All posts in Janel Galnares

Ars Poetica

For my last day with Homeroom 302 at Waters Elementary, the students described what they learned about writing and themselves through the process of writing poetry. They first completed a brainstorm activity where they […]

Summertime

For our last weeks at Waters, and to welcome the summer, homerooms 302 and 303 wrote poems about what summertime looks and feelings like in their own neighborhoods. Our example poem was about the […]

Last Day of School – Summer Poems

For my last day with the 7th graders at Sayre Language Academy, the students described what they learned about writing and themselves through the process of writing poetry. Then they wrote poems about what […]

Riddle Our Fears

This time in poetry class at Waters, homeroom 305 created riddle poems inspired by Sylvia Plath’s poem “Metaphor” which begins, “I’m a riddle in nine syllables.” Students guessed at Plath’s riddle, then had a […]

Of What Are We Afraid

For our second to last week, the students at Sayre focused on writing poems with metaphor about their fears–physical and abstract. Ms. Hernandez 7th Grade Untitled by Lupita C. Bee is a yellow stinger. […]

Gwendolyn Brooks – Into Music

These past weeks students from Waters focused on including rhythm and rhyme in their poetry, gaining inspiration from Gwendolyn Brooks’ iconic poem “We Real Cool.” Our prompt was to write a poem about others’ […]

What Is Freedom?

This past week at Sayre Language Academy we recalled learning Gwendolyn Brook’s poem “We Real Cool” and answered why it is so easy to remember–the music. We focused on rhyming and writing poems about […]

We Real Cool: Misconceptions about this Generation

This week we focused on including rhythm and rhyme in poetry, gaining inspiration from Gwendolyn Brooks’ iconic poem “We Real Cool.” Our poetry prompt was to write a poem about others’ misconceptions about the […]

Riddles of Value

During our last class of April at Waters, homerooms 301 and 302 created riddle poems inspired by Sylvia Plath’s poem “Metaphor” which begins, “I’m a riddle in nine syllables.” Students guessed at Plath’s riddle, […]

To Wish Upon a Star

Last week with Mr. Raman’s 7th and 8th graders at Waters Elementary we thought about the practice of wishing on a star, and wrote a poem to something much larger than our own lives […]

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I’M FROM THE CITY LIGHTS / STREAMING OUT IN THE NIGHT / AND HUGE SKYSCRAPERS / TOWERING OVER THE LAKE – MELISSA E., 7TH GRADE POET