POETIC POWER PLUGS


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It's In-the-Bag: Poetry Lessons from History-Rich Field Trips

Grade: 3-12

Objective: Take a trip to a historical area to inspire poetry and/or other literature.

Directions: Setting the Patriotism (or Other Content) Stage
Teachers should prepare the students for the specific content and direction of their field-trip experience. In preparation for our patriotic theme, we had invited a military bugler to visit our classes. We also discussed the realities of and responses to war through sharing trade books, songs and poetry, patriotic quotations, and art works. (Some works were used across the age levels, while the teachers of the various grade levels chose others according to their appropriate content for the children's ages.) Finally, the students and teachers involved in our summer writing program met at Cowpens National Battlefield on June 8, 2002. Once we arrived at the battlefield, we watched the film presentation about this specific Revolutionary War battle, and then we walked, in small teacher-led groups, the historical trail through the battle area. Along the way, each group paused to read and discuss all the markers that detailed the facts of the battle, as they have been recorded.

Teacher Prep for Modeling the In-the-Bag Assignment
A few days before the trip, I (as director/teacher of the program) visited the site, walked the trail, and performed the In-the-Bag assignment below, in order to make sure the ideas were workable. Part of the assignment was to choose items discovered while traversing the walking trail through the now-healed battleground, placing them in separate paper sacks. (Groups of six small lunch bags for each participant had been stapled together at the left-hand corner prior to arrival at the park.) I demonstrated by showing some of the items in my own previously-gathered collection.

Personal Reflection followed by Share Time
After the walk, we gathered quietly around tables in the picnic area to write words, phrases, or fragments on the outsides of each bag. Students' replies might be connected to the scene of battle but did not have to be, thus allowing broader personal-response decisions. I shared, again, the contents and also the comments from three of my bags (see the entire list and comments, below), modeling the targeted behavior. After the other teachers and most students had finished writing on their bags, those who chose to share aloud any or all of their "found" items and the accompanying thoughts were encouraged to do so. Sometimes, an idea would remind others of additional words or phrases to add to their own bags.

Beginning the Composition Process
We discussed, as a group, choosing among our thoughts and combining them to flesh out poetry (or stories, if one so chose). Most students and teachers did end up composing verse rather than prose, however. Again, as an example, I shared my first two stanzas of a poem in progress, demonstrating the incorporation of the mementos and thoughts to prompt a piece of literature in response to the overall battleground experience and/or to one's found items. Some wrote poems or stories about the battle itself, while others reminisced about personal events (i.e., one girl had plucked wildflowers that reminded her of her grandmother's floral dress as she had lain in her coffin).

Teacher-Example Mementos, On-the-Bag Thoughts, and Poem
Listed below are the items I discovered and "bagged" during my walk, accompanied by the thoughts in words, phrases, or fragments that occurred to me in response to my memento choices. Then, there follows the poem that arose after my immersion in the history of, and my experience of treading on, the actual once-blood-soaked soil.

"Found" Mementos with On-the-Bag Comments
Purple wildflowers
-symbols of valor
-beauty of bravery
-tiny "purple hearts" (medals)
-fallen, nameless heroes
White wildflowers
-purity of purpose
-nourished by patriots' blood?
-mixed in with others, different sizes, shapes, colors ("melting pot")
Yellow wildflowers and daylily blossom
-smiling across the years of renewed relationships
-drops of sunlight, hope from death and despair
Frond, sharp along the edges
-shaped like bayonets
-secretly hurtful, cutting
-foreshadowing of fate to come
Queen Anne's Lace blossom
-symbol of monarchy
-delicate, as is life
-ironic to find growing prolifically on a battlefield - particularly an
American Revolutionary War battlefield

Brown sandy soil
-surprising lack of cohesion
-"should" be red and clumped, blood-like, as is the clay a few miles away
-porous
-readily draws in fluid
Brick-red pebble
-forever blood-stained with Patriots' sacrifice
-touched by boots of both militiamen and British troops?
-mixed blood, British and colonists'
Dandelion seed puff
-change "blowing in the wind"
-precarious pom-pon, easily destroyed
Bird's feather
-incongruity: centuries of dawns heralded by birdsong; suddenly, a morning heralded by sounds of war
-feather of progeny of bird actually THERE that morning?
-instinctual fear of people begun with gunfire?
Grass-seed stalk
-oral way to bide time: waiting, wondering, chewing
-seeds of freedom, clinging now but ready to float aloft
-future funeral pall of endless sod
-potential carpet to cover wounds of battle

Example:

Mementos of the American Revolution: Battle of Cowpens
By Diana Wright

I stroll through a field of ironies on a peaceful, sunny spring day.
Can I begin to imagine musket fire where now, today, gentle breezes blow,
Quiet as the Morning’s soft sigh?
Markers outline facts of history, but can I ever understand HIS story?

He leans against the bark-protected oak; young teeth, barely stained by Time,
Worry a grass-seed-stalk* end to pulp. The hopeful seeds, not yet freed,
Dance in the afternoon whisper of wind. He dreams of battle, innocent in his languor,
Ignorant, yet, of nearby British advance. He has no bark. What will protect him?
He reaches absently to pluck a frond, its dagger-shape foreshadowing
The enemy’s bayonets. Unaware, he runs the leaf through his fingers
And draws beads of dark red blood, blood he is ready to forfeit for freedom,
Blood that has barely boiled for a woman, given his tender years. The drops dry.
Later he sleeps; crickets sing; stars move in their midnight minuet: “All is well…”
Meadowlarks lilting their morning tunes bear first witness of war: they silence.
Blood-red Dawn paints the eastern sky, soon mirrored in scarlet pools of life soaking sandy soil, staining stones.
He is among the first to feed the land, the ground he died to claim forever.

And as I walk on, I wonder where he fell.
Does he live in the wildflowers spotting the field with hues of yellow and purple and white?
Does the lifeblood of our fallen heroes literally nourish the soil of our homeland?
Delicate, lacy white blossoms wave a greeting. How ironic: this battlefield of pain and hate and
separation,
Of revolution against monarchy, now lies dotted with Queen Anne’s Lace.

*Though the Battle of Cowpens occurred in the dead of winter, I envision the setting in spring-time since that is when I walked the historic trail. The theme of inexperienced blood sacrificed for the noble cause of liberty demands no specific season.

Diana Wright
Chesnee Middle School
Chesnee, SC



“Heritage “ A Patterned Poem

Grade: 3-12

Objective: To follow a pattern in creating an original poem
Directions: First, students read stanza 1 of Countee Cullen's poem, "Heritage." The students then use the pattern of the "Heritage" poem to write their poems. With this pattern, they start with a question about their topic, give the answer, in depth, to their question, and end again with the beginning question. A topic can be assigned by the teacher to check for understanding of a lesson taught in class, or the students can choose a topic of interest.

Some possible poetry choices are:
What is (abstract noun) to Me? Ex. (What Is Courage to Me?)
What is (grammar topic) to Me? Ex. (What are Personal Pronouns to Me?)
What is (history concept or topic) to Me? Ex. (What is the American Revolution to Me?)
What is (science concept or topic) to Me? Ex. (What is the Water Cycle to Me?)
What is topic of interest) to Me? Ex. (What is a Hero to Me? or What is Basketball to Me?)


The following is the first stanza of "Heritage" by Countee Cullen.

What is Africa to me:
Copper sun or scarlet sea,
Jungle star or jungle track,
Strong bronzed men, or regal black
Women from whose loins I sprang
When the birds of Eden sang?
One three centuries removed
From the scenes his fathers loved,
Spicy grove, cinnamon tree,
What is Africa to me?

D'Ann Delgado
Grantham Academy for Engineering
Houston, TX


Color Chart

Grade: Various

Objective: To get students to play with language in creating shades and variations with paint colors.

Directions: The students role play was that they were hired by Sherwin-Williams (a big employer in our area) to name colors. Each student chose their favorite color and had to come up from light to dark with names for the various shades i.e, fire red, kiss red, brick red, pink red, English book red, happy red etc. It teaches them to play with the language and that writing is not just big words and fancy sentences.

Linda Maxwell
Lincoln County High School
Stanford, KY


Answering Machine Poetry

Grade: Any
Objective: To create telephone messages in rhyming verse
Directions: Write telephone answering machine messages to the rhythm of familiar songs or nursery rhymes. A rhyme dictionary is helpful. Here are some samples:
Examples:
(Twinkle, Twinkle)
Leave a message at the tone;
It appears we're not at home.
Say a name and number now;
We'll get back to you somehow.

(Pease Porridge Hot)
Summer is gone
And so are we.
Please talk to our machine
At the beep.

(Auld Lang Syne)
Should you desire to talk to us
But chose our busy time,
Please say your name and number clear
At the end of this silly rhyme.



(Humpty Dumpty)
Alexander is out running track,
Joshua Mark is riding horseback,
The Mom's doing errands,
The Dad's busy, too.
They're sorry they missed this message from you.

Sara Everett
Community Christian School
Fort Dodge, Iowa


The Music of Poetry

Grades: K to 8
Objective: A lot of teachers forget about the music of poetry because they are concerned with the context of the written word. I have found that students in grades 4 to 8 will respond to a hidden treasure in the world of poetry. Rap Music. It has all the components of poetry and uses rhyme as a tool to get the message through. While rhyme is not necessary at this age, the students will use more of their vocabulary in doing this lesson.

Directions: Step One: I take in a boom box and a Will Smith CD or tape that has Just the Two of Us on it. I use this particular artist and song because there is a positive message and no objectional language in the song at all. Because of the in-depth discussion that is involved in this song, it will take 2 or 3 periods to complete - depending on how well the students respond to the idea. Of course, the song will have to played at the beginning of each session to bring the focus back to the matter at hand.

We listen to song and talk about what the artist has to say, how he says it and the overall feelings that the song evokes. The we discuss the meaning the song has for some of the students. Of course, as in all poetry, there is no wrong answer and while I allow a difference of opinion, I don't allow a student to argue a point with another.

Step Two: Brainstorm about what positive message we can give to the world using rap music. I usually try to settle on three or four good messages and let the students choose which one they like best. When the students have a clear idea of what they want to say, we begin writing that message, not concentrating on the rhyming of the music first but on the message we want to give.

Step Three: Refine and rhyme the students' ideas into a poem that can be put to rap music. After they have written the songs they have a choice to either read or perform the piece to the class. If the student decides to perform, a simple beat will be tapped out on the desk by the student or a classmate.

I hope this idea suits your needs, I have had great success with this lesson and it is fun to teach, too. While I haven't seen a hit song yet, I have to say that the students are surprised and enthusiastic about this particular lesson.

Michele Holmes
The Poetry Experience