All posts in Haines

“Do anything you want/The limits are the sky/ Only one restriction apply”: Portrait Poems

Students read Instructions to the Artist by Billy Collins before crafting their own portrait-inspired poems. Lesson Note: According to findings by the leading researcher on the power of writing and journaling for healing purposes, […]

“To another holding room until she went upstairs to stay”: To the Stars

Students read a student poem that used personification to talk to a star before trying their hands at their own poems addressing something… bigger than themselves while using words from legendary poet/teacher Kim Addonizio’s […]

“But as a ghost, watching over you, giving a sign of presence.”: Table Poems

A common household object became the focus of this lesson while studying Joy Harjo’s poem, Perhaps The World Ends Here. The poet James Merrill once commented, ‘we understand history from the family around the […]

“In the hot Summer/Radio ready/ Blue leather walls”: Memory Poems

Students wrote poems about recent and not-so-recent memories and continued working with short lines and sometimes minimalism. Lesson Note: “To get the right word in the right place is a rare achievement…Anybody can have […]

“After the glory of the day”: Night Poems

Students doodled and drew pictures of what happens at night before they drift off to sleep and then wrote short poems using sensory details. Lesson Note: “Do stuff. Be clenched, curious. Not waiting for […]

Cutting Up: Collage and Visual Poetry!

Students used magazines and created cut-up poems! They used ‘found language’ and images to create new meaning. Lesson Note: Creative Artist guru, Julia Cameron, says the part of us that creates art is about […]

In The Black: Blackout Poetry

Blackout Poetry: A blackout poem is created when a poet takes a marker (usually black marker) to already established text–like that from a newspaper–and starts redacting words until a poem is formed or an […]

“Portrait of a Grandmother”

Last week with Haines 4th grade after school poetry group, we talked about grandparents. Some of us live far away from our grand parents, some of us see one or both of our grandparents […]

‘I believe you will be deeply touched.’: Video-Inspired Poems

Students watched a bear cam video similar to the one described in the poem we studied, ‘There was this bear cam’ by critic and poet, Sandra Simonds. Sandra Simonds charts the formations and deformations […]

“We Are from the World”

Fresh from spring break, Haines after-school poetry group met for a round table reading of Because You Matter by Tami Charles. From there, we returned to the “Who I Belong To” lesson created around […]

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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