Amok in Tanka

If there's one thing third graders know how to do, it's fill the paper edge to edge.

That presents a challenge when we're writing poetry. The stillness, pause and "wait for it" drama you can create with a poetic line and line breaks -- not their natural skill set.


This week, we're trying Tanka. If you'd like to learn more about this ancient Japanese form, visit the Tanka Society of America. The form is popular with poets who favor the spareness of haiku, but want to extend beyond that moment-in-time image into metaphor or emotion.

My first attempt didn't go so well. The concept of five lines was difficult for some children to grasp, so the poems looked paragraphs.

I put my teaching cap on and created a frame. The new lesson works like this:

The children are in small groups of two or three (cooperative learning warm-up). I put a word up on the board: SNOW. We brainstorm all of the associations, feelings and images we can think of. No editing allowed! If I say "monster trucks," it goes on the brainstorming. Maybe my family goes to see the monster truck show every winter.

Next I give each group a word: bird, grass, shell, moon. They do the brainstorming activity on their own. We might share a few with the class after five minutes.

We spend about 15 minutes reading and discussing sample tanka. We try counting syllables, although I tell them the syllables needn't be exact. I explain the upper and lower poem -- a challenging concept that we can continue to work on in later drafts.

And here is the tanka frame, with a student's brainstorming and initial poem filled in.

Much better! I love how this student captures the mixed emotions a powerful animal can give us. Check back for more third grade tanka tomorrow. There is a lesson on teaching students how to create line breaks here.

Poetry Friday Remembrance: Lucille Clifton

Poet Lucille Clifton died earlier this week. After I heard the news, I wrote this post about Clifton and her importance to our local literary community in Howard County, Maryland.

Clifton is best known for her National Book Award winning poetry and her long tenure as Maryland's Poet Laureate. But she was also an author of children's books.

Rather than post one of her poems for Poetry Friday, I'm sharing a wonderful clip of Lucille Clifton reading to a group of children. You can see what an easy, wonderful rapport she had with young ones.

I love how "Don't You Remember" begins: Once upon a time, there was a four year old person who remembered everything.

That one word person -- rather than girl or child -- says much about Clifton's respect for human beings, regardless of age, color or gender.

For more Poetry Friday offerings, please visit our gracious Host: Irene Lantham.

Details, Details

"A poem is a window that hangs between two or more human beings who otherwise live in darkened rooms."  -- Pulitzer Prize winning poet Stephen Dunn


One of my favorite things about writing poetry with children is the details they share. They write about things I have never done, like ski racing, using vocabulary and facts that are new to me.

Each time this happens, the young poet is opening a window -- for me, but also for teachers and peers. In their poems about sports, dance recitals, or just sledding with a parent, these young authors are opening a window for readers, giving us a broader view of who they are.

See yesterday's post for a description of the activity-poem lesson. Below are two third-grade responses poem.

I love how the details Helen chooses for her poem make time seem to slow down.

Piano Lesson
by Helen Y.

I sit on the bench with my big stack of books.
Mr. G reaches over the piano and takes the
metronome. I hear a drum beat and begin the piece. Tick, tick.
The keys feel like my school desk, but they look
like a huge black, white, brown zebra being groomed
by my fingers. In the small basement, I smell the
smell of summer. The sound of the door distracts me.
Jane is already here? Whoops, wrong note. "You have totally
no dynamic!" says Mr. G, laughing very hard. "Keep this
for one  more week!"

Marcus' poem is fast! Look how he uses the specific vocabulary of his sport to include the reader in the world of ski racing.

Ski Racer
by Marcus A.

I wait at the start. Racer ready?
3, 2, 1 GO! I hear my team cheering
me on and my skis scraping
the ice. feel the cold through  my
speed suit and the weight from
my helmet and jaw guard and the
gates hitting my pole guards.
The course looks intimidating. Two more
gates and I finish!

Again, thanks to Northfield Elementary staff and families for giving me permission to post student work.

Tomorrow is Poetry Friday. I'm going to take a break from student work to honor Maryland poet Lucille Clifton, who died earlier this week.

Keeping It Real -- a lesson in imagery

My annual poetry residency at Northfield Elementary began before the big snow hit. We only had time for our first session, on imagery.

Tapping into the five senses keeps it real for the reader, but kids are so accustomed to school-writing and BCRs (shudder), that it can be a challenge.

We warm up with a literary experiment using baby powder. (See the full lesson here.) Everyone in class gets a little bit of baby powder and creates a simile for each of the five senses. I'm always amazed, in a group of 25 people, how many different ways we can describe the same object.

Here are two imagery-of-the-five-senses poems by Northfield third graders.

Ryan H. is thinking about summer. With the weather we've had, I don't blame him.

"It's as hot as the sun out here," I say.
I want to go to the pool.
I meet my friends outside. They want to go too.
When I walk in the door
it sounds like a zoo full of elephants
and tigers. All I can hear are kids screaming,
trying not to get hit by water guns. Then
I jump in and it smells like the ocean.
I come up for a breath and it
looks like a big cup full of water. I go under
again but this time my mouth was open.
I come up and it tastes like shampoo
mixed with water. My mom gives me a towel
and says, "Time to go." The towel feels like
a pillow on my head. We get in the car
and drive away.

The shampoo simile is so evocative. Can't you smell and taste it?

The writing prompt is to describe an activity using all five senses. Often, the children's poems are about the things they do outside of school. It's a nice way for their peers to get to know them better.

Lucy F. chose her dance class.

When I walk into the room it is
as cool as September. Then I go to the
barre. It's so quiet I feel like I'm in an
empty house. I sniff the air and its a
rubber tennis shoe. Eww! I turn for
an exercise. WOW looks like a
row of buns. The air has a stale
cracker taste. Once I'm done, I talk while
putting on jazz shoes.

The empty house captures the quiet dance studio before the dancers arrive. And look at the metaphor Lucy uses for the way the room smells. Do you think these poets were successful in keeping it real -- making you feel like you are there at the pool or the dance studio?

More poems tomorrow. These were posted with permission of the poets and their families. Thanks, Northfield!

Revisions: To re-key or not to re-key

How am I staying sane during this season of SnOMG? Since the kids have no activities and I can't teach (central MD schools are closed through Tuesday), I have time to revise.

Here's the big revision question: Are you a re-keyer?

Re-keying a manuscript seems counter-intuitive. Easy revisions -- that's what makes computers so great, right? Here are some cons -- and pros -- of re-keying a manuscript when you revise.

Cons

• Your critique group will look at you like you just said, "Twilight wasn't all that great," because you'd have to slightly touched to make all that work for yourself.
• It is work. Work takes time. Which leads to...
• Re-keying is slow. You won't get your manuscript revised in a flash.
• Typos. You cleaned them all up in the last draft. If you re-key, you'll have to proofread again. Carefully.

Pros (There's really just one, but let's break it down.)

• Re-keying forces you to consider every word in your book.
• There are places your eye glosses over when you're reading, carried along by the story. That's good, if you're a reader. Not if you're an author. Re-keying slows you down and reveals lazy spots in your writing.
• Re-keying puts you back in that magic place of creating, rather than the shuffling of cut, paste, and delete. This opens up discoveries. Doors open in the story, in the characters, that weren't there before. If you were rushing down the hallway to get to your destination, you might have missed that small door that opens onto a garden.

The funny thing is -- I rarely re-key poetry manuscripts. When I've got the poetry thing going on, I'm already looking at each word, making sure it's earning its keep. But for prose pieces, re-keying at least once during the revision process is, well... key.

Re-keyers, speak up. If you re-key your manuscripts, tell us why the technique works for you.

Blessing the Boats

Late last night, the local poetry community started spreading the sad news that poet Lucille Clifton died yesterday morning.

She was a resident of Howard County, Maryland, where I live. Clifton was beloved for her active support of local poets and literary groups.

Lucille Clifton's poetry had a raw honesty. When she spoke to an audience, you knew right away that the honesty of her poems equalled great personal bravery.

I was lucky enough to interview Clifton for a Baltimore Sun article about the 2002 Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival, where she was a featured poet.
She said, "Poetry speaks to something in us that so wants to be filled. It speaks to the great hunger of the soul and I define soul in a broad way.”

When I asked her about her popularity with Dodge attendees (Clifton appeared at every festival but the first, 1986), she said, "I do seem to have an audience that cares about me...I don’t quite know why. I’d like to think it’s because what I write about is about being human. . . I invite humans to join me there in that place where we are human.”

I am celebrating the life and work of Lucille Clifton with her poem,"Blessing the Boats."

blessing the boats

by Lucille Clifton

(at St. Mary's)

may the tide
that is entering even now
the lip of our understanding
carry you out
beyond the face of fear
may you kiss

the wind then turn from it
certain that it will
love your back

Read the rest at the Poetry Foundation.

Children's writers who follow this blog might  know that Lucille Clifton was also an author for children. In addition to her National Book Award and being a two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist for her poetry, Clifton's picture book, Everett Anderson's Goodbye is a Coretta Scott King award-winner. The Boy Who Didn't Believe in Spring is a favorite at our house.
 
May the tide that she is entering even now love her