All posts in Josie Levin

Poems (with footnotes)

This week Water’s 6th and 7th graders in Ms. Smallwood and Ms. Hernandez’ classes read “Thank you Letter (with footnotes)” by John Grandits. In class we discussed creating double meanings in our writing and […]

Comic Poems!

This week in Ms. Smallwood and Ms. Hernandez’s classes we read an excerpt from Cartoon Dialectics by Tom Kaczynskki and discussed how something can both be a comic and a poem. We came up […]

Poems after Paintings

This week students dipped their toes into art criticism. We read “Untitled #9, 1981” by Victoria Chang, after the Painting by Agnes Martin of the same name. We discussed how Chang’s poem described the […]

A Glossary of Glossary Poems

This week in class we read “Glossary of Terms” by Franny Choi and discussed how form affects poetry with a new and unique form. Students filled in their own categories for Choi’s terms as […]

Concrete Week!

This week in Ms. Smallwood’s 6th grade class and Ms. Hernandez’s 7th grade class we took a crack at concrete poems. We read “Spew Machine” by John Grandits and discussed the logistics of a […]

Repeat, Repeat, Repeat

This week in class we read the poem “The Gift” by Ocean Vuong and talked about the way this poem uses repetition and how to incorporate it into our own poems. Students wrote about […]

“so vibrant and orange” Poems of Memory

This last week students in Ms. Smallwood’s and Ms. Hernandez’s classes wrote poems about important memories. We read “My Father’s Mustache” by Ada Limón and both classes discussed what it is like to see […]

Fear and Big Words

This week we read “HIPPOPOTOMONSTROSEQUIPPEDALIOPHOBIA” by Aimee Nezhukumatahil. We discussed how we approach long words, how to write about what we’re afraid of, and irony in poetry. Students used a map to connect the […]

“In response to the season of winter” Responding with poetry

This week students explored what it means to respond through poems. We started class by exchanging some short letters. We read “Way Opposite” by Harryette Mullen which was also a response to the poem […]

Opposite Poems

This week students at Waters wrote poems about opposites! In class we, fittingly, read “Some Opposites” by Robert Wilbur and talked about the confusing process of defining an opposite and making up our own. […]

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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