Two Moon Poems

Brought to you by Sara McCarney, ideas stolen from elsewhere

Intro.

-Read an inspiring selection of text related to the topic. For our celestial creations, I read Papa, Please Get the Moon for Me by Eric Carle.

Poem One: From List to Shining List

-Start with a list of some kind. We shared ours taken from the previous night’s homework of observing nature, the sky specifically, for 10-15 minutes. Talk about what you noticed.

-Next, take each word and weave it into a phrase full of descriptive flair. Using words that elicit the five senses is particularly nice. Your phrases need not connect at this point.

-Once you have the phrases to your liking, create a poem by ordering them in a way that pleases you. There ’s no need to use all of them, but at least five seems to work.

Poem Two: Found Poems Using Non-Fiction

-Pass out a photocopied piece of text from a non-fiction book related to your topic. Have them read it solo, or read it as a class.

-Use scissors to cut out particularly meaningful words. Strings of words are fine, but keep it to no more than three in a row. This is a cool way to focus kids in on the key concepts.

-Order the chosen ideas into a poem. Adding words is allowed as long as key ideas are the focus.

**These could be adapted to just about any topic with great success guaranteed