All posts in Leslie Reese

Jealous clouds, guitars, and more

In our recent sessions, Swift 2nd graders were counting down the hours before spring break began! We read “Ode to My Shoes” by Francisco X. Alarcón, and talked about giving non-human things – like […]

2nd Grade Experts Weigh In

Today Swift 2nd graders talked about (1) things they know how to do well; (2) the recipes they know how to cook; (3) and how to give someone expert instructions. We passed around different […]

“It’s really easy to get a pet…”

Last week at Swift – rather than introducing a new lesson – I asked students to look through their folders to select a poem that they would like to spend more time on. Many […]

What if we lived in a world without color?

Swift 2nd graders pondered this question, and then came up with responses such as “It would be boring,” “It would be sad,” and “Artists wouldn’t be able to have any fun!” In Ms. Pendola’s […]

Do you love sour pickles?

Valentines Day landed on my most recent sessions with Swift 2nd graders, so we read Eloise Greenfield’s poem, “Honey, I Love.” Students enjoyed lines in which the poet said she LOVED “a flying pool” […]

Would you like to see…?

As usual, when working with 2nd graders – many of whom have never had a creative writing practice – the first 5 sessions are meant to introduce students to how poems look on the […]

Daydreaming…

My fourth session with Swift 3rd graders was dreamy. We talked about many kinds of dreams and nightmares. Then we read the poem “D is for Daydreaming,” which ends with the following stanza:“Try to […]

“big kids sound like brown bears roaring”

For our 3rd sessions Swift 2nd graders talked about comparisons. We tried to look at pairs of very different things to find similarities in color, texture, shape, size, and feeling. After examining similes written […]

“crackly” and “crunchy”

For my second meeting with Swift 2nd graders, we discussed things we experience using our sense(s) of sight, taste, smell, sound, and touch. We also talked about the seasons, and some of the changes […]

First Poem

Happy New Year Greetings!Being invited to return to Swift for my 6th year brings me feelings of joy and humility. This year I have the pleasure of joining Ms. Pendola’s and Ms. Brist’s 2nd […]

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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