Simple Odes

One of my favorite poetry workshops for schools is writing simple odes.

I use the same model poem for elementary and secondary students, Gary Soto's "Ode to Pablo's Tennis Shoes." (There's a printable version for teachers here.)

With younger students, I ask everyone to take off a shoe and write an ode to it. They need a tactile object to smell, touch, and see in order to write a juicy ode. I've posted the full lesson and some elementary responses here.

Middle schoolers understand the use of tone in a simple ode. The words and phrases we use give the reader a new, elevated experience of an every day object. These students no longer need the support of an assigned topic.

I've had wonderful odes on the EXIT sign in the classroom, a bookmark, and in Sarah P's very juicy ode, an orange.

Ode to the Orange 

by Sarah P. (7th Grade, St. Jane Frances School)

The small sphere of sunshine

is revealed as the knife

slices into the golden flesh

of the orange halves.

Juice swells from the orange,

ready to burst

as it        d

                r

                i

                p

                s

d

  o

     w

         n

from the knife

like the color of

precious honey.

The golden tiles of the orange

piece together

like glass forming a mosaic.

As the fragrance

of the orange rises

the divine aroma gathers around me,

tempting me to take a bite.

I can’t resist and sink my teeth in,

getting a sneak peek of heaven.

Posted with permission of the poet and her family.

I love Sarah's playfulness in this poem. The descriptions themselves aren't enough to capture the experience of eating an orange, so she uses some concrete-poem techniques to add to the reader's sensory experience of this "bright object."

Thanks to St. Jane Frances School in Pasadena, MD for allowing me to share student work. I'll be back with more middle school poems tomorrow as we gear up for National Poetry Month.

I Need a Ti-shoe

It's my last teaching day at Northfield Elementary. I'll be back in a few weeks for the third grade's Poetry Celebration, but I'll miss working with the kids on their poems.

Maryland State Arts Council Artists-in-Education get to spend several days working with students. The children get to know and trust me. They're willing to take creative chances, have fun, and view their poems as poems -- rather than writing assignments.

Here's the last crop of shoe odes (lesson here). Kids often capture an energy in their poems that's rare in the adult poetry world. I love the rhythm of Ryan's poem.

Poet: Ryan L. Ode to Nike Shoes Old Nike shoes. Your words: Dart IV. WOW, do you smell! You’re made in Vietnam. Such a long travel as a bird flies migration. Extremely fast like a jet. Old Nike shoes. Elementary schoolers aren't accustomed to working with similes, but they're great at it. We warm up first with the infamous baby powder exercise (see the description here). I told the students to use whatever similes popped into their minds, however wild. Peyton took me up on it!

Poet: Peyton L. Ode to Peyton’s Shoe My shoe looks like A green grape ready to be eaten. Caves waiting to be filled with People. Rocks that go in curvy paths, Mazes you can never get out of. Holes the size of the moon. Words that Mean crazy things. Smells like rotten cheese. They protect my feet From everything. I love my shoes.

See you tomorrow for Poetry Friday.

Shoe Odes

The model poem for this lesson in writing odes (which I usually use for middle school, but adapted for elementary with great results) is Gary Soto's wonderful "Ode to Pablo's Tennis Shoes."

Kids' lit agent Michael Stearns (Firebrand) told me it's Soto's most anthologized poem. No wonder. It's got some juicy similes, which I asked my third graders to aim for in their odes.

It's not often a teacher asks you to take off one shoe, put it on your desk, and examine it. We had a blast with this activity!

Ethan and I discovered the word "Raptor" -- a model name -- on his sneaker.

Poet: Ethan K. Dear E-Raptor, you taste like rubber bands. You feel like leather seats. You smell like fresh dirt. You sound like fireworks crackling. You look like neon green lasers. You’re my favorite shoes.

Juicy similes? Check!

In the poem below, I notice Mayur responding to the quiet emotions at the end of Soto's ode.

Poet: Mayur K. Ode to Mayur’s Shoes They are as fast as a cheetah, rain beaten. They are kicking a kickball, and they smell like the sewer. But I don’t care because they sound like rain drops when I walk. They remind me of a spider because they are all brown and dark colors. When I come back from school, I put them in the closet near the door. Now it’s night. I can hear my dad snoring and my mom laughing to the America’s Funniest Videos.

More shoe odes from the Northfield E.S. third graders tomorrow. Thanks again to Northfield's third grade team and our young poets' families for permission to post these poems.

Amok in Odes, Part 2

A middle school lesson on writing odes.

I sent Keats’ “Ode on Grecian Urn” ahead for Janene Sharbaugh at Bonnie Branch Middle to discuss with students.

Since the language is so dense in Keats’ ode, I also sent an online image of a Grecian Urn, so kids would know what Keats was describing.

Ms. Sharbaugh admitted that the kids struggled with Keats, but some fell in love with the imagery of people frozen in time, forever chasing after a kiss, always young.

We started the lesson talking about Keats’ elevated language. “But what if we used that same language for everyday objects?” I asked. Pablo Neruda’s “Odes to Simple Things” include odes to a tomato, his socks, and laziness.

Now we are ready to talk about Gary Soto's modern "Ode to Pablo's Tennis Shoes." The students noticed that the character of Pablo isn’t described directly in Soto’s poem. We get our information about him through his beaten-up, grass-stained shoes.

He wants to be Like his shoes, A little dirty From the road… For me, these conjure mythological American heroes – the cowboy, “Easy Rider” traveling cross country by motorcycle.

The class liked that Soto doesn’t judge Pablo for not being studious. He’d rather run through his days in those almost-magical sneakers because "his eyes sting...from long words in books." It’s as if Pablo can’t be a rambunctious, active kid without those shoes to get him through the day.

On the board, we brainstormed for an imagined ode to the floor. It gets stepped on all day. We band and stomp, but it never complains. It holds up the walls. It’s versatile – carpet, wood, linoleum.

Lots of hands were going up – a signal that the students had the idea and were ready to write. We did a short reading at the end of the period.

One of my favorite responses was an ode to a spoon, which tasted food alongside the poet, then enjoyed a cleansing shower in the dishwasher. Another was “Ode to an Exit Sign” (talk about an overlooked object). One of the lines described the sign, “Guiding us to freedom.”

Writers will appreciate one boy’s “Ode to a Pencil.” He called his pencil, “Wand of the mind.”

It’s exciting for me – and the classroom teacher – when kids get the idea like this. I can’t wait to see their finished odes.

Writing Exercise: Paying Attention with Everyday Odes

Recommended for: advanced elementary through adult

Choose an object that you would normally overlook or take for granted. Take a few moments to brainstorm what role that object plays in your life.

Could you live without it?

What does it do for you?

What makes it wonderful?

Describe your object in an ode.

Poetry Craft Alert! If you’re working on “Ode to Pablo’s Tennis Shoes” with elementary and middle schoolers, here’s a craft idea. It was recommended by my friend, super-crafter Amy Vittori (check out her blog!)

Materials: pre-cut card stock in the shape of a sneaker, whatever crafts bits and pieces you have.

Give every child a sneaker. Like Pablo in the poem, these shoes are a way for kids to describe themselves. Have kids decorate their shoes with clues about things and activities they like.

A child who has a dog might add dog hair (pieces of yarn) to his sneaker. A girl whose basketball team color is purple might have purple laces or her jersey number. Kids who love being outside can add green crayon for grass stains, like Pablo.

I haven’t tried this craft. If you use this idea in your classroom or home/school, let me know how it goes. I'd love to see some pix.

Amok in Odes, Part 1

Ode to a Wrestler’s Parents' Nerves

DJRobMan is at the Cougar wrestling tournament in Thurmont, MD tonight. He made it all the way to the final round! I’m waiting for a phone call to hear how he did. He was pretty pumped about one of his matches – he won by tech fall.

To help me bide the time, here is an ode by Gary Soto that I’ve been using with middle schoolers.

Ode to Pablo’s Tennis Shoes They wait under Pablo’s bed, Rain-beaten, sun-beaten, A scuff of green At their tips From when he fell In the school yard. He fell leaping for a football That sailed his way. But Pablo fell and got up, Green on his shoes, With the football Out of reach. Now it’s night. Pablo is in bed listening To his mother laughing To the Mexican novelas on TV. His shoes, twin pets That snuggle his toes, Are under the bed. He should have bathed, But he didn’t (Dirt rolls from his palm, Blades of grass Tumble from his hair.) He wants to be Like his shoes, A little dirty From the road…

You can find the poem in Soto’s collection, “Neighborhood Odes.” I got it from my favorite kids’ book on poetic form, "A Kick in the Head: An Everyday Guide to Poetic Forms," edited by Paul B. Janeczko.

Do a search on the title of the poem and you’ll find lesson ideas for “Ode to Pablo’s Tennis Shoes,” including classroom reproducibles from Scholastic.

Last week, I took this lesson to Bonnie Branch Middle’s GT Writers’ Guild.

(There's a description of Howard County, MD's G/T Writers' Guild program at this school website. It's not Bonnie Branch, but you'll get an idea of what the program is about. Full disclosure -- I co-chair the county's G/T Advisory Committee.)

Janene Sharbaugh is the G/T Resource Teacher at Bonnie Branch, which is in Ellicott City. We chose a lesson on odes because she wanted students to work on word choice.

In this lesson, we use the celebratory wording and grand metaphors of an ode to describe common objects. The exercise shows students that the words we select can shift the readers’ point of view.

Our discussion of “Ode to Pablo’s Tennis Shoes” and a writing exercise for middle schoolers tomorrow.

P.S. He won first place!