All posts in Twain

Too Cool For School: Gwendolyn Brooks-inspired Poems

Students read Gwendolyn Brooks’ classic poem, ‘We Real Cool’ before crafting their own ‘cool’ poems using their own words and ideas for what is cool, rhyme repetition, and the short form. We Real Cool […]

Planets Beyond this Earth

Twain Elementary 6th graders visited other planets for their fourth week of poetry. We discussed how we can create the ideal world. Most students thought it would be great to have a world where […]

“The background should be es grande y brilliosa como un sol “: Portrait Poems

Students drew their faces with closed eyes, talked about portraits, and read Instructions to the Artist by Billy Collins before crafting their own portrait-inspired poems. Lesson Note: According to findings by the leading researcher […]

Speak Up

For their third week of poetry, Twain 6th graders learned the importance of speaking up. We discussed how using our voices can help us communicate our feelings, thoughts, and opinions with others. Which is […]

“Hoping for 24 hours my Mom has to say yes to everything”: Night Poems

Students thought about what occurs at night, the concept of home, and short forms before penning their own poems inspired by Li Bai’s, ‘Quiet Night Thoughts.’ Quiet Night Thought At the foot of my […]

Recipe For You

For our second week, Twain Elementary 6th graders had brought their hungry appetites and were ready to sink their teeth into some recipe poems. I shared my own poem, “From Scratch,” which tells the […]

“but at the end of the day every/ body is going to do what they /want to do”: 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 that ‘we understand history from the family around […]

Wild Thoughts at Twain Elementary

It was great meeting Twain Elementary 6th graders on Monday. Students had some experience writing poetry with their teachers. They already knew various poetry styles such as haikus, odes, quatrains, and sonnets. Being among […]

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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