Where I'm From, 2015 extended dance mix

     Another poetry month has come and gone. In spite of state testing on the horizon, we spent some time creating our "Where I'm From" poems in order to get a handle on free verse techniques. I asked that children go heavy on the sensory imagery and gather facts from at least one family member of a different generation. 
     There are at least two other posts on my blog about this activity, but this year students chose a "golden line" to include in our collective/collaborative poem.
   If a line is indented, that means it belongs to the same person who wrote the preceding line. The students are very proud of their work, and we hope you enjoy reading our family history.

“Where I’m From”

I am from a stranger time

          from a bad war and an old compass

A man who put his country before him

          And became my hero

I am from military moves all around the globe

I am from the tendrils of the Vietnam War

And my grandfather’s homecoming

I am from C-130’s in Vietnam

          To Apache helicopters in Afghanistan

And keeping vendettas

I am from a broken down town

          Gun shells everywhere

From stitches in people

to stitches in stuffed animals

I am from collections of Indian arrow heads

I am from open fields and massive mountains

From sleeping under the stars

I am from long rides to county fairs

From hooves pounding against the ground

          To get to the open

I’m from factory fresh Rolls Royces

          and dusty Chevy step sides

I am from rusty trucks and muddy boots

I am from the scratches on my knees

I am from the acne on my parents’ faces

I am from sweet tea on the front porch swing

From a cheagle running

I am from slurred words and fast talkin’

I am from corn hole and fireworks

          Until the neighbors complain

Where pranks were part of our daily routine

I am from the country mile to the city limits

from blaring Bruce Springsteen out of the old stereo in the Blazer

Pushin’ the speed limit on dirt roads without a care in the world

I am from the North and the South

I’m from the smell of horses and fresh cut grass

I’m from the quick whiff of cookies baking

I am from Florida, Ohio, Virginia,

          Each with friendships broken and repaired

I am from Puerto Rican neat freaks

I am from the Naval base in Japan

          Two baby boys brought home

          To the giddy faces of their new family

          Fighting over who gets to hold them first

I am from New Orleans

          Where the gumbo smells like vegetable soup

I am from the salty smell of the Gulf

I am from Portugal

          With soccer fanatics and day long beach trips

I am from gauchos and riding bulls

I am from a small town with big ideas

From long, loving hugs

          To sweet, short ones

I am from the grunge sound

          Of Nirvana and 4 Non Blondes

I am from Kurt Cobain concerts

          And from Onyx blaring through the Walkman

I am from Def Leppard

Days of listening to 45’s

using my hairbrush as a microphone

Old school music and fancy car shows

          Never dull or boring, a bunch of Chatty Cathys

Family of blue and green eyes

I am from weekends spent in tomato fields

          Hoping that a sweet pecan pie was hot on the stove when I got home

I am from jars of lightning bugs we’d collect at sunset

From the political disagreements in the dining room

          washed down with sweet tea

I am from big meals and bigger hearts

I am from the sound of music and joined hands

From sitting in lonely hospitals

From calls to get a cat out of a tree

          To taking a tree off of a house

I am from the feet running off the starting line

          To oars gliding against the calm, cool water

To Friday night soccer

          To Saturday morning cheers

Wrestling instead of pageants

I’m from the smell of nicotine from lit cigarettes

to Mom and Dad smoking with the windows up

I’m from the 60’s and 70’s peace movement

And pinning dead bugs on cardboard

I am from old school hip hop and sick beats

And watching Netflix in my bed

I’m from soccer every weekend

From hustling to first base

          And playing infield

Feeling muscles getting stronger with every throw

I am from summer vacations in the OBX

From barefoot summer nights on the beach

I’m from cold ocean breezes and city smog

Warm, cozy and away from the freezing winter

Jumping on the trampoline in the cool rain

Blue water and chlorine

I am from standing on the pier

From the scent of freshly baked bread out of the oven

And dunking Oreos,

          But making sure the milk doesn’t drip

On

the

couch

I am from the smell of Lysol and bleach

I am from Sunday morning church

From fussy pajamas on Christmas Eve

From working hard and playing harder

Hand-me-downs were a necessity for some

From the smell of pasta made on Italian streets

From hot tea with too much sugar

I am from beautiful outcomes and tragic mistakes

I am from a caring grandmother

I am from the highs and lows of life

Motivated by my mother’s and father’s words

The dream is still alive

From parental love that will never fade

Sister to Jesus’s disciple, Buddha’s enlightened, and the lack thereof

And making my mark upon the world

          And touching the hearts of people

I’m from never forgetting

that family is everything

          and always sticking together

For they are

          My key

Where Tanner's From

If this post's title sounds familiar, it's probably because you remember an entry from a while back, Where Malik's From.   See the original writing assignment here.

I'm just stopping by to remind all of us that writers bloom throughout the year.   I get a whole lot of flowers in September, but I also get some children who are seeds, bulbs and tubers...and planted at different times.   That's pretty normal in 8th grade.

There's a whole lot of research about boys and language arts instruction, so go ahead and read it.   Don't discount what you know to be true from firsthand experiences either.   There's not one magic key that unlocks a joy of writing for boys.   The young men who are most successful in becoming writers with my style of teaching have these commonalities:

They listen to mini-lessons on writing skills.

They practice these skills in small bits of writing.

They then work these skills into larger pieces of writing.

They welcome feedback.

They recognize that writing is a craft.

They get downright metacognitive about their use of language.

They believe that the world around them is to be examined.

They know that a final draft means edits and revisions, not simply neatness.

Before you think that I am a "my way or the highway" kind of writing teacher, I'd like to say that I don't think that I am.   I can't be certain, but I am pretty sure that if I were reviewing student writing with Stephen King, Anne Lamott and Natalie Goldberg-- we'd at least recognize and agree upon bad writing when we saw it.   And...yeah...it's totally okay to see some bad writing from 8th graders.   I mean, they're 8th graders.   Sheesh.

I center September around some of Laura Robb's mini lessons for writers and Nancie Atwell's lesson on narrative leads.   If I can get kids using specific nouns, strong verbs, a variety of sentence starters, PARAGRAPHS, effective narrative leads and a unified topic...I feel pretty ding dang good about that.

(Pardon my shouting.   I'm still teaching perfectly kind children how to paragraph narratives.   It's December.   It hurts.   My eyes are bleeding from the dreaded BIG, FAT PARAGRAPH.   I might write a song about it.   Never mind.)

Back to Tanner.   He came into class on day one with a strong work ethic, unmatched tenacity, a kind spirit and some sharp writing skills.   Even so, his mom is pretty impressed with his current interest in getting all of his words in the right spots.   I sure do wish I could just let you see all of his various writing work from this year because he's a perfect example of a talented, developing writer who fits all of the qualities I listed above.   

Check this out.   Remember the two-sentence journal assignment I borrowed from a class I took at William and Mary?  Here's one of Tanner's entries, "It's the time of year when the smell of corn chaff and diesel fuel fill the air.  Visibility soon becomes low as the farmer takes the combine for another round."   You better believe I asked his permission to write that gem down for other grasshoppers to see.   It was feng shui perfection on the white board.

Here's where Tanner's from:

I’m from sunglasses in the rearview,

From tie straps and duct tape,

I am from eggs in the nesting box,

(Dry and Warm with a surprise inside)

I’m from orchard grass,

The yellow poplar,

Whose leaves fall every year just for me to collect.

I’m from fishbites and pellet guns,

From Pride and Horton,

I’m from the bluecollars and the hardheads,

From “How ya whole family doin’?”

I’m from “American born and Southern by the grace of God.”

I’m from Genesis and Communion,

3 inch slugs and ram rods,

From the man who died for our sins,

And the 10 commandments.

From the gray uniform stained with blood,

Whose owner long gone from Earth,

Waits patiently in the Promised Land for the ones who honor him most.

Thinking Inside and Outside the Box

You made it to Friday!    How about an 8 minute film that will make you feel even better?   You know the parts of you that wake up when you even think about going to Disney World?   This short will speak to the stirring child in you.   

It's a film without words, so my teacher friends all over the world should be able to enjoy it with their students as well.   Perhaps you are old enough to remember how exciting it was when a neighbor put an empty, gargantuan cardboard box on the curb.   The possibilities were endless, and usually included awkward attempts at breakdancing, if you are my age.

You may watch the film by clicking on the link below.

The Adventures of A Cardboard Box

I use the film as a preface to a writing prompt.

Think back to your elementary school days.   

Did your imagination comfort you?   Entertain you?    Frighten you?   

Write about a time that your imagination left you content, happy or scared.

Use action, dialogue, reaction or sensory imagery in your narrative lead.

I'm gonna assess the stuffin' outta you, bub!

Can I talk with you about something we used to call effective teaching?   Now it's called Response to Intervention, or RtI.

RtI isn't as scary as it seems.   Its basic premise is differentiating instruction for students without pushing them past their (learning) frustration points.   For example, an eleventh grade student reading on a fourth grade level who is handed an American literature textbook and expected to conquer it without any teacher support...just worksheet after worksheet...well, that's bad teaching.

RtI is about getting instruction geared towards different ability levels within the structure of the usual school day.   The first focus is on tier one...meaning...let's get all teachers to instruct in a way that maximizes learning.   Fair enough.   And a little common sense goes a long way with me.

Kids who still need additional help would be considered to be in tiers two or three.   Your lowest readers may even need one on one instruction with the reading specialist, if you are lucky enough to have one in your school.   RtI is an "all hands on deck" approach to instruction, but your options can be limited if you are light on faculty and resources, as many schools are in our current economy.

RtI is a way of thinking.   Your school decides how to implement it.   I'm over-simplifying the program concepts, but if you are teaching with the intent of having your students learn, you are probably all about intervening when a child needs more support and instruction.   And nobody had to force you to do it.

Here's the bumpy part.   RtI can quickly turn into an avalanche of data.   And the true blue RtI folks would be the first to tell you that data for data's sake, data that is not reviewed or used, is useless since it serves no purpose.   Many of the assessment tools were piloted in the elementary school, but they don't quite translate into meaningful information for the adolescent reader.

Let me pause and remind you that these are my opinions.   I encourage you to seek out research-based articles to make your own judgments.

Many of the assessments that seem to draft the barreling 18 wheeler that is RtI raise red flags more than anything else.   This could be more meaningful in lower grades were there's not a long history of prior assessments.   By 8th grade, we know who is at-risk from day one because we inherit 8 years of test scores and other information that indicate a child who lacks fluency in reading and math.   Using red flag predictors with adolescent readers seems to be putting the cart on top of the horse.   Yes, the cart on top of the horse.   Ouch.

That is all I have to say about that at this point, but I will tell you that if your school runs the Maze assessment, there's a free online Maze generator that you can use to  give your kids some practice before the real test date.   You can paste any passage into the space provided and come up with a text that can be used to remind the kids how short three minutes can be when one is reading and circling.

Assessing a child's learning is important.   But what do we do with that data?   Does it inspire us to change our instructional methods?   Does our school district identify areas in which we need additional teacher training?   Does our district invite presenters to train us in a manner that is in line with best-practices that work with children and adults?   Can teachers even interpret the data and apply it to their instructional approaches in a meaningful way?   Do all teachers have access to the data?   Is the data compiled in a user-friendly document or program?   How will you explain children's scores to them and their parents in clear terms that lack educationalese?

If we do not use the data, we are disrespecting the instructional time of our students.   Assessments are crucial to what we do, but how much testing is too much?   Think about the days in a school year and how much time is given over to assessments.   Are you assessing more than you are teaching?   Is each assessment valuable and valid?   Are they biased in any way?   Can they be scored objectively?  If you are able to preview potential tests for purchase, please don't waste any time kicking a flawed assessment to the curb before your district swipes its credit card.

Lastly, does your opinion matter?   Sometimes decisions are made outside of your learning community that are non-negotiable.   If that's the case, you have to do what you have to do to make the experience a positive one for kids.   Explain how the test is administered and what the results mean.   Tell them how you are going to use the results to benefit them.   Give them time to practice with the format of the test.   Make them comfortable with the process.

And if you teach in a way that causes children to learn, stick with it.   Protect your instructional time as best you can.   Perhaps this is the year that some of your struggling readers are ready to make some big strides.   Hopefully, the next time your school conducts a mass screening, they will see the progress that they are making thanks to your diligence.

When Laura Robb, Nancie Atwell and Kelly Gallagher prescribe an RtI plan, I will hop right on board and complete any assessments they see as vital.   Until then, I will need to weigh all of the options before moving forward.   Children first, right?

Where Malik's From

Not so long ago I told you about a poetry exercise called Where I'm From.   I found it in Nancie Atwell's book Naming the World: A Year of Poems and Lessons.   I have to tell you that it is my favorite writing activity that I have ever done with my students...ever.  

Why?   The students dug deep.   They thought about themselves.   They talked to their families.   They revised.   They edited.   Many even allowed me to make copies of their poems to put in a binder to share with classmates and teachers.   Some were asked to publish their work in the school literary magazine.   I wanted to publish one here for you to enjoy as well.

A big part of what I like about Atwell's book is the fact that she has published student samples alongside the bona-fide, gen-u-ine poem that inspired the lesson.   The poem I chose to share with you, with his mother's permission, is written by a young man who has a natural ear for language.  At the same time, he would agree with Thomas Mann's statement, "A writer is someone for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people."  

Malik is about the craft.   His poem was a process.   Believe it.   I was there.   His first draft was flat but intriguing.   I know when he's "in the zone."   But I hadn't seen it yet with this activity.   It took having the poem knocking around in his brain for a day for the pieces to start falling into the right places.   He opened with a general line about slavery and moved quickly to the next subject.   I had a feeling that there was more there, but he wasn't able to come up with it until he had a chance to talk with family.   He did.   The poem really opened up after that.   See what you think.

“where i’m from”

i’m from slaves working in the hot fields of gloucester
to whites only and piles of found jewelry.
i’m from farming crops and hard work to
“when will we be free from this misery?”
i’m from families being torn apart
to  wondering if relatives will be found,
dead or alive.

i’m from newport news to a family of 5
i’m from "that’s dope" and billy jean,
to the greatest love of all.
i’m from the the jeffersons and moving to the eastside,
to finally getting a piece of the pie.
i’m from the sweet taste of butterfingers
to playing with barbies and kens.
i’m from the witches and mysteries
to playing softball in the warm dusty summer of ’90.
i’m from stacks of poems and books,
to barking dogs and purple soda.
i’m from a ripping eye and pain,
to doctors working to fix it.

i’m from a lost boy living in hawaii
to a military woman with no children.
i’m from that boy found and loved
to that woman who’s now a mom.
i’m from a calm, peaceful place
to the concrete jungle of new york.
i’m from winters spent in maine
to the sunny city of los angeles.
i’m from the flow and rhyme of a
lonely soul,
to slick rick reading
a
fairy tale.

Where I'm From

I've yet to even scratch the surface of the beauty that is Nancie Atwell's Naming the World: A Year of Poems and Lessons.   Today I continued an exercise from the "Your Life" section of the book.  

Ms. Atwell provides a copy of poet George Ella Lyon's poem, "Where I'm From," as well as two poems written by inspired middle schoolers.   We read all three poems last Friday, and I sent students home with the intergenerational questionnaire.   Because of the nature of eighth graders and weekends, many people did not have the interviews done by Monday, so it took until Tuesday until we could really get down to the business of writing.   And, no, everyone had not completed their interviews by Tuesday either.

Today I shared the poem that I wrote based on Lyon's original.   You already know that it's good to make yourself vulnerable to your students by sharing your own writing.   They generally respond with kindness and respect; it also gets them into their poets' groove.  
Please understand that the intent of the lesson is to borrow Lyon's riff, to mimic her style and to mirror her repetition.   This is not a lesson in how to plagiarize.   Make sure you click the above link to Lyon's poem, so you can see her patterns in my draft below.  

I am from Sundays after church,

from sweet tea and Formica tables

enchanted by my grandmother’s blessings.

I am from the vinyl records inside the garage.

(Silent, waiting,

they held secret spells.)

I am from the tulip tree,

the summer garden

whose crusty, baked soil  between rows of corn

crumbles gently under bare feet. 

I’m from Number, please  and  Promenade.  

I’m from dusty circuses and shimmering skylines

from tobacco leaves in barn rafters

from flowing rivers near textile mills.

I’m from both Carolinas

     from limestone and sisterhoods. 

I’m from dipped snuff and tinned sardines,

jets of sawdust that tickle noses.

I’m from wires pulsing with electricity

   stretching across the South. 

From the body bag of the local boy

     my father escorted home from Vietnam.

I’m from a hand to hold and shirts off backs,

from promises kept

rooted in both love and duty.

Some students will need your help to mine for information.   I grew up minutes away from all four of my grandparents and was a curious child.   It was easy for me to tap into all of those years of informal "research" that I completed before writing this poem.  

I drew a simple family tree on the board, and many writers used that as a way to brainstorm.   Although their homework was to interview one person using the questionnaire, their poem should include anyone from their family line.   Steps, adoption, blood...it doesn't matter.   Your students can decide who is or is not family to them.

Please be aware that some of your students have only painfully dark memories of their families.   Some will be ready to write, some won't.   Encourage children who make an attempt to tackle such a raw topic.   Give an alternative assignment for those students who just can't face or make sense of their family relationships yet. 

Talk is the Exercise Ground

If you recognize the title of this post, you know it's not mine.   It's one of the chapter titles for Natalie Goldberg's how-to classic Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within.   (http://amzn.com/1590307941)   Now, I have to admit that I don't recall doing a whole lot of talking after the class was given a writing topic when I was a student.  

What I have noticed as a teacher is that often student talk bubbles up when I assign a new prompt.   In the first few minutes, it's usually a direct discussion regarding the new activity.   If you let it go on too far past that point, it derails into unrelated subjects.   I've been wondering how to capitalize on teens' innate desire to talk, talk, talk and be heard.

Goldberg's chapter focuses on the talk that occurs spontaneously in life.   The stories we swap over and over.   I haven't thought of the best way to get this type of conversation going in the classroom with 8th graders.   At their young ages, I know that they have some stories to tell, but they probably haven't been in those social situations where the spotlight turns to them and they polish the same gem of a story time and again with each retelling.   I think that I am going to link this approach with a technique from another great how-to book that focuses specifically on teens.

Nancie Atwell has a simple, effective prewriting activity in her book Lessons That Change Writers.   (http://amzn.com/0867095067)   Orient your paper/ notebook to landscape, draw a big heart, write down everything and everyone you love.   These become part of your writing territories.  

I modified it slightly to get a variety of topics.   Students label 3 larger portions of the heart with People, Places and Things.   In the bottom of the heart we leave a small spot for Ideas.   And, yes, you may list your sweet little doggie in the "People" column if you want to, Tina.  This is something I do at the beginning of the year, so students have somewhere to go for free writes if they are experiencing writer's block.

 Although this is a prewriting activity, I think if I added another step, I might be able to help students zero in on the juiciest parts of their heart map.   What if I gave them time to think-pair-share one of their topics before they start writing?   If they are unable to mine for anything interesting to say, perhaps they would switch topics before they continue prewriting.   On the other hand, if they light up the room with their passion for the subject and enchant their audience with an engaging narrative...   Well, if they are writers, they will know that they are on the right track.

Thanks to the lovely Susan Pongratz and charming Kaplan family for restoring Nancie Atwell books to my classroom.