Hands on Stanzas Journal for Belding Elementary
Weeks 1-5 , Fall 2006
Cecilia Pinto, writer in residence
It’s Halloween today, so in an effort to acknowledge a little spookiness, I present the fifth grade with these three little poems that involve dreams and a suspension of disbelief. Students were asked to describe what occurs during the act of writing.
Hands
When I fall asleep
my hands leave me.
They pick up pens
and draw creatures
with five feathers
on each wing.
Siv Cedering Fox
The Word
comes out from the pen
like a rabbit from a magician’s hat
astronaut who knows itself alone and weightless
suspended on a line
in space. Manuel Ulacia
The Poet Pencil
Once upon a time a pencil wanted to write
poetry but it didn’t have a point. One day a boy
put it into a sharpener, and in place of a point
a river appeared.
Jesú s Carlos Soto Morfí n
Student Work:
Untitled
My pencil is like a pet.
It will do something when it’s ready.
My pencil is doing something right now.
When I get an idea, my pencil gets one.
My pencil is proud of what it does.
My pencil helps me in many ways. Jayson S.
David Rosenstock (Smyser 10/30/06)
We looked at a poem called “I Am Timothy the Lion”. We talked about how some poems can be just plain silly. Then I had them scribble on a piece of paper. They passed their scribble to a neighbor and that person drew the image they saw in the scribble. Then they wrote a poem in the voice of their image.
I Am A Pair Of Shoes
Cristian R.
I live on a woman’s foot
She wears me out
When I am no more
She throws me away
I Am A Rosary
Armando C.
I’m a rosary that people hold in their hand.
When I am not in somebody’s hand,
I am usually on the wall. When
I hit the floor I snap.
I Am A Leaf
Sylwia Z.
I am a leaf blended
My color is flowing
Through a stream of river
My green colors are
Fading away
I am in a blender
Mixed and crunched
Away. Goodbye my
Shape goodbye me
I Am A Wave
Matt K.
Influenced by the wind
Surfers are my best friends
They love it when I rise
They hate it when I fall
They all ride me
I Am An Eighties T-Shirt
Anonymous
I live in the closet of a hippie
My best friend are the blue jeans that live
Next to me. His name is Jeanie.
I Am A Sandwich
Marek S.
I live in pieces
My head and legs in the break box
One lucky day a giant comes
And I come to life with the green cheese
But then I scream and run
When this thing takes me to a wet world
12 October 2006 (Galileo)
Today’s lesson is one of my favorites, but I have yet to find a more viable, understandable example to present to the students (other than one I’ve written myself). This lesson is cribbed from Koch’s Wishes, Lies and Dreams book—the “swan of bees” idea—using “of” phrases as a starting point for understanding comparison. I also like it for the transformative nature of language it presents to students—they can transform their ordinary “boring” classroom into a place where there are “skeletons of pumpkins” or “flags of blood.”
I threw caution to the wind and used the poem below—last year I used a longer piece of this poem to the utter confusion of the students and since the students work so much by example I cut the poem even more to get an excerpt that honed in on the “of” aspect. Maybe I should drop showing a poem at all for this “of” exercise, but I like to get this lesson in early, and I like to show poems in the first three or four classes at least. So: we read this excerpt from “Europa” by Anatol Stern:
...here’s the jazz-band
of discoveries
shimmy of relativity
jig of
economics
catastrophes
under which collapse
the parquet floor of
europe
I go over A LOT of vocabulary, but I think it may be worth it. I stick to the first and third “of” phrases. I ask, “What’s a jazz band of discoveries”—“A band that discovers things”—“What does it discover?”—“New music! New ways to make music! New Noises!” “Why does economics jig?” “Because prices go up and down!” “Because money can make you want to dance!” These phrases excite the students—they act as little engines of suggestion and make them want to suggest their own odd things. It began to snow heavily during on class—and suddenly snow appeared in almost all of the poems. It was an exciting moment, and it was immediately recorded in the poems. The “of” framework also allows the students to play with opposites (“dog of cat”) and pairs (“pencil of paper”) as well as emotion (“Textbook of terror”; “school of boring”). Also through this exercise, the students can express wishes and thoughts in a condensed way—a good lesson useful for the rest of the year.
Of
Allaysia Dower
Math of stars
Fan of cat
Canyon of pumpkins
Strips of people
Mr. Eric of the sun
Wood of steel
Books of change
Poetry of snow
Cow of moon
11 Out of 11
Nicholas Munoz
snow of sun
math of hair
Texas of books
stars of dark
cats of green
trees of fans
A of Z
good of bad
Nick of Nicholas
grass of steel
1 of ∞
School Time
Penny Xu Yue
seconds of time
flag of blood
books of paper
pencils of writing
desk of room
money of skeleton
wars of death
window of snow
Penny of change
school and back
quite of light
people of work
[Chinese characters]
hi of baba
Snow Of Ice
Clarissa Perez
Book of baskets
closet of water
Kleenex of globe
flag of blackboard
organization of words
garbage of students
paper of chairs
The Man
Jenna Simons
Wardrobe of modes
globe of snow
word of voice
cloth of ideas
fluency of sentence
doors of open
book of reading
six of washer
man of desk
paper of pencil
poetry of draft
science of story
blanket of snow
Snow, wood, marker and nosepin
Dante Gutierrez
snow of water
wood of baskets
clothespin of nosepin
snow of ice
wood of door
marker of crayon
The Poem That Always Has Of
Reyna Estrada
Wardrobe of writing
globe of world
snow of America
time of writing
modes of poetry
chairs of poetry
wardrobe of writing progress
flag of writing
board of word wall
flag of pictures
wardrobe of wild wall
My Silly Poem
Tyler Young
snow of tongue cloud of sky
continent of world snow of snowball fight
leaves of trees clock of time
air of vent fan of air flag of Chicago
Stuff Mixed
Brian Alvarez
The witch of the fire.
The bat of the chair.
The world of baseball.
The ghost of the garbage can.
The flowers of the volcano.
The pyramid of clock towers.
The books of waterfall.
The US
School in My Classroom
Maddie Divittorio
School of knowledge.
Pencil of lead.
Paper of writing.
The book of stories.
Speaker of words.
Graph of numbers.
The light of the letters.
The room of bookbags.
The desk of teacher.
All things you need.
Stick of measurement.
Board of list.
Cup of pens and pencils.
Book of funniest.
Witch of cars.
I know these things
I use these things
That’s how I learn.
My World
Andrew Miller
Continent of North America
Country of the USA
State of Illinois
City of Chicago
Street of Carpenter
School of Galileo
In all of that is
the wisdom of Andrew
The Flower of Feelings
Jasmine Pruitt
The Rose of love:
is really full of goodness
and lots of light and
the flowers of fun
and flowers of sadness
and the sun flower
of greatness.
The War of the World
Samantha O’Brien
The flag of time
Pyramid of the class
Cubs of October
Trees of the earth
Witch of the kids
Numbers of books
The of of of
Balloon of the school
Shelf of the map
Paper of calculator
Perimeter of area
Girls of boys
Desks of computers
Music of board
Gym of science
Yellow of red
Chalk of tiles
Crayon of markers
Alphabet of poetry
My Poem!
Meagann Ibarra
Fish of the sea.
Mesa pisa
El mundo of la luna.
The flower of the water.
Pencil of the paper.
The ear of the earring.
The ponytail of the hair.
Apples of the tree.
Monsters of October.
Puppies of mom.
Kittens of the cat.
Clothes of the body.
Chalk of the board.
Birthday of cake.
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