Writing Prompts

Working with Jeff Simmons, a parent of one of our students who teaches creative writing at Syracuse University, the older students were given two writing prompts which launched them into many weeks of writing fiction.

"Not all stories have good characters, but most good stories have vivid characters that the reader feels they know almost immediately." Students were asked to develop two characters, distinguishable from each other, and were encouraged to write about them separately, using descriptions of who they are, the places they've been, the things they haven't or have done etc.

The second writing prompt was about setting. "Equally important to story is setting - that is, the time and place that the story takes place. Whether the story takes place in a mythical place like Narnia, or in our world, the reader has to believe in the place enough to want to stay there." Students were asked to put their two characters someplace where one or both of them doesn't want to be.

The children were very motivated to write their stories after having invested two weeks developing character and setting. They developed stories about a lonely boy befriending a dragon, a girl who is saddened by the sudden moving away  of her best friend, a hard working father who looses his job at the mall and lies to his wife, Charlie and his friend with no name, Mart and Sam's search for the Grand Apple Tree, and Lily and Martian the iguana who escapes from the zoo.

Poetry

Inspired by Kenneth Koch's Rose, where did you get that red?  book the older students spent a month studying the poems of Wallace Stevens: Thirteen Ways to Look at a Blackbird, John Ashbery: Into the Dusk-Charged Air, and Arthur Rimbaud:  Voyelles. Kenneth Koch's prompts for children are both motivating and creative. Our final poem was inspired by our study of the Reconstruction period. The children were challenged to write a poem about "Freedom." 

The River by Andy Zamora

As the river throbs on hitting rocks, and flowing over white with foam,

No one knows the name,

No one really cares,

Tuck between the evergreens, far from any city, any means of civilization,

Only deer and elk come to its waiting shores,

Lost to the wilderness,

The unknown river throbs on,

The wolf trots in the edge waters fallowing it prey,

With the moon glistening above,

Like a thousand stars in one,

In the day the sun beat down, as the animals emerged from the pine and Burch,

and wade in it cooling waters,

and the unknown river throbs on.  

Vowels by Zerbie Hynson

A feels like Tuscan red, like the slash of a laser sword, like leaping the tallest building in a single bound.

E feels like a crescent moon, like a very bright, light yellow, like a purple roly-poly elephant.

I feels like light green, like a leaf blowing in the wind, light shining through it like a stained-glass window.  It feels like the way the buttons on an arcade game click when you press them.

O feels like black, like a rocket blasting off into space, into the stars.

U feels like an assortment of bright, vibrant colors set against a dark background, like a skateboard half-pipe, like a yo-yo or a spinning top.

Different ways to look at a book by Sam Pullman

A book

A book is like a world

unfolding before your eyes

a book is like

a being

explaining itself.

A book is like the only diamond

in the

modern world.

A privilege is a book

no book can be

a punishment

A book is a magnet

drawing

drawing

Freedom by Bobby Simmons

Freedom

Animals have the freedom

To be released into the

Lush forest, green meadows

Tan fields, rocky mountains

Sandy beaches, and blue waters

They have the right to be

In the night sky, the Sandy wastelands, and the dead trees.

Animals have the right to survive

In whatever environment they need.

Six ways to write a poem by Emmy Newman

The moon rises like a silver ball.

The cat pounces on the

ball of yarn they roll

and roll and roll away

the dolphin drifts to the sky

and lands lightly back in

the water

the river slides along the

valley like a blue snake

The fluffy cloud gets

Brown across the sky

A tree stands like a

Tall man with green hair.

Xerox

On Wednesday mornings small groups of children in need of phonemic awareness instruction met to work on blending sounds on a soundboard. The children made words on their boards where only one sound changes at a time. This fall and spring they worked on CVC words with initial and final blends, (words like stamp, spill, gift) and silent-e words (such as like, hope, cape, tune, eve) To practice these skills they played games such as Blend Go Fish, Blend Bingo, Silent-e Go Fish, Under the Sea, and Pirate Keys. Once a week the children were also part of a dictation class where they had to write words or sentences using these spelling patterns. 

Ancient China

Third grade students created a China poster describing four aspects of Chinese culture. They were able to select their own topics from a list that included the Silk Road, Chinese religions, Architecture/Homes, Clothing, Silk, Dynasties, Food/agriculture, Art/Music, and Inventions. For each topic they needed to include an illustration and a short typed paragraph.

Ancient China

Ancient China

Our study of Ancient China continued through Chinese New Year, 2011. The youngest children explored the world of Ancient China in many different ways.

The children visited Syracuse University to make paper. After selecting a Chinese character, which they practiced using black ink and brush pens, they drew their character on the handmade paper. These were framed and given as Chinese New Year gifts to families. The children wrote and performed a play based on the Chinese story, How the Rooster lost his horns.

Children studied and colored, using colored pencils, a map of China, locating its deserts, rivers, mountains, seas and plains. Discussions focused on what each landform was, what is a legend, the compass rose and what effects such land features might have on the people of China?

Our next unit focused on Chinese fairy tales. We read Lon Po Po, by Ed Young, and Yeh Shen by Louise Aling. The children were quick to recognize both stories as Chinese versions of  Little Red Riding Hood and Cinderella. Children compared and contrasted these stories and discussed how it could be that countries so far apart could share similar stories.

Finally the whole school listened to more than ten picture books about ancient China. While listening children made observations which were recoreded on a chart about architecture, clothing, food, government, religion and recreation. They also looked for examples of dilemma, symbols and metaphors.  Some of the titles we read were: Night Visitors, The Artist and the Architect, Red Thread and the Eyes of the Dragon.

Money

1st graders were given a magnifying glass and asked to compare and contrast dimes, nickels, pennies and quarters. They played games such as “Race to a Quarter” and “The Matching Game” which gave them practice trading coins (5 pennies for 1 nickel, 2 nickels for 1 dime and so on.) In Matching Game they became quite adept at selecting a coin only be feel from the inside of a sock! Independently on their contracts they completed a work job called “Scoops of Coins.” For their final assessment students were asked to figure out how many different ways you can make 25 cents. 

The Periodic Table

The older students spent four weeks studying The Periodic Table and creating a Wanted Poster for an element of their choice. We introduced the project by listening to Tom Lehrer singing "Elements," his well known song where he rattles off all the elements of the Periodic Table. Students had to research their element and creatively include the following information on their poster - its atomic symbol, number, weight, an interesting fact, the element's uses and chemical state. On their contracts students completed a word search of all the elements, timed themselves on how long it took to put together a magnetic puzzle of the Periodic Table and completed a matching game which reviewed all the new vocabulary of the unit. During snack they watched and responded to a video "Atoms and Molecules."