I arrived at school to discover that half my class were being tested for an advanced math class placement for next year in Middle School- good for them! They arrived back about half way through the session. Spring break has just ended for these students and now comes lots of end of the year activities that require readjustments in schedules. I decided to let them have a little fun with language and taught them how to create Poetry in the News! It's also National Poetry Month so what a delightful way to celebrate! We had a lot of fun and they were very creative. I'm going to spotlight them here:
First we tackled haiku - remember the rules for that type of poetry:
five syllables
seven syllables
five syllables
They read their articles and referred their reader to source. They learned about links in their weblogs. They also learned how hard it was to come up with the first one, but after that and with practice it gets a lot easier.
Ben chose an article entitled The New Robots Are a Lot Like Us
Started in Japan Over 20,000 words Next generation
Brianna had a burning desire to write on the First Amendment.
The First Amendment Gives the right to speak freely Has Consequences!
Derrick interest in planes led him to a news article on the Concord entitled Bye, Bye Concord
Sleek looking jet New York City to Europe Flight of the future
Building a Better World grabbed Emily's attention.
Camille and Wissam They are all just kids who care About the whole world
Mrs. Mateling's good teaching in her classroom piqued Jacqueline's interest in writing about the dust bowl.
Dying, Choking, Suicide In the Big Dust Bowl
Dust, dust, everywhere
Jennifer is concerned about SARS and read an article called Asia's Mystery Illness.
Guangzhou, China SARS Asia's Mystery Illness Helping to prevent
Kayla cares about school lunches and wanted to write about her feelings.
Feelings on Lunches Are they healthy ? You tell me. Doubtful Opinions
An Era Ends in Iraq was Lindsay's article. That brought this poetic response from her.
Tanks entered Baghdad Welcomed with cheers and flowers Saddam rules no more
Lucy dived in with the Dolphin Brigade and created this haiku.
Dolphins in Iraq Searching for mines in water K-Dog the hero
Melanie chose Women Aviators Now Flying Military Aircraft to create this haiku.
Women pilots soar Serving as combat pilots Females earned their wings
Good job students! What a great first attempt! Some of them even got to Cinquains so go to their sites and enjoy reading their Cinquains in the News!