Category Archives: #writeout

The Magic of Mini-Zines

There’s something so special about making things. You use your own hands and something that was once a flat blank piece of paper is suddenly something else, something you created.

We’ve been making Zines in my first grade classroom. Our first attempt happened during our Dot Day celebration. We took a piece of printer paper, folded until we had 8 even rectangles, made a single cut…and voila! The paper became a small, multi-paged book. Those first books became our “A Dot Can Be…” zines.

Last week in honor of #writeout, we spent some time in our pollinator garden and basin area of the playground exploring nature’s artifacts. I wrote about our experience with our nature collectors and our wonder walk here. When I left off with that post students were in the process of creating zines about the nature items they collected. What I love most about these mini zines is the agency students feel about creating them. I also like that it allows students to both “write small” and to be literary in their approach. Students who are emerging as writers might create a page that reads, “Spiders Find a Way” with a beautiful drawing of a spider on a web, while more advanced writers can write, “A rock finds a way to scrub against the tree with happiness.” The writing and creating is accessible to everyone in our first grade class. And the zines are truly tiny jewels!

And after a conversation with some colleagues on the Connecting the Network Call with the National Writing Project last week, I took their suggestion and sent blank zines (made by my students) home with students with an invitation to explore on their own at home and to make a zine on their own. (We forgot to take them home on Friday, so they went home on Monday).

And…just like my colleagues suspected, my students were motivated to write at home. Today this lovely book came in:

My student was excited to read it to me…and for me to read it to the class! It was a delightful nature-based fictional story that involved a bug and a centipede. I’m guessing some more student-created zines may show up in the classroom later this week!

I know we’ll keep on making and writing…and making writing, both inside and outside the classroom. I’m excited about the writing community that my classroom is becoming.

#writeout: Because of an Acorn

Change in View: #writeout

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I walked out of school with the sun shining brightly on my shoulders. I peeled my lightweight jacket off before getting into the car to head down the hill toward the beach for my after school walk.

In the less than two miles from school to the beach, the sun dimmed, shuttered by a thick veil of fog. Palm trees became shadowy pillars as I steered toward the beach parking lot. As I walked down the long steep ramp to the sandy beach, it was like walking into another world. Colors were swallowed by the damp blanket, the view disappeared, I could see only 20 or 30 yards in front of me.

My mind filled with stories, the stuff of Halloween and horror movies. What was around the corner? What evil might that shadowy figure in front of me bring? What about the sea itself, was the tide actually as low as I expected?

Luckily, my feet know this beach. They followed the path worn by my frequent walks, recognizing the curve of the beach, the squish of the sand under my soles. Familiar birds whistled hello, giant kelp caressed my toes and a huge piece of bull kelp appeared from the shadows.

As I neared the end of my walk, a crowd of children appeared from the mist. And with them, the bubble man, the pied piper of the beach, casting a spell with his magic wand. The thick mist didn’t dampen their spirits, instead the dampness of the air helped them catch bubbles–holding them in their hands and allowing them to slip into the bubble tunnels the bubble man created.

Stories continue to swirl, wrapping me in their damp, shadowy chapters. My imagination is already hard at work, making connections, creating movies in my mind. I can only hope they don’t become the stuff of nightmares as I drift off to sleep.

Inanimate Objects: Students #writeout

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Some days in the classroom are just right. Students are productive, interesting learning is visible, and it seems that we all grow closer as a result. Today was one of those days.

As promised in a previous post, my students used the poem Pencils by Barbara Esbensen to inspire their writing about an inanimate object. They picked topics as varied as ropes/knots, french toast and pancakes. (There are also poems about gravestones, oil pastels, basketballs, and erasers…they are just not quite all the way finished yet!) And then, to take the writing just another step further, we explored the Adobe Spark Video app to make a video to amplify their voices and extend their ideas. Spark video is friendly for my students, offering a number of high quality photos for them to use in their videos.

So…here’s a few of the videos. (I’ve included a screen shot of the video with a link to view/listen to the poem.)

Khloe’s pancake poem

Screen Shot 2019-10-15 at 6.13.05 PM

Shea’s french toast poem

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and Bodhi’s rope/knots poem

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As always, my students would love comments. And I’d love to know what you are doing to celebrate writing this month with your students! #writeout

What Students Love: #writeout

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As promised, here are some of my students’ poetry inspired by Lee Bennett Hopkins’ City I Love. (For more details, check out this previous post.)

Even before pulling out City I Love, I launched the idea of writing about place by reading All the Places to Love by Patricia MacLachlan and Where Am I From by Yamile Saied Mendez. Students then created heart maps of the places they love (ala Georgia Heard). By this time students were excited about the places they love, eager to tell each other and me all about them. But instead of diving right into the writing, I asked students to “map” themselves. I tried to keep this direction pretty broad, letting students take it in any direction they wanted. These watercolor and black sharpie marker masterpieces are the result!

This map is a wonderful map creature by H.

And his poem:

Morro Rock I love

Looking at the dormant volcano

The fish swarm in the water

The sound of the sea gulls

The smell of the salty sea.

Casting a line

Getting the bait

catching the fish.

It’s just sitting in place

Day after day

Year after year

For hundred of years.

Walking on the beach

looking at the fish and crabs

and looking at the ocean scenery

Sitting on a dock waiting for a fish

like waiting for a train.

And a pineapple map by I.

And her poem about a very special bench that honors her grandmother:

The Bench I Love

On the bench I sit at

Bench I love

I watch the flowers flowers flow

As the birds glide slow as they pass by their home

Through the palm tree garden I go

Past the great sun’s glow

On the bench I sit at

Bench I love

I sit down and watch the tide curl

Up & down it will go

On the bench I sit at

bench I love

The breeze flies past my hair

And chases the ocean’s salty waves

On the bench I sit at

bench I love

I sit down and inhale

Look up and exhale

And a horse map by S.

Accompanied by a barn poem:

Barn I Love

Barn I go to

barn I love.

Horse smelling wonder beyond city.

Gallops of emotion. Races of hearts.

Barn I go to

barn I love.

Each morning a sweet smell of hay .

Each night a thankful nay.

Barn I go to

barn I love.

Morning wet covers the arena.

Full of playful horses running.

Barn I go to

barn I love.

Stardust black mares galloping in the cold moon.

Sunset colored butterflies leave at the end of the day.

I told my students that I would use my blog to amplify their voices (our vocabulary word from last week!). I know they will appreciate your comments. And know that these are just a glimpse of what my students created as they thought about the places and activities that matter to them.

How are you celebrating writing in your classroom, in your home, in your life? #writeout

Things and Places: #writeout

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An email subscription led me to a podcast called Everything is Alive, where inanimate objects are interviewed. (Full disclosure, I only listened to a few minutes of one podcast–but did read the transcript linked above.) But, this idea of the personality and alive-ness of inanimate objects got me thinking about inspiration for writing. And, in the serendipity sort of way I often experience when thinking and writing and lesson planning, I came across an old favorite poem I have used with students called Pencils by Barbara Esbensen. (You can read Esbensen’s poem linked above.)

I have this idea that students will pick an object that matters to them and create their own inanimate object poetry inspired by Pencils. Should I have them write about pencils? No…let them choose something that matters to each of them. What would I pick? My camera, of course. So, here’s my try:

Cameras

The rooms in a camera

are a tight fit

but forests seascapes classrooms

crowd right in

In a camera

nature’s colors riot, drawing your eye

and dim light shifts the world

to black and white

From a photographer (experienced or not)

an unexplained photo may emerge

framed by the untold story

living in the stillness, frozen in time

Every image in your camera

is ready to

dance on rays of light

ready

to focus and expose

ready to come right out

and save that moment

so that you can explore

and experience it again and again

®Douillard

Will my third graders be able to animate their inanimate objects? I think so…and I also think that the objects will connect them to places they love and spend time at…so #writeout it is! I’ll share the results later in the week!

Here are some of my favorite places that crowd right into the rooms in my camera!

sand art

A Place I Love: #writeout

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When I learned that the National Day on Writing, the National Park Service, and the National Writing Project would join forces to celebrate writing through #writeout in October, I was all in. #writeout is meant to help writers focus on stories of place…particularly if there is a national park nearby. I don’t happen to live near a national park, but I do live by spectacular outdoor spaces where I spend lots of time walking…and that inspire my writing.

As October began, students read and studied the poem, City I Love by Lee Bennett Hopkins. The rhythms and patterns of the poem were friendly to students, they were able to notice many techniques Hopkins employed. And better yet, they were eager and ready to write their own versions using this poem as their mentor text.

City I Love by Lee Bennett Hopkins

In the city

I live in—

city I love—

mornings wake

to swishes, swashes,

sputters

of sweepers

swooshing litter

from gutters.

In the city

I live in—

city I love—

afternoons pulse

with people hurrying,

scurrying—

races of faces

pacing to

must-get-there

places.

In the city

I live in—

city I love—

nights shimmer

with lights

competing

with stars

above

unknown heights.

In the city

I live in—

city I love—

as dreams

start to creep

my city

of senses

lulls

sleep.

With this poem as a mentor text, I wrote my own version, focusing on a favorite place of mine. Of course, I had to write about walking on the beach!

Beach I Love

At the beach

I walk on

The beach I love

Seagulls hover

Squawking and flapping

Searching for treats

In unattended

Beach bags.

At the beach

I walk on

The beach I love

Salty waves

Curl and break

Tossing swimmers

And tempting surfers

Into the cool, refreshing

Depths.

At the beach

I walk on

The beach I love

Squishy sand

Sucks at my toes

Tiny grains sanding

My soles smooth

And sheltering

Tiny frisky crabs and

Multitudes of bean clams.

At the beach

I walk on

The beach I love

Rhythmic seas

Slow my breath

Warm my heart

And clear my mind.

Kim Douillard

So in honor of the National Day on Writing and #writeout, I let the outdoors inspire my writing. I will include my students’ writing in days to come!