Small Reads for Brighters Days
My biggest hopes for We Belong are that it gets used to spark good discussions and to create community. So I’ve created a template for you to use with your students to write a classroom or family poem. I used this template at the book launch and on some recent author visits with K-1 classes. […]
Why not write an equation poem for someone you love for Valentine’s Day? These snappy poems are short enough to fit on a handmade card! Just pick a person to make your valentine for. my sister Patty Brainstorm lists of specific things about your person. loves: funny movies dark chocolate cross-stitching games therapy dogs wolves […]
I so love it when kids (or grown-ups) do their own writing inspired by something I wrote! A virtual book club of 2nd graders at Spradley Elementary in Frisco, TX, read Lion of the Sky and wrote their own zoo-ku in response. Aren’t those fabulous? Can you guess the animals? I love seeing how students […]
Happy Poetry Friday! (Wondering what Poetry Friday is? Click here.) Shoot! I forgot until this moment that this was the first Friday of the month, so it’s a Poetry 7 day! But I promised my Young Authors Conference writers last week that I would share our work today, so I’ll have to have a two-post […]
Last month, I got to visit Hugo Elementary School in White Bear Lake, MN, at the invitation of Media Specialist Connie Stirling, whom I had run into at the Hubbs Children’s Literature Conference. I was so excited to visit the school and spend an entire day writing poems with 1st graders! This meant the day […]
Hello, and Happy Poetry Month–again! In a happy Perfect (Poetry) Storm, this is actually my third Poetry Friday post for Friday, April 1st! This one is because I am honored to be starting off Irene Latham‘s annual Progressive Poem. Irene, of Live Your Poem, invites poets each year to sign up and take one day, […]
Last Friday, I was part of a literacy event in Stewartville, MN, called Hot Reads for Cold Nights. Wow. There were 500 or so people there, and organizer Renita Irvin had so many things going on: book exchanges, food, storytellers, silent auctions, and a ton of other stuff. What a logistical accomplishment! All these elementary […]
As a writer, nothing makes me feel better than knowing that my words inspired someone else to do something: to write, to think differently, to take some kind of action (or even just to relax, to laugh, or to learn). Last month, I got the nicest letter from teacher Ashley Vallarino, who wrote: I am […]
Happy Poetry Friday! (Wondering what Poetry Friday is? Click here.) I learned about Padlets recently when Amy Ludwig VanDerwater created a Favorite Poem Padlet and shared it at The Poem Farm. So. Cool. I can see tons of ways that teachers could (and probably already are) using this tool with their students. Anybody can add […]
One more day of wordplay poems here! Monday, I shared the lesson plan. Yesterday, I shared a gallery of poems. And today, here’s a gallery of the rest of the poems! Thank you, students! Teachers, please note: Most of these are their notebook version, not copied over neatly yet. That’s because these students spent time […]
