First Days Poetry

For a few years, my co-worker and I have been reciting the poem "If I Were in Charge of the World" by Judith Viorst to our classes the second day of school (our first day with classes is too short). We then provided students with a template, and they chose one or all stanzas and wrote their own versions. Of course, we'd model one, as well. The last few years, however, about 1/4 of my students said, "We did this last year!" So... it was time for a new poem.

"Introducing a New ME" by Kelli Dakos

We know many 7th graders like to share about themselves, and I'm sure we'll learn a lot from them by what they write. (This poem, however, reminds my husband of Toby Keith, and that just makes me like it even more.) 😉

I thought I'd share my version here, to mark the occasion of my students starting a week from today!

That's version 1.0. I'm sure I'll come up with other ways of writing it before the week is through!

What's YOUR "New ME"?

Our Best Lessons

Actual lessons... In fact, BEST lessons... Tried and true, shared by master teachers.

I am truly honored to have been asked to be part of this project - with fourteen other master teachers. What constitutes "master?" I'm not sure. I do feel fortunate to be classified with these other teachers who love to share ideas with peers - no matter how long each has been teaching. It's the passion that came out of these lessons that makes this book exciting to share with you. Brian Sztabnik reached out to middle school, high school, and even college professors, asking for our BEST lesson - lessons that we love to teach.

Best Lesson Series

Steal these ideas, make them your own, and then share with us what you've modified to work for you.

Anyone can try a chapter for free! You can then grab a copy for yourself or a coworker. These are literature lessons, and I'm excited to try the fourteen other lessons myself, now that I've read them.

Here are the chapters, who the lessons were intended for, and my brief thoughts...

Name	Topic	M.S.	H.S.	My thoughts on if I’ll be using and/or adapting...
Ruth Arsenault	Visual Literacy & reading all kinds of “text”		X	I want to adapt this one.
Susan Barber	The American Dream - photography & stories		X	I can adapt this one - will see where it can best fit.
Laura Bradley	Thinking icons	X		I can fit this in next quarter!
Brianna Crowley	Symbolism & Characterization		X	I will be adapting this one - when we read The Outsiders!
Gerard Dawson	Ignite Talks		X	Would be fun and valuable to try!
Todd Finley	Multi-Draft Reading		X	This lesson would be tough for my kids - I could probably adapt it, however.
Joy Kirr	Student-Generated Questions	X		Um… ;) I’ll be using AS IS!
Jori Krulder	Demystifying Poetry		X	We can use portions of this prior to Poetry Month.
Shanna Peeples	Visual Literacy		X	We could use pieces of this - the text is definitely high school level.
Amy Rasmussen	Literature		X	This lesson made me really THINK. Lots of resources that could be adapted for M.S.
Dan Ryder	Literary 3 x 3		X	Once students learn how this goes, it can be used with any text!
Joshua Stock	Poetry Challenge	X		I might be able to cover half of these lessons / poems - the kids will love it!
Dave Stuart, Jr.	“When Novels Start with Bathroom Scenes”		X	We could do this in M.S. - without reading the entire All Quiet On the Western Front… Deep lessons.
Brian Sztabnik	Think Like a Poet		X	Can be adapted for M.S. - I wonder if they could handle “Ulysses” …?
Heather Wolpert-Gawron	Excitement Graph	X		We’ve actually used this in a lesson or two - anyone can adapt this lesson to fit his/her students.

As Dave Stuart Jr. says near the end of his chapter, the lessons are completed in a "very non-razzle-dazzle fashion." These lessons aren't about the technology. They aren't even really about the text that is shared in the chapters. They are about getting kids to learn HOW to learn. Teachers step aside and help students learn from each other. If you teach middle school ELA or high school English, take a stab at these lessons. I'm sure I'll be writing more blog posts about how these lessons went with the scholars in room 239!

A huge thank you to Brian Sztabnik for putting this all together. Brian loves sharing other teachers' ideas - on his Talks with Teachers podcast, and now through this book. Of course thank you to Todd Finley, Dave Stuart Jr., Susan Barber, Jori Krulder, Dan Ryder, Heather Wolpert-Gawron, Josh Stock, Laura Bradley, Amy Rasmussen, Shanna Peeples, Brianna Crowley, Gerard Dawson, and Ruth Arseneault, as well, for sharing their BEST literature lessons.

 
More posts about this book from the authors:
     Laura Bradley          Shanna Peeples          Brian Sztabnik

Blackout Poetry

They say to first try yourself those activities you want your students to try...

April is National Poetry Month, and one idea that's been floating around to encourage children who dismiss poetry as being for "writers," is blackout poetry. You'll need a newspaper or a discarded book.

Blackout Poetry is shown quickly in this video:

Jason Stephenson & Lesley Mosher are encouraging everyone to take part in Blackout Poetry Week, which is April 7-11th this year. Since I might suggest it to my students, I thought I'd try it out myself first. It's tough, but an interesting process occurs in your head. Here are my results - I was thinking of the blog post I wrote a little over a year ago about challenging the status quo...

I kept changing my mind, but here's what it says...

"Breaking new ground often means breaking the rules." (Daily Herald, 3/29/14, Section 6)

Safe had gone.
Special plan...
Adjustment in attitudes would be a challenge.
Slow... new vision... goal... enormous project.
To give St(udents!) - 7s (7th grade!) - new power.
Dazzling.
Toast!

(Ultimate meaning - I had a plan to give the seventh graders more power over their learning. It was dazzling. Let's toast!!)
Not the best, I know, but I can only get better!!


It's in my lap as I write this, and I still smell the fumes. But I haven't "colored" like this in a long time, and my head was spinning the entire time (10-15 min?), changing what I thought was important, trying to see a line I could use...

Check out how to get you and/or your students involved in this post by Jason:
     Blackout Poetry
and this one by Lesley:
     Blackout Poetry