Hi, Koo! A Year of Seasons

I had not taken the time to look Hi, Koo!: A Year of Seasons until spring break. It was on display at Cover to Cover. I didn't plan to love it, but when I opened it up, I did! I fell in love immediately.  My poetry shelves are too full these days so I am trying not to add lots more poetry until I take time to weed. I have hundreds of poetry books and so I'm being very picky about the ones I add to the shelves. But this one was a must-have.

I love great Haiku for kids. I find that it is a fun type of poetry to play with--a comfy way to get them to move beyond rhyming poems and still have a ball.  I also think there is so much learning when you are playing with writing a haiku.  Syllables, word choice, message in so few words are all amazing writing lessons. So, when I find a great book of haiku that is accessible to young children, I am happy! And who could not love the cute panda? This book makes me happy.

The poems in this book (one per page) follow the seasons through a year.  A few poems per season capture the things outside as well as common activities for the season.  There are haikus that are more serious and some that are more humorous.  The variety of poems in this book will naturally create invitations for young poetry writers.

Love this book and can't wait to share it with kids. I have not been so good about embedding poetry this year and this book reminds me why it is so important and fun to make time for poetry.  So glad I finally took a good look at this new favorite!

Our Wonderful World.3

Details of my Poetry Month Project can be found here.

3. Colosseum

Wikipedia

COLOSSEUM

Broken soup bowl,
tarnished crown,
gaping eyeholes,
center of town.

Shaken, crumbled,
still you stand.
By history humbled,
yet you're grand.

©Mary Lee Hahn, 2014



Carol Varsalona has a Colosseum poem for today on Notegraphy. Kevin's Colosseum Fibonacci poem showcases HaikuDeck.

Carol's poem from yesterday about Stonehenge is at Carol's Corner.

Kevin wrote a Stonehenge poem in Notegraphy yesterday. (I can't wait to give this app/website a try!)



It was in my plans for us to write similes and metaphors about the Colosseum as a possible way into our poems. Good thing I tried that before I had my students do it -- I learned that you can't write much when you know next to nothing about your topic.  (DUH.) So we started with some quick research.

Bless you, KR. I knew I was ready to pull them all back together for some brainstorming when K said aloud, "I wonder how much cereal it would hold? It looks like a bowl!" We had our first simile.

Then, as they fed me facts they had learned, we worked together to bend them into similes or metaphors. Here's we came up with:

•The colosseum is a bowl. How much cereal would it hold?

FACT: It is big.

•It is as big as the moon. (Nice example of hyperbole!)

FACT: It is old, made in 70 AD.
•The Colosseum is nearly as old as the Pyramid of Giza. (We had a good conversation about why this isn't a simile. It is simply stating how old the Colosseum is. And it's not even true. The pyramid is WAY older.)

•My teacher is nearly as old as the colosseum. (Now that we're comparing two unlike things, we have a simile. And hyperbole, please!!)

•The colosseum is like a crown on a princess’ head. (Simile)

•The colosseum is a crown. (Simile transformed into a metaphor)

FACT: It's made of concrete and stone.

•The Colosseum is as sturdy as the tree branch Ry climbed on. (We wanted a simile that compared the Colosseum to something that really wasn't so sturdy, since it is falling apart. Our read aloud is AS EASY AS FALLING OFF THE FACE OF THE EARTH, and Ry is the main character. You can probably guess what happened to the tree branch he climbed on!)

FACT: 500,000 people were killed and over a million animals were killed there.

•The colosseum is a graveyard.

Our Wonderful World.2

Details of my Poetry Month Project can be found here.

2. Stonehenge

Wikipedia

We stand.

Sun warms us,

wind pushes us,

people stare at us.

We wait.

Moon comforts us,

rain gouges us,

people stare at us.

We know.

Tools made us,

ancients moved us,

people stare at us.

We endure.

History created us,

future sustains us,

people admire us.

©Mary Lee Hahn, 2014

S t o n e h e n g e

feels              hard,

can                lift,

sounds          silent

very              strong

reaches         high

to the            sky

feels             rough.

©JB, 2014

We did another two-column brainstorm for today's poems. This time we thought about what moods the picture evoked, and what sensory images we might include in our poem.

There's so much we don't know about Stonehenge. I tried to capture the solid silence of the stones, and the wonder and amazement that we continue to feel in the presence of this mighty ring of standing stones.

EDITED AFTER SHARING WITH MY CLASS: The last line of my poem used to read "people stare at us." AH suggested that perhaps since the poem shifts in that stanza to bigger themes, the last line could be "people admire us." I totally agreed and have made that change! Thanks, AH! (This is what I love about being a part of a community of writers...in my classroom!)

Carol and Kevin both wrote poems yesterday for The Great Pyramid of Giza. Check them out at Carol's Corner and  Kevin's Meandering Mind.

Little Poems for Tiny Ears

Sally shared this book with me at Cover to Cover when I visited over spring break. Little Poems for Tiny Ears is an adorable new poetry book by Lin Oliver. The book is illustrated by Tomie dePaola. It is a happy little book of poems for "tiny ears".

This book is filled with great poems for babies and toddlers.  The poems are short and very sweet.  They capture the joy of being a baby. One of my favorite poems in the book is called "I See a Baby" and it is about a baby seeing itself in the mirror.  There is a poem about walking and a poem about strollers and one about diaper time.  There is lots of rhyming so young children will love the language and rhythm even if they don't yet understand the words.  And Tomie dePaola's illustrations are quite adorable. Each child has his or her own personality and the colors are joyful and engaging.

This is one of those books that both child and parent will enjoy.  I plan on buying it for baby gifts in the future as it is the perfect baby gift. I also think it would be great to have in the classroom. I have so many students with baby sisters and brothers that they would enjoy this take on babies!

A great find--thanks Sally!

Our Wonderful World.1

Details of my Poetry Month Project can be found here.

1. The Great Pyramid of Giza

Wikipedia

TIME

Time

in the desert

is as vast as the sky

expanding across blue distance.

Ancient as sand, changeless and thirsty,

time waits, encased in a monumental tomb of stone.

©Mary Lee Hahn, 2014

Stacking stones

all day and all night.

Just to make a pyramid

to store dead people.

This is all for naught.

But the Pharaoh wants it,

so he gets it.

©VS, 2014

This year, because April 1 is on a Tuesday, I am including my students in my writing process for this first week. Yesterday we looked at this picture of The Great Pyramid of Giza and did a two-column brainstorming activity with DENOTATION on the left and CONNOTATION on the right. Denotation is where we listed the exactly what we could see in the picture, or facts we gathered from further research. Connotation is where we listed what those facts made us think about, or feel. My denotations were big, old, triangle, sand, desert, brown. My connotations were important, valuable, knowledgeable, solid, balanced, sturdy, strong, classic, time, change, changelessness, vast, empty, silent, dry, hot, thirsty. You can see which ones made it into my poem!

It was fascinating to watch the students' writing move immediately in unique directions based on their own connotations. After 5 minutes of my own writing, I circled the room and found another pyramid-shaped poem, two acrostics (mummy and pyramid), three different voices (a slave, the pyramid, and a conversation between the pyramid and a visitor), and poems about the sand, grave robbers, and oldness. I hope a couple of them will allow me to post their poems here later today!

And (drumroll...) I am cross-posting my Poetry Month posts on my spankin' new poetry website!

Jama has a list of the Poetry Month projects around the Kidlitosphere at Jama's Alphabet Soup. Yours isn't there? Let her know!

Carol's pyramid poem is at Carol's Corner; Kevin's is at Kevin's Meandering Mind.

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

Thanks to Jen and Kellee for hosting It's Monday! What Are You Reading!  Stop by Teach Mentor Texts or Unleashing Readers for the round up and see what others in the blog community are reading.

This does not feel like enough reading for Spring Break week but it didn't end up to be a big reading week for me. But I did find some gems.

I've loved Jenny Offill since I read 17 Things I'm Not Allowed to Do Anymore so I was thrilled to see Sparky! by this author. A fun story about a girl who gets a pet sloth.

And Dan Santat has a new book out: The Adventures of Beekle: The Unimaginary Friend.  I received a review copy this week. A fun read! I need to reread and look more closely at his amazing art.  So much to look at!

And I was so happy to read Cynthia Lord's new book, Half a Chance. I love all of her books and loved this one as much as the others.

I am always looking for great nonfiction and Itty Bitty Kitty Committee looked like a good one. I spent some time browsing it and reading parts and pieces this week. Very cute kitties!

And I am about halfway through Under the Egg by Laura Marx Fitzgerald. I have heard lots about it so am happy to have a copy. I'm loving it so far!

Celebrating Pernille Ripp with a donation to Global Read Aloud

We continue our year-long blog birthday celebration by honoring blogger and Read Aloud Activist, Pernille Ripp. Even though our blog birthday was on January 1, we are celebrating it all year! On our 8th Birthday, we decided to celebrate 2014 by celebrating others who inspire us every day. Each month, on the 1st (or so) of the month, we will celebrate a fellow blogger whose work has inspired us recently. We feel so lucky to be part of the blog world that we want to celebrate all that everyone gives us each day.

We have been learning from Pernille Ripp for many years at Blogging Through the Fourth Dimension. She is a generous, honest, funny, and both thoughtful and thought-provoking writer. She is a constant contributor to the world of teaching and learning and always advocates for doing what is right for kids. A while back, Franki did an interview with Pernille for Choice Literacy. Pernille tweets @pernilleripp.

And, if you didn't know, Pernille INVENTED The Global Read Aloud! This international literacy event connects students, teachers and classrooms from all over the world around books and reading.
Because she is a classroom teacher, she has made the whole process doable for anyone who wants to participate. Just like her inclusive classroom, the GRA has evolved. There are now lots of options for readers and classrooms at all levels. If you've never taken part, make it your goal for the fall of 2014. Mark your calendar for October 6, and make your voice heard right now: second round voting is open now for the 2014 books/authors for Global Read Aloud.

We'd like to support Pernille's work on The Global Read Aloud, so our donation this month will be to her very own cause!

Thank you, Pernille for all you do and all you inspire others to do!

National Poetry Month 2014: Our Wonderful World

This year, my Poetry Month project will celebrate the myriad wonders of our world. Every day for the month of April, I will share one of "The Wonders of the World" (selected from a variety of lists) and an original poem inspired by that wonder.

Please join me in celebrating the human-made and natural wonders to be found on this amazing planet upon which we are so privileged to ride around the sun. Leave your poem or a link to your blog post in the comments and I'll add your wonderful words to my post each day.

Here are the wonders I've chosen:

1. The Great Pyramid of Giza (the only one of the Classic 7 Wonders of the World that still exists)

From the 7 Wonders of the Middle Ages:
2. Stonehenge
3. Colosseum
4. Catacombs of Kom el Shoqafa
5. Great Wall of China
6. Porcelain Tower of Nanjing
7. Hagia Sophia
8. Leaning Tower of Pisa
9. Taj Mahal

From the American Society of Civil Engineers' 7 Wonders of the Modern World:
10. Channel Tunnel
11. CN Tower
12. Empire State Building
13. Golden Gate Bridge
14. Itaipu Dam
15. Delta Works
16. Panama Canal

A few of the New7Wonders of the World:
17. Petra
18. Machu Picchu
19. Chichen Itza

And 7 Natural Wonders from a variety of lists (including four of my own to remind us that there is wonder to be found wherever we look):
20. Grand Canyon
21. Great Barrier Reef
22. Mt. Everest
23. Aurora
24. Amazon Rain Forest
25. Victoria Falls
26. Polar Ice Cap
27. Sunrise
28. Chocolate Cake
29. Imagination
30. People

Celebrate This Week!

For the Celebrate this Week Link Up, visit Ruth Ayres Writes!

This week, we are celebrating a week of leisure--not of doing nothing, but of having a little bit of extra time over spring break to browse online, to read a few more posts than usual and to find some gems!  Here are the things we found online this week that are worth celebrating and sharing.

If you have not read A Snicker of Magic , it is one of my favorites of 2014 already.  I was thrilled to see that author Natalie Lloyd had a post on Nerdy Book Club this week and even more happy after I read it. It is an amazing piece that you'll want to read.  There's A Lion in My Closet.

My good friends Drew and Candis Jones created a new product for their Etsy store which I LOVE LOVE. They shared the new produce on Facebook and I was so glad I saw it right away!  I own a few too many of their necklaces but I can't imagine I could ever own too many of these bracelets! Check them out!

Then, I found this amazing Ted Talk thanks to @kylepace on Twitter. Drew Dudley's "Leading with Lollipops". Such a powerful message.  I happen upon Ted Talks I love once in a while but knew that Mary Lee had a goal of fitting more Ted Talks into her life.  So I passed it along. She loved it too.

Mary Lee here: I had high hopes for getting caught up on reading through the blog posts in my overflowing Feedly. Alas, that, and thoroughly cleaning the house one room at a time just didn't get done. I did manage to get in a TED talk with illustrated notes. Thanks for the link to Kyle's post about "Leading With Lollipops," Franki!

And I loved this piece by Tammy at Assessment in Perspective, "Practicing Until It's In Your Bones". An important message for teachers.

At Michigan Reading Association, Colby Sharp hinted that there'd be a big SharpSchu announcement coming up soon so I was thrilled to finally hear details about their new challenge!  Looking forward to hearing their thought on the Geisel winners!

My daughter and I went to see Divergent this weekend. We both loved the movie. I became fascinated by the idea that Shailene Woodley is playing the part of Tris and of Hazel in the upcoming Fault in Our Stars movie.  What am amazing actress to be able to play both of these roles well. I loved her interview that I found somehow.

One thing I like about social media is the way that it gets word out about important issues. I try to focus on positive stories but there were a few negative stories that pulled me in this week. One story that has stayed with me was the story about the runner wearing a tutu who was made fun of by Self Magazine.  I don't often repost negative stories on FB or Twitter but I felt like sharing this story was important. It is a celebration for me because once it was shared in social media, it was clear that most everyone in the world knows this is wrong.  That treating people like this is not okay.  Lots of people sharing the story as a way to take a stand against people being treated like this. A very small thing to do but small things are important.

Poetry Friday: The Roundup is HERE!

Flickr Creative Commons photo by kristin

A TIME TO TALK

by Robert Frost

When a friend calls to me from the road

And slows his horse to a meaning walk, 

I don't stand still and look around

On all the hills I haven't hoed,

And shout from where I am, "What is it?"

No, not as there is a time to talk.

I thrust my hoe in the mellow ground,

Blade-end up and five feet tall,

And plod: I go up to the stone wall

For a friendly visit.

Thanks, y'all, for stopping by for a friendly visit!

Jan at Book Seed Studio is collecting a list of books that feature young poets as characters. She shares one today.

Matt at Radio, Rhythm & Rhyme has a NH Rock Garden for us today -- could be the one the speaker in my Robert Frost poem is working in!

Mrs. Bennett at Used Books In Class had her students write the narratives behind Shakespeare's sonnets. The results are brilliant!

Michelle at Today's Little Ditty celebrates spring with e.e. cummings.

Laura Salas comes to us from Teaching Authors today with a water poem by Christina Rossetti.

Buffy at Buffy's Blog shares her March Madness Poetry Sweet Sixteen poem. There's still time to vote all day today at Think Kid, Think!

Robyn at Life on the Deckle Edge workshops a haiku for us today.

Beth at Tiny Readers and Writers shares one of her four year-old daughter's original poems.

Jama at Jama's Alphabet Soup is hosting a vintage tea party. She's also the official collector of our Poetry Month 2014 projects and celebrations. Be sure to let her (and us) know what you'll be up to in April!

Diane has three offerings: at Random Noodling, a poem by Tess Gallagher; at Kurious Kitty's Kurio Cabinet, a trip to the circus; and at K.K.'s Kwotes, a poetry quote by Edmond de Goncourt.

Tara at A Teaching Life has a Mary Oliver tribute to her dog Sophie, who makes her pause.

B.J. at Blue Window also has a third round poem in March Madness. Good luck, Authletes!

Irene at Live Your Poem has a Poetry Friday gift for us -- a group SoundCloud page where we can record our poems! How cool is that?!? (As soon as I'm caught up with the roundup, I'll definitely check it out!)

Linda at TeacherDance shares a sweet alphabet poem.

Keri at Keri Recommends ends her celebration of Laura Purdie Salas' Water Can Be... with her favorite spread and a give-away.

Bridget at Wee Words for Wee Ones has a pithy comment on the seemingly endless (snow forecast here YET AGAIN for tomorrow) winter.

Jone at Check It Out is playing with pantoums.

Margaret at Reflections on the Teche writes about her student-voters in the March Madness competition. She took it to another level when she had her students use one of the Authlete's words in their own poems!

Tabatha at The Opposite of Indifference has poetry from the herbary today.

Carol at Carol's Corner shares her favorite spring daffodils with us.

Donna at Mainely Write has bedtime stories and grandparenting on her mind today.

Travis at 100 Scope Notes is back at it with Book Spine Poems! Dump your shelves and make one to submit for his gallery!

Crystal at Reading Through Life shares spoken word poetry, poetry in music, and a few poetry book recommendations.

Dori at Dori Reads has a cinquain from Myra Cohn Livingston.

Charles at Charles Waters Poetry has a smorgasbord of offerings today!

Lorie Ann at readertotz shares a Jane Yolen book of poetry for your little ones, and a haiku at On Point.

Supratentorial recommends a book with poetic text that explores the concept of memory.

City Muse Country Muse shares a poem by Peter Everwine.

Shannon at Van Meter Library Voice tells about a fabulous project two schools created that incorporates Rainbow Loom research and Joyce Sidman's poetry!

Kathleen at What's Next? weaves a Louis Armstrong song with her own words.

Amy at The Poem Farm shares a poem of address, a school visit, and a Poetry Month Project announcement.

Jeannine at Views from a Window Seat shares her thoughts about the new verse novel Miss Emily by Burleigh Mutén, and remembers a conversation about poetry with the author.

Sylvia at Poetry for Children shares the line-up for the Texas Library Association Poetry Roundup session. What an amazing 10-year legacy AND a great line-up for this year!

Little Willow plants seeds of hope with a line or two by Gertrude Stein.

Sherry at Semicolon Blog features Dante Gabriel  Rossetti.

Myra at Gathering Books has a Maya Angelou poem for us today.

Cathy at Merely Day by Day is wandering today.

Ruth at There is No Such Thing as a God-forsaken Town is thinking about the life of words (thanks to a student and Emily Dickinson).

Becky at Tapestry of Words is gearing up for National Poetry Month AND celebrating her 100th post!

Greg at GottaBook announces his plans for 30 Poets/30 Days this year, and shares an original poem from earlier in the week.

Joy at Poetry For Kids' Joy shares a bus ride poem.

Janet at All About the Books shares the rhyming book Animal Snackers.

Catherine at Reading to the Core offers an original poem filled with wonder.