Somehow Dixie over at Ethical ELA conjured this heron into my path today…the day she offered bird as our #verselove poetry prompt. Thanks Dixie–readers here know I love my egrets…and their cousin, the great blue heron is a welcome sighting any day!
Participating in #verselove over at Ethical ELA feels like a daily workout, faced with innovative approaches to poetry that I might not otherwise attempt. And today is no different. Today Scott has challenged us to show something without telling. So here goes…
Each Footstep
Don’t let them fool you
It’s all about the shoes
pulled on over two pairs of socks
a smooth, thin inner layer
and soft cushy outer layer
crissed and crossed
hooked and tightened
tied in a double knotted bow
These boots are made for walking
And they log miles
on dirt
over rocks
through snow
into squelching mud
across crunching gravel
beside trickling streams
Heading nowhere and everywhere
filling my ears
with birdsong
and windy symphonics
the scritch of lizard toes
echoing thump, thump of woodpeckers
the chasing race of squirrels
My faithful friend
gives me a lens
to see anew
snapping scenic vistas
noticing nature’s intricate and unexpected artwork
heightening awareness and concern
for Earth’s fragile beauty
Each footstep connects me
to my breath
to the planet
to these booted feet
These feet were made for walking
@kd0602
(Showing hiking without telling that I hike…with my camera!)
On day 7 of National Poetry Month, I have faced the most difficult challenge ever! As you know from Day 3, I don’t identify as a music person and today’s challenge was to use a song structure to write new lyrics. Chris over at Ethical ELA was generous, offering his song as structure and giving writers an out–if it doesn’t work for you, do something else. But…the point is to try…right?!?
So after a day spent in 100 degree temperatures learning about and photographing power generating windmills, I just had to figure out how to say something with a song structure. Since music is definitely a challenge for me, I asked my husband what song he might think of related to our exploration today. And he offered up the old classic, They Call the Wind Mariah from the movie Paint Your Wagon.
I listened and hummed…and tried my own (amateur-ish) attempt at song writing. This will definitely not be up for any Grammys, but I hope you get a bit of a glimpse of what a windmill farm is all about.
Imagine my surprise this morning when the post by Ethical ELA was hosted by friend and colleague Emily Yamasaki! I was immediately drawn into both the mentor poem, things I have memorized by Maria Giesbrecht and Emily’s poem, Things I Know. I dove deeply into the cool pool of poems that emerged from Emily’s provocation, reading and feeling, admiring and analyzing as I began to think about my own writing for this second day of National Poetry Month.
Things I Know by Heart
The sleek curve of the egret’s neck
in the tidepool at low tide
The smells of love that fill our home
emanating from the kitchen
The silence of his last breath
matching the empty space in our family
My daily commute, etched in the recesses of my mind,
requiring no conscious thought
My childhood phone number
but not my passwords–they continue to elude me
The sweetness of little boys
now into the second generation
Fear of fire, seared into my memory
brought back by ashes that rain down like snowflakes
Fog’s gray blanket
an indicator that spring has arrived
Each of the traffic spots on the 5 between our house and theirs
no matter how long it takes, every trip is worth it
It’s April! And it’s the first day of National Poetry Month. I don’t profess to be a great poet–but I am able to share my love of words and poetry with my students–especially when I do the things I ask them to do.
So even though this is not a teaching day for me and even though Spring Break begins tomorrow and I won’t see my students until April 11th, I will write a poem each day. I know that I will be better able to coach and guide them if I am doing the poetry writing I want them to try.
I plan to use Eve Merriam’s Peeling an Orange with them when we get back to school after Spring Break, so why not experiment with it as a mentor text today? One of the techniques I notice in this poem is her use of the contrasting words carelessly and meticulously. So, since photos tend to inspire my writing, I took a peek through my camera roll and spotted this one of a snail from a neighborhood walk earlier this week. And here is the poem it inspired:
One of the things I love about walking on the beach is that it is forever different and always fascinating. Today was gray with a pretty thick marine layers covering the coast. I love low tides when the reef is exposed, the beach is wide, and if I’m lucky there will be more shore birds and other sea creatures visible.
Today it was the tiny sandpipers that caught my eye. They gather in groups, perhaps safety in numbers, and move in unison. I crept close today (they spook easily) and waited and watched with my camera at the ready. Their coloring helps them camouflage with the reef, making it hard to get great photos.
So many birds stand on one leg…and this one is a perfect example. I’m guessing it’s a way to rest. I know when I am standing a lot (like every day teaching), I find myself standing one one leg or resting one foot on the other.
As I was thinking about these birds that run and fly in perfect synch–their little feet almost like perpetual motion machines–I was also wondering about their collective noun. What is a group of sandpipers called? With a question like this, I did the usual and turned to Google. There I learned there are a number of names for a group of sandpipers including a contradiction, a fling, a hill, and even a time-step! Where do these names come from…and why? A contradiction?
If I were to choose from these nouns, I would definitely go with time-step. I love to watch their little legs move in a blur of constant motion and in perfect step with each other–definitely a time-step!
And…I was lucky enough to catch this guy mid leap! Notice the little drip of water from the tiny bird foot raised above the ground.
It’s fun to leave the beach wondering and thinking. No two days are alike and every day gets me thinking. Where do you go to think and wonder? (And maybe even walk and photograph)
Today summer arrived in March with warm Santa Ana winds from the desert bringing 80 degree temperatures to the coast. It was a typical work day–except that I had no after school meetings today. That is a rare occurrence and I took full advantage. I left school at a reasonable hour, called my husband to see if he was interested in heading out for coffee and a peek at the beach, and headed home feeling like we were embarking on a vacation–even if it was of the 60 minute variety!
I’d read on Monday that our beach was getting sand this week–part of an infrastructure project that involves dredging the local lagoon and relocating sand to sand deprived beaches. I wondered just what that would look like.
Sure enough, heavy equipment was parked on the beach and new sand was evident along the shoreline.
We weren’t sure just how much beach there would be for walking, high tide often means the water covers the ground right up the cliff (and walking too close to the cliffs is an accident waiting to happen–cliff failures are well-known in these parts and have been known to be deadly!). But after only a couple steps where my foot squished way down in the brand new muddy sand, we could see plenty of room for walking ahead.
Just like the winds, we headed in the opposite direction today–walking north instead of south. While the sea birds I love to photograph weren’t present, there was plenty of other action to observe. We came across lifeguards training on jet skis, roaring up and over waves, dragging a water stretcher with another helmeted lifeguard aboard. I watched them soar over the whitewater, doing donuts in the surf. I snapped and snapped and snapped, playing with capturing action in a still photograph. (My favorite photo is posted on Instagram, but this one shows the swirl of the water.)
With the sun a warm hug on our shoulders, we continued our walk to a popular surfing area. Like ants, we watched the trail of surfers going up and down to the water’s edge. The weather makes the beach irresistible, calling loudly with blue skies, warm air, and adequate surf, in spite of the not quite warm water (61 degrees).
We couldn’t quite make it to our turnaround point as we watched the waves splashing up all the way to seawall. I couldn’t help but snap these young people trying to time their move from the stairs of this private residence to the shore. (Note the seagull on lookout above).
This afternoon foray to the beach was exactly what I needed today. It’s been a stressful week following a too-short weekend, working on getting report cards finished for an upcoming week of parent conferences, not to mention those frequent after school meetings. Today was a perfect respite–a tiny vacation in the middle of the week spent with the one I love. Sometimes a mini vacay is the perfect solution to the mid-week blues. Thursday–I’m ready for you!
I hear them call from a distance, a ripple swish invitation to come and play.
We dance on the shoreline, chasing one another, pulling me closer then pushing me back while all the time singing a song of water and moon in my ear.
Some moments are a whisper, secrets of the sea lapping on the shore. Sun drenched stretches shattering the light into a million sparking diamonds.
And then there is the soaring chorus, pounding percussion in the background. Walloping drum rolls with cymbal crashes as the white foam curves and curls, unfurling toward the shoreline.
I notice the standing ovation in the background and the chants of encore as I prepare to leave.
Even as I walk away, the echoes continue to sound in my ears. The wave song beckons me in, sends me off, and calls me back with a melody that constantly changes with a rhythm I never forget.
Back on Monday I wrote about my students and their foray into the garden to explore some photography techniques. We’ve been continuing our project, first by carefully examining each photo, noticing the technique used to take the photo, and then selecting their 3 favorites…one from each technique. Those three photos were then edited. I showed them two main function of the native iPad editing tool: how to crop and/or turn a photo and then had them use a filter to change their photo from color to black and white. (After all, we are studying Ansel Adams!)
Today, the choices got more difficult. They had to select their one favorite of the three edited photos to use as their inspiration for writing some captions–in the form of equations. One of my fellow slicers did a lovely photo essay (I wish I did a better job of keeping track of the blogs I read and leave comments for) where she used Amy Krouse Rosenthal’s This Plus That: Life’s Little Equations as her caption format. I knew this would be an excellent format for my young writers–and after reading and discussing what we noticed in Amy’s book, these 6 and 7 year olds set off to write their own–inspired by their black and white photos.
Here’s a few to share with you (along with the photo inspiration)…please keep in mind that these are first draft efforts!
I absolutely love B’s buckets–there is something perfect about the light and dark of them. Here’s one of his captions (he was quite pleased by this effort!):
Bucket + bucket = Buckets
Our warm weather obviously had an impact on A:
Fun + spring + warm = amazing
Only a few students risked subtraction, I love R’s sentiment!:
Trees – deforestation = Life
You’ve got to love the first grade angles! Here’s H’s view:
Love + joy + garden leaves = plants
This unusual view of sweet peas inspired C’s caption:
Plants + pollination = Flowers
In addition to the photography lesson, the actual photos, and the captions, students used technology to edit and also learned to upload photos to Google Drive, share them with me, and absolutely loved getting to choose from three different black and white filters.
And here is my own–I had to join in the fun!
Smooth stumps + tiny black ants = squirmy kids
Maybe you’ll want to head outside and give this a try! Be sure to share if you do!
Last week we learned about Jane Goodall and her passion for animals. Today we began learning about Ansel Adams and his passion for nature and photography. I want students to see that there are lots of ways to take action to make the world better–and following your passions is a great place to begin.
It’s surprising to me that I haven’t had students use their iPads to take photos before this point in the year. I’ve used iPads sparingly this year–I think partly in response of the intensive use of devices during COVID times. So today was the day I decided that we simply HAD to do some photography.
I started by showing my students a slide show with three photography techniques: bug’s eye view (a view from a low perspective), bird’s eye view (a view from above), and using the rule of thirds (framing the subject using grid lines to help with positioning). We did a quick practice in the classroom where I could give some immediate feedback by walking around the room.
After lunch, we came back to the classroom where I gave a few pointers about taking our iPads outside, and then we headed out into the garden to take photos using the three techniques. I limited them to 10 photos, but encouraged them to explore and experiment, deleting any that weren’t good.
There’s nothing like watching first graders take photos. They have no hesitation about laying on the ground, crawling under a plant, or taking an angle that I would never have imagined. As we walked back from the garden, we made a few stops to snap a couple of extra photos of some California golden poppies growing along the fenceline, some other wildflowers, and a lizard doing some sunbathing. And of course, I couldn’t resist a bird’s eye view shot of the class on our way back.
Back in the classroom we took a few minutes to look through the photos, identifying which technique (or combination of techniques) we had used. Tomorrow we will explore some editing…and select our best three for some caption writing.
