Onomatopoeia Lesson Part 1

Boom! Crash!

Look out, readers. The Manor Woods Third Graders have more ear-splitting onomatopoeia poems to share with you today.

Diane Mayr is hosting all
of the Poetry Friday links
at Random Noodling.
Stop by for book reviews,
original verses, favorite
poems, and more.

After last week's Halloween sound poems, many of you asked about the onomatopoeia lesson that I use in elementary schools. For Poetry Friday, I'm sharing Part 1 of the workshop, along with some sample responses. Next week, I'll post Part 2. Feel free to use or adapt this lesson plan for your classroom.

Onomatopoeia is a great way to start a residency or poetry unit with emerging writers.

1. I write the word "Onomatopoeia" on the board with great flourish.

This, everyone, is exciting. Onomatopoeia is a long word. It's a cool word. A mysterious word. Plus, it's fun to say. (The whole class says "onomatopoeia!")

2. Rather than defining "onomatopoeia" for the students, I help them to figure the meaning out themselves. I begin filling the board with words:

Vroom

Crash

Zoom

Crunch

Slurp

Crack

Meow

Woof

Cluck

Whisper

Rumble

Snap

3. After just a few of these words, the students are starting to get the idea. Now we have something to discuss. 

Onomatopoeia has to do with sound. Some may notice that most of the words on the board are one syllable. They have a few words to add to the list: pop, stomp, shush, splash. But it's still not easy to come up with a definition.

What if I say, "Loud and quiet are not onomatopoeia words"? Hmm. Those words are about sound. So why aren't they onomatopoeia words? The light bulbs are really flashing on now. Oh -- onomatopoeia words make a sound.

4. Yes! Now I can integrate everyone's ideas and share a definition. Onomatopoeia words sound like, or mimic, the sounds they are describing. It's pretty cool to look at a word such as "Moo" and realize the cow sound came first and people created a word from it.

In the next post, I'll take you through a poem walk with the model poem for this lesson, Eve Merriam's "Weather." Until then, let's enjoy some onomatopoeia poems from the Manor Woods third grade poets.

Here's one last Halloween poem for those of you still enjoying your candy haul.

One Piece

by Nora E.

One piece

of candy and a boo.

A wolf in the woods

and a crunch munch

on candy. A funny

or scary costume.

A meow from a cat.

Laugh from a witch.

The wind goes by.

An owl's hoo.

Hoo! Hoo!

A stomp, stomp, stomp

and a trick or treat.

Yum!

The next poem tells the story of a typical school morning through the sounds our poet, Chimee, hears.

Rolling Away

by Chimee E.

Beep! Beep! Beep! Beep!

Hop down from the bed.

Brush! Brush! Swish! Swish!

Teeth are sparkly white.

Drop drip, drop drip.

Step into the shower.

Wipe dry. Wipe dry.

Pull on your clothing.

Tie tie, tie tie.

Shoes are tied well.

Munch, crunch, much.

Needs more milk.

Sip, sip, sip.

Taste the orange juice.

Open, close.

Chilly fall air.

Vroom! Vroom!

The bus is coming near.

Sniff! Sniff!

Smell the gasoline.

Clop! Cop!

Walk to the seat.

Rumble! Rumble!

We're rolling away.

In the last poem for today, Nathan takes us to a very noisy place -- a construction site.

Big Machine

by Nathan Z.

Boom! Crash!

Hammer strike. Hammer strike.

Looking out, a mess.

Ready for lunch!

Tires are rolling.

Lots of wet concrete.

Splat, sploot, spleet.

A big machine goes by.

Cranes are everywhere.

So much wood.

A brand new area is born.

Thanks to the awesome educators (seriously, they are a joy to work with) at Manor Woods. And a special thanks to the PTA and the Howard County Arts Council for sponsoring our poetry residency.

Parents and poets -- I love being able to share your poems. Thanks to all of you for giving me permission to post your work today.

In Residence: Poetry Stories

Greetings from Northfield Elementary School, Writerly Friends!

Ms. Grim's class began our residency with growing and shrinking poems this year. Although this prompt is simple, it lends itself to narrative poetry.

But first, I am sharing an old post with details about the grow/shrink workshop, first published in 2008.

This is why I love teaching poetry...

Yesterday, I was working with a third grade in Dundalk, Maryland. We were writing "Grow/Shrink Poems."

My model poem for this lesson is Stephanie Izarek's deceptively simple, "Under the Sky Is."

A view of the sky from the London Eye.
Photo: J. Shovan

The poem begins in the great big sky. In a few short lines Izarek takes us to a place where things are so small, "we can never see" them. You can read the poem here: http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=1558

It's a wonderful first day poem. Kids love the repetition (each object in the model poem is "under" the object from the previous line). Their job is to start with a big object (the sky) and end somewhere small. Or, they can begin small (a seed) and grow the poem (outer space). Even first graders can use language and ideas creatively with a structured form like this.

One boy sitting in front was stuck. No ideas. I asked, "What are you interested in?" Shrug. "What do you like to do after school?" Shrug. "Do you know if you want to grow or shrink?" Shrug.

I noticed he was fiddling with a small, round magnet, about the size of a washer. I asked him, "Can we start with your magnet?" No shrug! A glimmer of hope.

"What do you see around you that the magnet could attract? Start small." He looked around the classroom.

A desk, he told me. I scribed. A blackboard. Then, "The City of Gold."

Wow. Did I just witness a huge leap of the imagination? Okay, he was inspired by the second "National Treasure" movie. But how did we get from a blackboard to a city of gold? Amazing.

The reluctant poet proudly volunteered to read his work to the class at the end of the lesson!

Since that 2008 post, I have created a writing frame for this lesson. If any readers would like a copy of that to use in the classroom, let me know in the comments. I will email it to you.

On to today's poets!

Mela starts her shrinking poem with a simple list of smaller and smaller objects. Her inspiration -- which adds a touch of narrative -- appears in the poem's last line.

Shrinking Poem

by Mela W.

Under the tree is a dog.

Next to the dog is a cat.

Under the cat is a mouse.

Under the mouse trap

there is a mistaking step that the mouse made.

SNAP!

"Under a tree is a dog."
Sam is enjoying the cherry blossoms.

I like the way that Cade's poem gives us, line by line, a vivid visual image of this pond.

Grow Poem

by Cade D.

Over the rocks in the pond is a baby tadpole

Over the leaves in the pond is a frog.

Over the grass in the pond is a dog swimming.

Over the edge of the pond

there are two boys catching tadpoles with a net and a bucket.

Tadpoles teeming in our neighborhood frog pond.

Did you notice that both of today's poems ended with action? That's a great way to leave the reader with something to think about. Did Mela's mouse get away? What did the boys in Cade's poem do with their tadpoles?

Thanks again to the Northfield community for allowing me to share the third graders work.

Portrait Poetry Friday: Starting with What's Real

One of my favorite workshops for elementary and middle schoolers is on portrait poems. (You can read a "poem walk" though the model poem, Shonto Begay's "Down Highway 163" here.)

The poem and painting "Down Highway 163" are featured
in Begay's book Navajo.

Writing a portrait poem requires a lot of imagination. For the third graders, who are still developing a sense of self, speaking in someone else's voice can be a challenge. What's been working for my students, I think, is providing structure for their imaginations. How?

1. Someone to look at.

I ask the teachers to gather fine art portraits from the art room for the lesson. I also bring in picture books with drawings -- mainly realistic -- of children. After we discuss Shonto Begay's portrait and accompanying poem, both titled "Down Highway 163," the classroom teacher and I put the images up around the room. Students quietly walk through our makeshift gallery, deciding which portrait they want to write about. Having an image in front of them provides structure -- tangible details to record in the poem.

2. Starting with what's real.

When we talked about the painting "Down Highway 163" as a whole class, I split our discussion into two parts. First, we listed the facts of the painting -- the things we could actually see. No guessing was allowed. There is a bag or sack in the painting. Fact. Do we know what's in it? No -- we put that kind of imagining on hold until we have all our facts.

Once we've exhausted the details of the painting, the class begins generating stories. The time for "I see" is over. Now we explore what we imagine. Who is the person in the painting? Where is she going and why? How is she feeling? What's in the sack? What happens next.

This painting by Leonardo da Vinci was one of the portraits
the children could choose.

When it's time to write, the students who need organization can make a t-chart. On one side, they'll write "I see" and list all of the things they observe in the painting or picture book image they chose. On the other side of the chart is space for "I imagine." Sometimes, I compare this to looking at the image as if it were a DVD on pause. If you hit the play button, what would happen next?

Last, I reminded students that they had an important choice to make, as poets. Did they want to narrate the poem, writing in third person and describing the story? Or would it be more effective to write in the voice of the character, the person in the portrait?

Here are some of the third grade portrait poems. You'll notice that a few students used their knowledge of stanzas (from the opposites poems lesson) to separate the "I See" elements from what they imagined about their subjects.

A student from Ms. Grim's class borrowed my Shonto Begay book, Navajo, intrigued by an image that shows a man transforming into a werewolf.

Wolf Man

After a painting by Shonto Begay

I am a sad guy without a shirt in the day time. Each hour of night I will change hairier and hairier, hungrier and hungrier. Then I get blood thirsty. Now I am the hairy beast of the woods. Attacking deer and bunnies, I go. Shredding the skin with my hard and sharp teeth. It’s getting to daytime. I am back to the shirtless me again, but lying on the grass and not knowing what happened. All I know is I like being back to a man.

Malia chose a picture from the art room. This was an artist's self-portrait, showing him painting en plein air.

Malia K.

I’m painting with my

favorite apron on.

My brushes flow smoothly over the canvas.

My blue shirt is soft to my skin.

I love painting still life,

especially the forest.

It’s very quiet. Too quiet.

I jump as a rabbit pops out of the bushes.

I look at all the animals and start to paint.

When I finish, I look at it and think…

I LOVE NATURE!

Hunter's fine art portrait was of a young boy. The portrait was close up, with a simple, dark background. Our poet had to stretch to imagine the boy's story.

Hunter M.

I see hair,

a green shirt

and a hat,

blue eyes.

I see that he is young

and I see a mouth.

He is staring at a bird

because the bird

is feeding her babies.

He is feeling interested

because he has never seen

a bird feeding its babies.

Hannah also chose a fine art portrait. This one was of a girl. Hannah used the I See (stanza 1) /I Imagine (stanzas 2 & 3) strategy for her poem.

Hannah L.

The Dress-up Girl

I am a little black girl

wearing a white frilly dress.

A necklace hangs from my neck.

A bracelet hangs from my wrist.

I have dark brown eyes.

I throw down my book, losing my page.

I change into my favorite dress.

I am supposed to read, but I don’t.

My necklace flies over my head.

My bracelet slides onto my wrist.

I am the dress-up girl.

Oh, no! Mom has come.

She looks disappointed.

I hang my head with a slight frown.

I am in trouble but it was worth it.

I am the dress-up girl.

I can't remember which painting Cole used for his poem, but the poem stands alone. Once again, you can see how stanza one (I See) is a jumping off point for a powerful stanza two (I Imagine).

Cole E.

He is wearing a

brown jacket, brown

shirt with a beard

and a scar on his neck.

He is a wanted man.
He’s been running away.

He lives in the desert

or maybe the attic.

Will he get caught?

Will he get caught?

No. He keeps running

from town so he can

get a better life in

a different place, a

different time.

I was so impressed with the Northfield poets' insights into human nature. I think they impressed themselves, too! More portrait poems on Monday.

Enjoy your Poetry Friday. Ed at Think Kid, Think! is hosting the poetry party today. I see that Ed makes great use of technology on his website. I imagine Ed typing away, planning some high-tech poetry project for us to enjoy today.

I See the Stars at Night: A Lesson in Opposites

How do we get our bearings in a poem? Is the action set in the day or night? Is the emotion happy or sad? Are the people or animals in the poem working or resting?

One way to organize our thoughts in a poem−and to help readers find their way−is to use stanzas.

At Northfield, the third graders know that stanzas in a poem operate much like paragraphs in regular writing.

“Stanza” is the Italian word for “room.” (Read about the word's origins here.) 

I ask students to imagine that I am welcoming them into my house. We talk about what they would see in the front hall, the kitchen, even the bathroom (that gets a few giggles). 

So why would poetry borrow that word stanza? Because, one of the students will share, reading a poem with several stanzas is like walking into the different rooms of a house.

Since the third graders know we are doing opposites poems today, they quickly figure out exactly how many stanzas our poems will have.

Next, we brainstorm pairs of opposites on the blackboard. Some favorite topics for this poem are: delicious and disgusting, summer and winter, home and school, old and young, real and imaginary animals, night and day, hot and cold, busy and lazy, fast and slow.

Fast and slow is the topic of the model poem I use on opposites day. The poem and the guts of this lesson were shared with me by poet-in-the-schools Rosanne Singer. She was my mentor poet.

(Artists coming into the MD State Arts Council school residency program student teach. We accompany an artist on one residency, observing first and picking up classes throughout the week.)

Swift Things Are Beautiful

Swift things are beautiful:

Swallows and deer,

And lightning that falls

Bright-veined and clear,

Rivers and meteors,

Wind in the wheat,

The strong-withered horse,

The runner’s sure feet.

And slow things are beautiful:

The closing of day,

The pause of the wave

That curves downward to spray,

The ember that crumbles,

The opening flower,

And the ox that moves on

In the quiet of power.

by Elizabeth Coatsworth, author of The Cat Who Went to Heaven, 1931 Newbery winner.

At Goodreads.

Students love to pick out their favorite lines in this poem. We look at our hands and say, “Veins really do look like lightning!”

We pat ourselves on the back between the shoulders because that’s where our withers would be if we were horses.

One year, I had a class that was particularly taken with the line "The closing of day." I brought their teacher the Jane Kenyon poem "Let Evening Come" so they might further explore the idea of light and shadows settling at dusk.

Embers often need some explanation, but enough children have been camping or have fireplaces at home that they recognize the glowing coals, once they are described.

Someone always brings up the wonderful last two lines.

Because our culture equates power with speed, the slow, powerful ox creates a great discussion. The students often bring up other slow, powerful animals: tortoises that live over 100 years, elephants. This year, one boy mentioned that glaciers are slow and powerful. I'd never thought of that before. The class added the concept of slow, powerful water, using the Grand Canyon as an example of a gradual but powerful change to a landscape.

Thanks again to the Northfield community for giving me permission to share the third graders' wonderful poems.

I love the way Emma uses description in her poem so that we can guess which animals she's talking about even though she doesn't name them.

Emma B.

It Is OK to Be Big

It is OK to be big

If you have a long trunk,

Or a long body to keep you swimming,

Maybe a long neck to reach high,

A big body to keep babies safe.

It is okay to be big!

It is okay to be small

If you have a shell to keep you safe,

Or a small squeak for your mom,

Maybe you can hide really well.

If you fly very high you are safe.

It is OK to be small!

"A big body to keep babies safe." From Kangroos.Org

Evan's poem reminds me of "Let Evening Come." He shows the busyness of day, contrasted with the slowing down, peaceful feeling of night.

Evan M.

Day is so fun:

Go outside and run,

Go play rugby in the grass,

Go to the park with friends,

Put up a lemonade stand,

Hear the birds chirp,

Go inside at the end of the day.

I see the stars at night:

After a long day

In the sun, after a day

With my friends,

Go inside and eat

Dinner with my family,

And then go to bed, read a good book

Then say goodnight

To the world in your bed. 

I loved the conclusion of Andrew's poem. The inside fun stanza includes things my family enjoys doing together.

Andrew P.

Outside, Inside

Playing outside is fun:

Like climbing the stairs

Of the tree house,

Spinning in circles

On the tire swing,

And climbing to the

Tippy top of

The trees.

Inside is fun also:

Rolling the dice in

Board games like Sorry,

Dancing around in

Charades,

And watching a movie on

Family movie night.

I hope your Mother's Day was both fun and peaceful, everyone. I'll post more third grade opposites poems tomorrow.

Free printable vintage Mother's Day Cards!

Portrait Poems Part 3

Last week, we looked at writing portrait poems with elementary schoolers.Part one of the lesson is here, where I introduce the concept of starting with "what I see" in a picture or newspaper photo, then adding "what I imagine" to extend the poem.

Part two of the lesson is here. It includes a model pairing of painting and poem by artist Shonto Begay.

Picasso is a great choice for the
portrait poem workshop. The image
invites storytelling.

In some schools, the art teacher will provide fine art portraits for the kids to choose from. I'll share some art-response portraits from fifth grade students tomorrow.

At Northfield Elementary, we like to display the portrait poems with their images. This means the children are asked to bring in newspaper or magazine clippings. Two rules: it has to be an image of a person, it should not be someone you know. We can bend this rule for celebrities. I don't like the students to write in response to photos of themselves or family. (See part one of the lesson for my reasoning.)

I recommend having extra photos. Newspaper clippings work best, because they often have a story built into the image. In finding good photos, look for expression in the face or body language, a person in action, or an interesting setting or "props" within the image.

When the students are ready to write, some like to use a T-chart for brainstorming: "I see" or "Facts" listed on one side, "I can't see" or "Imagination" on the other.

Kyle's portrait is also a narrative poem. I think he was inspired by our conversation about Shonto Begay's painting, "Down Highway 163." This poet has a natural sense of rhythm.

Run Away Slave

by Kyle S.

I've been working so hard

all day and night

but now I get to run

away from my king's sight.

I've been running through forests.

I've been running through fields.

I've been swimming through rivers.

Ouch, there's an eel.

And now I'm in a cave

with rocks and a boulder.

Oh NO! A dead end.

I must roll the rocks over.

Yay! Look, there's an exit

behind all of these rocks.

Out in the sun

and away from the locks.

Oh NO! It's my king

with the guards on his wing.

Now, the chase is on.

 

With a poet this advanced (even in third grade!) I feel comfortable making a comment on the eel line: "Does this funny line fit the tone of your poem?" Kyle will think that over when we revise.

Two students had the same photo -- a magazine ad showing a girl with a jar of fireflies. The class got to hear both poems. It was fascinating to see what different responses each poet came up with. Here is one (I added line breaks):

As She Sits

by Katie T.

As she sits on the stone fence,

her face gleams with light.

She held a jar

with rocks and plants plus light.

What is that glow in the jar?

Then fireflies shot out.

Her face lit up.

She watched them fly free.

In the darkness an owl hoots,

but she still watched.

The lid was in her hand.

A firefly landed on the lid.

The gold color shined bright

from the light.

The dark doesn't scare her.

animals.howstuffworks.com

The class talked about the owl -- an addition from Katie's imagination. There was no owl in the starting image.

Abby wrote in response to a post card I brought. It's a photo from a series of famous women. This one was of a statue of Sacagawea in Portland.

I See a Woman

by Abby Y.

I see a woman

reaching out

feeling her furry dress

with a stray coat

that's very gray.

The wind blowing

through her thick hair

with a baby on her back

standing there like she

is a frozen statue

not happy.

I read somewhere that Sacagawea is the subject of more U.S. statues than any other single person.

We'll look at some fifth grade portraits in response to fine art tomorrow.