog.

Family is photo albums
in the antique armoire
saving the years.

Family is a favorite restaurant
where they know your name.

Family is a daily text,
Facetime, calling Bluetooth,
feeling close together
while far apart
knowing there is no place like home
and no friend like family.

–Margaret Simon

Last night I happened upon a Twitter chat for #TCRWP. Someone mentioned using PicLit, so in the spirit of digital poetry, I tried it out. The first picture that came up was the Bean in Chicago where we have posed a few family pictures. The word family was not listed, so I used people instead.

PicLit from PicLits.com
See the full PicLit at PicLits.com

And here a family Bean photo with haiku using Picmonkey.

Bean family reflection

Read Full Post »

Use this button created by Leigh Anne Eck to post your Digital Poetry this month.

Use this button created by Leigh Anne Eck to post your Digital Poetry this month.

Please use this button on your site for DigiLit Sunday posts

Please use this button on your site for DigiLit Sunday posts

Amy Ludwig VanDerwater is doing a unique and fun writing project on her blog, The Poem Farm.  My students are huge fans.  We have been checking in daily to see the new poem, to sing all the match up songs possible, count syllables, then make a guess.  We have recorded our guesses on Soundcloud using my iPhone.

My students have gotten good at this.  They are not in the least bit shy about singing.  This week was mostly filled with more state testing.  So when testing was over, and we finally had uninterrupted time together, they insisted on visiting The Poem Farm.  We read Amy’s poem Memories and after quite a few fails, we decided it was the tune of “London Bridge is Falling Down.”

Day 16 Song - Memories

 

Writing workshop became a frenzy of experimenting with different songs, counting syllables, and writing original poems to the tunes.  I was particularly fond of Emily’s because I helped her with it.  She was writing about stinky feet.  We googled a picture of a labeled shoe to get the proper shoe vocabulary.  I talked to her about how she could personify eyelets.  Finding rhymes was a challenge, too.  (Rhymezone.com helped) I kept trying to describe that reeking of feet as steam. She came up with word vapor.  So we made a near rhyme with vapor and garbage collector.  It worked.  Read the poem first to see if you can guess the tune, then listen to the Soundcloud.  Thank you, Amy VanDerwater for inspiring such creativity and fun.

 

Do your shoes smell bad?
Do your laces stink a tad?
Can the eyelets see the dirt?
If they can, they may avert.
Does the footbed reek and vapor
like the garbage can collector?
Do your shoes smell bad?

by Emily

 

Link up your Digital Literacy posts below:

Read Full Post »

Join the Spiritual Thursday round up at Reading, Teaching, Learning.

Join the Spiritual Thursday round up at Reading, Teaching, Learning.

Use this button created by Leigh Anne Eck to post your Digital Poetry this month.

Use this button created by Leigh Anne Eck to post your Digital Poetry this month.

The theme for today’s Spiritual Thursday round-up is love.  At first I thought, “This is easy.”  However, the more I thought about it, writing about love is hard.  What do I have to say that is new and refreshing or inspiring?  When I have a difficult writing assignment, I often turn to form.  Today I turn to Kwame Alexander and his amazing 2015 Newbery Award book in verse, The Crossover. In The Crossover, the character writes definitions in a particular form.  My blogging friends, Michelle and Holly, each used the form (vocabulary poems) this month.  I haven’t tried it with my students yet, but I usually like to practice before presenting them with an idea.  Here’s my definition of love.

love 

/ləv/

a person or thing that one loves.

as in: the curl of an infant’s
new fingers around your thumb.

as in: looking through the open window
of our arms as we dance
the Lover’s Waltz.

as in: let the soft body
of your heart love
what it loves.*

as in: He gave his only
begotten son so that
you and I have eternal life.

© Bratishka | Dreamstime.com - Baby Hand Photo

© Bratishka | Dreamstime.com – Baby Hand Photo

 

* variation of a line from Mary Oliver’s Wild Geese, my all time favorite poem.

Read Full Post »

Use this button created by Leigh Anne Eck to post your Digital Poetry this month.

Use this button created by Leigh Anne Eck to post your Digital Poetry this month.

Join the Two Writing Teachers blog for Tuesdays Slice of Life Challenge.

Join the Two Writing Teachers blog for Tuesdays Slice of Life Challenge.

I love this poetry exercise inspired by Bob Raczka “Some Reasons to Write a Poem.”  Stacey Shubitz of the Two Writing Teachers wrote one here that is personal to her mothering a four-year-old girl.  Catherine Flynn’s version is here.  My digital version here. 

I prompted my students last week and told them the form would work well as a Slice of Life poem.  But some child poets are not happy with their first try.  Some of them (actually a rare few) take a poetry prompt home and incubate.  Emily did this last week.  She showed me her poem written in a spiral notebook she carries in her booksack.  I have to share this with you.  You’ll know why when you read it.

 

Because the Earth is round,
not flat

Because the rain seeps into the ground

Because the birds chirp a high pitched melody

Because trees are mossy giants

Because of the polka-dot fawn in the barn

Because the man on the moon is fishing for stars

and caught one
for you!

–Emily, 4th grade

(leave comments directly to her on her blog)

A mossy giant in my yard.

A mossy giant in my yard.

 

Matthew’s version starts off like an SOL then moves into a hats-off-to-writing-a-poem poem.

Reasons to write a poem

Because you ate too much candy last night and didn’t sleep
and woke up early to get donuts.

Because you’re in class with, like, 5 poetry beasts!

Because I took time out of my me-time to write this, which, F to the YI, is a poem!

Because you can be free, and you don’t have to do just one thing.

Because you can’t mess up.

Because you can’t be better than anyone,
or worse.

–Matthew, 5th grade

(comments for Matthew)

Read Full Post »

Join the IMWAYR meme at Teach Mentor Texts.

Join the IMWAYR meme at Teach Mentor Texts.

When I think of mentor texts, a wonderful addition to my library is I Love You the Purplest by Barbara M. Joosse with beautiful watercolor illustrations by Mary Whyte. This book tells the story of two brothers going fishing with their mom. Each wants to be loved more than the other. But this is one poetic mother. She loves one the bluest and one the reddest. The metaphorical language is understandable to even my youngest students.

love you purplest

Why, Julian, I love you the bluest!
I love you the color of a dragonfly
at the tip of its wing.
I love you the color of a cave
in its deepest, hidden part
where grizzly bears and bats curl up until night.
The mist of a mountain.
The splash of a waterfall.
The hush of a whisper.

After reading the story, I ask my students to choose a color. Brainstorm words that would go with that color. We share our lists. Then they choose someone they love. (Most choose mothers. You could make it a Mother’s Day activity.) Using their lists, they write a poem about the one they love using the title, “__________, I Love you the _______-est.”

Matthew won second place in a state writing contest in second grade with his poem.

Mom, I Love you the Bluest

Mom, I love you like the color of the sky.
The shimmer of the ocean.
The color of our cat’s eyes.
My old blue jeans.
I love you with the strongest emotion.

https://youtu.be/IYAl64ng09c

I guess when you have a tried and true lesson, and you’ve been blogging for 4 years, something’s bound to come back around. I did a Google search for images and came across my own Poetry Friday post from 2013. You can read more student poems here.

Emily purplest

Use this button created by Leigh Anne Eck to post your Digital Poetry this month.

Use this button created by Leigh Anne Eck to post your Digital Poetry this month.

Read Full Post »

« Newer Posts - Older Posts »