Launching Our Poetry Unit!

The little speech bubble in the corner says, “Oh my hamburger!”   Too comical!

Another fun activity we did involved a wow words search after reading The Boy Who Loved Words! The kids were given a red piece of paper that they cut into the shape of a heart.  They looked around the room, through books, and in dictionaries for words that make them say “Wow”! They chose words that were fun to say, had interesting spellings, or sounded just plain fancy.  I told them to copy the words as carefully as they could, but of course, I still have students who struggle with this skill! So, the hearts were life-savers, because it allowed the kiddos to get their words down before coming to me with their wow words.  We added the words to our class chart (with conventional spelling) to help us pay attention to precise language as we examine poetry.  Poetry is concise.  Every word matters.  Every word carries weight.

I wanted to model finding poetic words and poetic language because I am in the process of creating poetry centers from Georgia Heard’s Awakening the Heart.  It’s an amazing resource!  Unfortunately, because of the copyright, I cannot post the complete centers here.  Ultimately though, the kids will be going on a treasure hunt for poetic words and phrases!  They will be looking through poems and picture books like Owl Moon or Twilight Comes Twice (books that we have already read together).  Then, the kiddos will record the poetic language they encounter before choosing one line to write and illustrate on a bookmark.  Viola!