Thursday, September 6, 2012

Week 2

For Week 2, the theme is "More School" since most of us are still helping kids get into the rhythm of school life. Here's a taste from THIRD GRADE with an excerpt of the featured poem by up-and-coming poet Michele Krueger.

Recess
by Michele Krueger

Climbing, sliding,
laughing, skipping,
cherry-flavored
fruit juice sipping

....

walking, talking,
jump-rope turning,
‘til it’s time
to go back learning


This poem is FULL of great action words that describe a variety of recess and playground activities and is fun to perform-- with motions, too.

And here are the Take 5 activities that accompany this poem:

TAKE 5
1. Try pantomiming some of the action words in the poem while you read it aloud (climbing, skipping, throwing, catching, bouncing, hopping, running, walking, jumping, etc.).

2. Alert the students to all the action words in this poem (climbing, sliding, throwing, catching, etc.). Display the words of the poem and invite students to choose their most favorite action and chime in when that word appears.

3. Talk with students about their favorite recess and recreational activities.

4. Show how rhyming words help turn this “list” of action words into a poem. Ask students: What are the words that rhyme (skipping/sipping; smacking/snacking; singing/swinging/ turning/learning). Read the poem aloud again and pause before the final rhyming word in each pair and invite students to complete the rhyme.

5. Pair this poem with another “Recess” poem by Avis Harley (2nd Grade, Week 2) or with selections from Jack Prelutsky’s Good Sports.


Every single poem in this anthology of 200+ poems includes "Take 5" activities just like these to help you introduce and share the poem and tie in a quick skill focus. Stay tuned for more examples each week. And don't forget to join the Poetry Friday round up at Write. Sketch. Repeat. 



8 comments:

  1. Thanks for sharing another excerpt from this wonderful anthology, Sylvia. This is great.

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  2. This poem sounds as though it would be a great action warm-up for my littlies in our children's choir...

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  3. Thank you for sharing this poem, Sylvia! I loved how these action words rolled in my tongue, and it got me all pumped up and excited (even if it meant it's nearly the end of my day!). Have a wonderful weekend. :)

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  4. Marjorie: if you have access to a copy of the book, take a look at Avis Harley's poem "My Kindergarten Choir" (Kindergarten; Week 16, page 42). I'm pretty sure that it will be a hit with your children's choir--especially the shortest members of the choir!

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  5. I bought the kindle version of the complete book and am enjoying it so much!! It's nice to see many of the Poetry Friday crowd represented. Wish I'd had a resource like that when I was teaching elementary school. Thanks to you and Janet Wong for an excellent book.

    Violet N.

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  6. We have so much fun with the 5th grade poem that I forget to pop into the other grade levels for the theme! Must remember to do that!

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  7. Violet: thank you! And if you are still in touch with any of your friends from your old school, will you please tell them about our book? I feel that word about The Poetry Friday Anthology has circulated well among poetry-lovers . . . but we need to reach more of those teachers who feel neutral about our genre (or even dislike it).

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  8. I agree, Janet. I see that many teachers are not aware of many great poetry resources available for them. We, who love and appreciate poetry, need to advocate for the use of it in the classroom. Thank you and Sylvia for this latest(and greatest:)) book. I cannot wait to get my copy of The Poetry Friday Antology. As soon as I get it, I will have a book talk about it at our staff meeting. I hope every teacher at my school will get excited and eager to have his/her own copy in the classroom. Thank you again. Vida

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