My first workshop at Ti South was Poetry. Peter Murphy, the artist who conducts this workshop, began by using a humorous analogy (birth of a child to adulthhood)to explain the process of Poetry writing.
Not only did his analogy help me tremendously with my own writing, it inspired me to bring it to my classroom of students with Learning Disabilities ages 5-8 years old. I wanted to introduce them to the writing process in a way that would elicit enthusiasm for writing in all forms.
I used the vocabulary of the process steps and included a dramatic presentation of the analogy for each specific step.
A student writing her Big Book
1.Pre-writing:
Have you known a mother, aunt, sister, etc. who has had a baby? Most pregnant mothers prepare for their new baby before it is born. they read books about caring for babies; purchase baby furniture and prepare the baby room. Pre-writing is preparing for a writer's "baby". The writer may do some work finding out about what they will be writing about. hey brainstorm different ideas to write about.
Draft:
The big day comes when a mother finally has a new -born baby. They love their baby. Do they expect the baby to walk right away? Do they get mad at the baby because he has to use diapers and can't use the toilet? Can a new baby feed himself? Does mommy get upset because the baby can't do these things? No. Mommy loves her new baby anyway. When a writer drafts a story or poem the very first time, the story or poem is the writer's new-born baby. The writer doesn't get mad because there are mispelled words or it isn't quite finished. No! they love their new baby!
Revise/Edit:
Once the baby is two years old, he begins to crawl and touch things. If you let him to crawl over to an electrical outlet and touch it, you wouldn't be treating your child with love. So you have to say " No! No! and guide your child to take his fingers out of the outlet. Your first draft is your child. You need to teach it to take away certain sentences it doesn't need or to make better choices of words to use.
Then time passes and your child becomes a teen-ager. He grab your car keys and runs your car into a tree. If you love your teen, you'll need to discipline him. If you love your poem/story you will discipline it by checking for mispelled words, order of words and punctuation.
Publish
Your teen goes to college and graduates. You are so proud! When you have revised and edited your poem/store and you read it, you'll cheer and clap!
Your college grduate becomes and adult and gets a job. He sends money home to his parent and you begin to let him take care of you. Once your story or poem is finished, you will share it with others. You may become a writer and write a book and make money from your writing someday!
Lesson Summary
Dramatic presentation of the writing process(Prewriting, draft, revise/edit, publish) using the analogy of of birth to adulthood .
Write class poems:
a.begin each poem by a reading of a model poem and discussion of chosen poetic form
b.Student volunteers act out the poem.
c.teacher/students write poem on chart paper (use writing process)
d.Choral reading of poem
- End of year: students make an anthology book of class and individual poems
Lesson Objectives
- SWBAT:describe the writing process steps ( in own words)
- SWBAT:identify a variety of poetic forms
- SWBAT:collaborate with peers
- SWBAT:write or dictate and original poem
- SWBAT:publish collaborative and independent writing
- SWBAT:respond to the writing process with observable enthusiasm/motivation
- SWABAT:use the writing process in cross-curricular activities
NJ Standards/Bloom's Taxonomy Levels Achieved
3.2.12.A.3
3.2.12.A.4
3.2.12.A.6
3.2.12.A.8
Bloom's Levels:1,2,4,5
Rubric for Scoring
(oral evaluation by students, record student answers)
Was the process easy or difficult?
Did this activity improve their writing?
Did they like or dislike this approach? Why or why not?
How do they feel about themselves as writers?
How do they feel about poetry now as compared to before?
Which poets do they relate to or appreciate the most?
Which poet was their favorite and why?
Student Response:
My students were able to enthusiastically describe the steps to the writing process and comprehend what to do in each after this lesson. If the vocabulary of the step was forgotten, they could remember it quickly with a dramatic prompt or verbal prompt using the analogy of baby to adulthood. Student quotes during the school year:
"When are we going to write another poem?" "Let's write another poem."
I heard comments such as "It's fun to write poems" and I like writing poetry."
Curricular integration:We followed up during the year by writing different forms of poetry and started several book projects. The students wrote their own Big Books; we've combined Social Studies lessons; using writing and forming the end project into a book and used poetry to learn math concepts.
Because this lesson engaged the students and taught them how to creatively think about word choices and descriptions of every day events and objects, at least 3/4 of my class improved their writing skills. Even if they were only able to write one line creatively, some of the students were able to more than they had done previously. Children with learning disabilities can learn, although slower and one step at a time. Progress is slow, but measurable. It is especially measurable by student verbal responses to writing.
Art Specific skills: One of my students began to write in her journal consistently and at home. I give each student a store bought journal at the beginning of the year. I get them at the Dollar Store. I tell them this is their own to keep in their desks and that no one will see it but themselves unless they want to share what's in it. I tell them to write words, sentences, or draw pictures ( according to their skill level) in whatever free time they have during the day. this was not part of a lesson and would not be graded. It was their choice to do it or not. My student, Becky, began to take it home and came back each day asking to read what she wrote to the class. Over the summer, her mother continued to buy her little notebooks and she filled them. She brought them back for me to see in September. I did not edit or correct anything she wrote, but was able to see the areas of writing I could teach in class that were needed. Another student had lost a brother a couple of months before school began. He used his personal journal to write about what he felt angry about or a sentence or two about his brother whenever he felt the need. Some students were only able to draw pictures, but they wanted to take their journal in front of the class and pretend to read about their picture ... whole stories!
Wholestic Development: After using this lesson on writing, I can observe wholestic development in students. They became more confident and motivated in all subject areas. They expressed likes an dislikes more readily. Some students begin to become more accepting of their peers and encourage them.
General Education Students/Faculty Response:Public Relations/Prof. Dev.Turnkey: I display a lot of student's writing or cross-curricular projects using books, poems, stories on my bulletin board and wall outside my classroom. Students in the regular classroom see that students with disabilities have creative talent. I believe this makes an impact on the school as a whole, students and teachers. They begin to think on different terms about what my students are able to accomplish. After displaying student Big Books, a Kindergarten teacher from a general education class came upstairs to ask me how I was able to get my students to write and make theses books. She actually took notes.
The Arts Impact on Students with DisabilitiesI know that including the arts in curriculum daily impacts students to become motivated and to achieve in all subjects. My students may not be able to show this in specific "numbers" because they have disabilities that slow their processes, progress and test scores. Most children with Disabilities, LD included, do not take tests well. It's one of the characteristics of a Learning Disability. But they show achievement and progress in so many other observable measurement.
Ati Impact on the Teacher:
ATI link to personal/student accomplishments: I, too, as an educator, have achieved many of the goals areas mentioned in the paragraphs above through my time spend at aTi in the summers. I take away not only skills and ideas from my workshops, but I have gain so much valuable personal encouragement form the other artist/teachers who attend. At lunch, on field trips and in our workshops, we are able to talk about the discouragement we sometimes feel at school concerning bringing the arts into the classroom. We share ideas on how we each do this and what works and what doesn't work.I leave every summer I have attended full of energy and creative "juice". I am refreshed by being able to create and use my creative talents "for myself." Each year I come back to school in September full of new ways to incorporate writing and the other art disciplines into my lesson plans.
Cover of Big Book ( made with two pieces of cardboard, rings, inside pages made from oak tag, all pages laminated. Decorate with scrap-booking materials
Dedication Page
STUDENT POEMS:
“The Reason I Like … “ poems:
The Reason I Like Tootsie Rolls
By Sonya Griswold
They are round like
A brown crayon
They taste like chocolate
Ice-cream
They walk on their hands in my mouth
and
Skip down my throat
They are happy candy
The Reason I like Chinchillas
By Estrella Zepeda
They are gray little friends,
They say “ hi, how are you?”
They dance the Chinchilla dance.
See those funny Chinchillas!
“Color Poems”
Brown
By
Devon Miller
The color brown talks to me.
He tells me
brown tastes like peanuts spread between bread,
brown logs save a water rat’s life in the river,
about brown dirt over seeds,
a penny goes to work with his nickel and dime friends
inside the cash box.,
and how my brown skin makes him proud.
Blue
by
Jamal Walker
C old as teeth feel eating
Blueberry water ice,
Wobbly as my crayoin
Coloring a blue sky,
Blues as a whale
Shooting its spray from a water gun.
Solimar
By
Solimar Aceveda
Sunday I go to the park
On a trip
Little puppies are there
In the park
My cat plays with the puppies
And
Runs away.
Malke
By
Malke Torres
Monkeys in the tree
Apples they eat
Like them lots
K kkk kkk kkkk, they say
Everyday
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