Wondering if I can create a version of the reflection map that we used at the sharing event but do it with the year three children and others from different age groups next week in school...would need a good amount of floor space...hall perhaps or outside even better!
Headings might also be different...choosing our poet/interviews...meeting Alice...playground rhymes and chalk...shoe box worlds...weather mobiles...working outside...writing poems...getting ready for our celebration...Celebration Day...what have we learnt?...What would you like to do next?
Saturday, 24 April 2010
Friday, 23 April 2010
memory stick!
Iain, I left this at the Sharing Event - please could it be kept in a safe place and I will call in for it next week on my way home! Thank you.
sustaining the work already started
One thing that came up in our final staff meeting with Alice is that we are really short of good poetry anthologies to use with the children in school; Alice was saying that most of the anthologies we do have are quite limited in the range and style of poems that are included. There are so many poems around that we shouldn't limit children to only hearing/reading funny poems or nonsense poems. Poems can cover every human emotion and children can enjoy hearing serious poems or thoughtful poems as much as adults. We do them a dis-service if we only expose them to poems that entertain but never make them think or see the world in a different way.
It would be great if we could use the remaining money in our budget to resource some really good quality anthologies for use across the school. This would help to sustain the work that has already started through this project.
I am also planning to publish an anthology of the children's own poems from the project through a free online company. Families will then be able to order a copy to keep and school will be able to order some as well. It would be a brilliant way to create a permanent and lasting 'legacy' (if that is the right word) from the creative project and a way of celebrating the fantastic work created by the children.
It would be great if we could use the remaining money in our budget to resource some really good quality anthologies for use across the school. This would help to sustain the work that has already started through this project.
I am also planning to publish an anthology of the children's own poems from the project through a free online company. Families will then be able to order a copy to keep and school will be able to order some as well. It would be a brilliant way to create a permanent and lasting 'legacy' (if that is the right word) from the creative project and a way of celebrating the fantastic work created by the children.
Thursday, 22 April 2010
wow words!
One of the impacts of the project is that the children are more confident at trying out language and using more adventurous vocabulary in their writing. They have written some great descriptive work recently and I think that stems from the way they were encouraged to think about words through poetry.
One thing to think about is whether our emphasis throughout the project on breaking the rules means that their more formal writing has suffered; full stops and punctuation still have a really important place in the way they express their ideas across the curriculum.
It is possible that the project has actually helped the children to think about the rules of writing more because you cannot break the rules unless you are clear what they are in the first place. Also the children do recognise that writing has different formats and I think the project has highlighted that in a very practical way for them. It has given a reference point for thinking about how we organise ideas in other types of writing and the children are much more confident at talking about the features of their writing and what needs to be included. It seems that they are able to use the tools of writing (punctuation, connectives, openers) more effectively because they are more confident with the vocabulary that brings it to life.
One thing to think about is whether our emphasis throughout the project on breaking the rules means that their more formal writing has suffered; full stops and punctuation still have a really important place in the way they express their ideas across the curriculum.
It is possible that the project has actually helped the children to think about the rules of writing more because you cannot break the rules unless you are clear what they are in the first place. Also the children do recognise that writing has different formats and I think the project has highlighted that in a very practical way for them. It has given a reference point for thinking about how we organise ideas in other types of writing and the children are much more confident at talking about the features of their writing and what needs to be included. It seems that they are able to use the tools of writing (punctuation, connectives, openers) more effectively because they are more confident with the vocabulary that brings it to life.
Monday, 19 April 2010
Sharing event at PICL
Reflection day coming up on Friday. Will be really interesting to see what other schools have been up to. Need to reflect a bit more between now and then as the Easter hols have put a bit of distance between the project and now. Children in my class are going to write letters to Alice our poet tomorrow so that will be a useful way of helping them to reflect on their learning and whether their view of poetry has changed or developed since the beginning of the project. Think we might record some of our thoughts on video camera to add to the recordings from earlier as well.
Thursday, 15 April 2010
Where to now?
Since the project has come to an end we've been thinking as a school how to sustain the impact cross the year groups. Alice spent her last two days working with Year five and six on mini poetry workshops so that other year groups could begin to think about using poetry beyond the confines of the curriculum.
One thing that came out of the final staff meeting discussion was that we don't want to follow the literacy framework with regard to poetry anymore because it limits how the children think about and create poetry. The traditional shape poem is one example that we have used in school before but it can become very frustrating because children stop thinking about the words they are choosing and become constrained by the shape they are trying to fill.
The project gave children the freedom to play with words and use their imagination in a way that more structured poetry writing cannot always do. We were not asking the children to write in a prescribed style or to have a set number of lines in their poem because we wanted them to be able to break the rules and follow their own ideas and imagination by looking at things around them from a new angle or perspective.
At first they found this difficult because the 'rules' hovered over them and stopped them from just writing down the idea that struck them. So a child would talk about all the wonderful ideas they had been thinking but then say that they didn't know what to write; almost as if the ideas and thinking had no connection to the actual writing process of the poem they were creating.
A beautiful phrase spoken verbally would end up being squeezed into a correctly punctuated sentence and lose all its natural rhythm and impact. Once the children could move beyond that stage they were able to write much more effectively but it did take a while for some to grasp that.
One thing that came out of the final staff meeting discussion was that we don't want to follow the literacy framework with regard to poetry anymore because it limits how the children think about and create poetry. The traditional shape poem is one example that we have used in school before but it can become very frustrating because children stop thinking about the words they are choosing and become constrained by the shape they are trying to fill.
The project gave children the freedom to play with words and use their imagination in a way that more structured poetry writing cannot always do. We were not asking the children to write in a prescribed style or to have a set number of lines in their poem because we wanted them to be able to break the rules and follow their own ideas and imagination by looking at things around them from a new angle or perspective.
At first they found this difficult because the 'rules' hovered over them and stopped them from just writing down the idea that struck them. So a child would talk about all the wonderful ideas they had been thinking but then say that they didn't know what to write; almost as if the ideas and thinking had no connection to the actual writing process of the poem they were creating.
A beautiful phrase spoken verbally would end up being squeezed into a correctly punctuated sentence and lose all its natural rhythm and impact. Once the children could move beyond that stage they were able to write much more effectively but it did take a while for some to grasp that.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)