Friday, October 5, 2012

Poetry Friday is Integration!

I am sad to say last week we did not celebrate Poetry Friday!  I had to make a choice because of giving diagnostics which was not a choice.  So I chose not to do Poetry Friday, and I am pleased to announce that three students voiced their concern during our class meeting Friday afternoon.

"If we have to give up something, please do not choose Poetry Friday."

"I finally like poetry and so let's not give it up now."

"I was ready to sing today in Poetry Friday.  Can we sing now?" Of course the answer was YES!!

So I learned a few valuable lessons. First I already have my class hooked on Poetry Friday and most of them are anxious to celebrate it.  Second,  their comments reinforced how much students want and need routine in our class.  Finally and most exciting--- they missed it!


I am happy to report when the students returned to school - we celebrated Poetry Monday!  How could I not after listening to their comments Friday afternoon in class meeting.  After math class, I passed out the above poems, and I encouraged the students to write around the poems.  This is still a challenge at this time of year but already they are making progress.  As you can see from my notes, we rolled word study (the sound of long o & verb tenses) poetry (stanza, rhyme scheme notice the rectangles, triangles, circles in the first poem) vocabulary (synonyms strange/weird, exact/precise), connections (guidance lesson), set up (font change) and just had fun.  We were all exhuasted but in a good kind of way.  Are you celebrating Poetry Friday?   You should be--- you can hit every standard in one poem!

Thanks Laura for hosting today's Poetry roundup at Writing the World for Kids

7 comments:

  1. How nice to hear that Poetry Friday was missed!

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  2. Your post made me do a happy dance, Maria. You rock!

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  3. Thank you so much for your comments. I love Poetry Friday as much for my students as I do for me when I post and I have the feedback.

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  4. Any day is great for poetry....and so happy that your kids love it enough to never want to miss it, either! How awesome is that?!

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  5. Even though I believe to my core in the power of Poetry Friday, in moments of weakness, I question this use of time. And then I read a post like yours and remember all the good work PF does, and I even come away with a new strategy to try -- writing around a poem! I think we'll do that with short text, too!!

    Tnx, friend, for being my inspiration!

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  6. Blogging is so powerful for me for so many reasons. Time to reflect on teaching, time to learn about other ides, and one of my favorite parts: comments! THANKS to all of you for being a part of my blogging community. Smiling on Saturday!!!

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  7. I love, love, love Poetry Friday. Like Mary Lee, I always worried about how I would explain that use of time to administrators, etc. We marked poems, sometimes, not every week, like you do, but we also reread the poems at the start of our reading workshop every morning. FLUENCY PRACTICE! Helped my kids who weren't strong readers YET, and also gave them an extra collection of "readable texts" they could get out and enjoy during independent reading.

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