I
had some good fortune this year with a mini lesson I designed
for poetry. I entitled it "The ordinary way vs. the
Poet's way." As a way of introduction, we reviewed
figurative language and poetic devices that were used to express
normal ideas in a different way. I then modeled on my white
board and T chart with one side being /The ordinary way/ and the
other side being /The Poet's Way./
Under the ordinary way, I wrote 3-4 sentences regarding normal,
everyday situations, places, events. On the other sidea,
I then took each ordinary way and rewrote it in a poetic form
highlighting the poetic devices I employed and the figurative
langauge I had used to express the very same ordinary idea. One
situation dealt with a basketball game; another dealt with a young
person's pain over her parent's divorce; the last one dealt with
a special, defining moment. After modeling, explaining the whys
and whats of the change, I then
passed out a teacher-made sheet with 3 different situations for
the kids to work on. I allowed them to work in pairs and
we placed butcher paper from each class on the walls and boards
for other classes to see. From that day on, one of my revising
techniques became changing the ordinary into the poet's way. I
found it to have some refreshing changes in my poetry pieces during
this past school year.
