Swimming in a Sea of Poetry

We began our poetry unit today.  "Poetry is emotion" is one of our main big ideas for this unit.  We began by brainstorming poetic words and phrases.  Slowly, slowly the words came at first, then they flew from mouths onto two large pieces of chart paper, falling fast from lips until the paper had been taken over with their poetic words.  We talked about words that evoke feelings and imagery.  Each student chose several words to display artfully, and then added string to the top, to be hung from the ceiling.  As they worked, I read poetry.  We intend to transform our classroom into a sea of poetry, so that we feel as if we're swimming in poetry.  It is my hope that our young poets will sleep, eat, and breathe poetry in the coming weeks!  Every night each fifth grader will bring home a different book of poetry, to spend five minutes reading independently and five minutes aloud.  The more poetry we read and hear, the better poets we will become.  Fifth graders will begin writing original poetry next week.  At 6PM on June 13th the class will recite their poems at Blue State Coffee on Thayer Street.  Mark your calendars!