Monday Poetry Stretch - Limericks

I'm feeling the need for a bit of humor this week, so let's exercise our poetry muscles by writing some limericks. Limericks are five line poems that were made popular in English by Edward Lear.

Limericks not only have rhyme, but rhythm. The last words of the first, second, and fifth lines all rhyme, and the last words of the third and fourth lines rhyme. This means the rhyme scheme is AABBA. The rhythm of a limerick comes from a distinct pattern. Lines 1, 2, and 5 generally have seven to ten syllables, while lines 3 and 4 have only five to seven syllables. Here is an example from Edward Lear.

There was an Old Man with a beard,
Who said, 'It is just as I feared!
   Two Owls and a Hen,
   Four Larks and a Wren,
Have all built their nests in my beard!'

I usually get my fill of limericks each weekend while listening to Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me. Give a listen and see if you can complete the limericks. Then continue your warm-up and learn how to write a limerick, read a limerick lesson plan, or write an instant limerick.

Here are two limericks I wrote for my middle school science students.

A crocodile lived in the Nile
Near the bank he swam for a while
   A girl leaned o'er the water
   He jumped up and caught her
And ate with a cold-blooded smile.

Sad Sue swallowed bite after bite
But her weight was incredibly light
   She ate all her dinner
   Yet got thinner and thinner
But fat was that darn parasite!

So, will you join us this week? What kind of limericks will you write? Post your effort(s) on your blog and then leave a link in the comments. Once we have some poems, I'll link them all here.

I'm Back, I'm Tired, I'm Happy

I had a fabulous, wonderful, amazing time in Chicago and have now returned to a mountain of work. I promise I'll write all about my experience meeting so many terrific authors, bloggers, teachers, librarians, podcasters and oh so many more wonderful folks very soon. Until then, take a look at the picture of most of our group. You can mouse over the faces and see who came and where they make their home on the web.

Kidlit Conference Family Photo

Until I get back, you can read what these folks had to say about our 1st Annual conference. Will I be able to add anything new? I hope so.

• Book Buds
• Booktopia
  
• A Chair, A Fireplace & A Tea Cozy
  
• A Fuse #8 Production
• Got Art
  
• Grow Wings
  
• Jen Robinson's Book Page
• Jimbo Jabber
  
• Just One More Book
• MotherReader
  
• Pixiepalace
• Read*Write*Believe
  
• Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast
• Shaken & Stirred
  
• What Adrienne Thinks About That
• A Year of Reading
  

Sorry you missed out? Don't be. You can join us next year in . . . click here to find out!

Fly Me to the Moon (Or at Least Chicago)

Fly me to the moon
And let me play among the stars

Oh how I love Frank Sinatra, but given that I graduated from high school in 1983, I suppose REO Speedwagon would work too.

Time for me to fly
Oh, I've got to set myself free
Time for me to fly
And that's just how it's got to be
I know it hurts to say goodbye
But it's time for me to fly

How about Steve Miller?

I want to fly like an eagle
To the sea
Fly like an eagle
Let my spirit carry me
I want to fly like an eagle
Till I'm free
Fly through the revolution

But I suppose Peter, Paul & Mary said it best.

Now the time has come to leave you
One more time let me kiss you
Then close your eyes, Ill be on my way.
Dream about the days to come
When I won't have to leave alone
About the times, I wont have to say,

So kiss me and smile for me
Tell me that you'll wait for me
Hold me like you'll never let me go.
I'm leavin' on a jet plane
I don't know when Ill be back again
Oh, babe, I hate to go.

Actually, I can't wait to go, and I do know when I'll be back. My current conference ends at noon today. When it's over I'll promptly get in the car and drive just over two hours back to Richmond. I'll repack my bags and head directly to the airport for my flight to Chicago. I'm bringing a digital camera, a few goodies for gifts, and my writer's notebook. I can't wait to talk about books and blogging with some amazing people. What I am not bringing is my laptop.

Have a great weekend and I'll see you here on Monday. Come back then and I'll tell you all about the 1st Annual Kidlitosphere Conference.

Poetry Friday - The West Wind

Fall is much on my mind these days, so I want to share a poem that has always made me feel autumn in my bones.

Ode to the West Wind
by Percy Bysshe Shelley

I

O Wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being
Thou from whose unseen presence the leaves dead
Are driven like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,

Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,
Pestilence-stricken multitudes! O thou
Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed

The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each like a corpse within its grave, until
Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow

Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth, and fill
(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)
With living hues and odours plain and hill;

Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;
Destroyer and preserver; hear, O hear!

Read the rest of the poem.

The round up this week is at Whimsy Books. Be sure to stop by and check out the results of this week's poetry stretch before heading out to read all the good stuff Emily's collected for us. Happy poetry Friday, all!

October Edition of Learning in the Great Outdoors

The October edition of Learning in the Great Outdoors is now up over at Pines Above the Snow. You know you want to stop by and take a gander. Shoo. Go. Now!

Poetry Stretch Results - Fibs

Ah, the Fib. This wonderful form has inspired lots of folks to experiment this week. In many cases these fibs are accompanied by photos. Here's what we have.

Terrell at Alone on a Limb gives us several Fibs, some with pictures.

sister AE at Having Writ gives us her first Fibs.

Tiel Aisha Ansari at Knocking From Inside shares a Fib entitled Drip.

Over at a wrung sponge, cloudscome shares a Fib and a photo.

Cath at little cool shallows shares a trashy photo and a Fib.

You can read some of my fibs at the original stretch post (see rules below), in this entry on kites and poetry, this entry on drafting a fib, and this one with a reverse fib on rainbows.

Still want to play? Read the rules here. Then leave me a comment about your Fibs and I'll include a link to your poems on the list.

Calling All Book Lovers

Today is October 2nd, and you know what that means, right? Nominations for the 2007 Cybils opened yesterday. Get yourselves over to the Cybils blog and nominate your favorites in these categories:

• Fantasy/Science Fiction
• Fiction Picture Books
• Graphic Novels
• Middle Grade Fiction
• Non-Fiction: Middle Grades and Young Adult
• Non-Fiction Picture Books
• Poetry
• Young Adult Fiction

Here are the rules for participation.

• The books must be 2007 publications.
  
• You my only nominate one book in each category.
• Nominations must be in by November 21st.
  

To get started, click on a category and read the description. Our fabulous panel chairs have given you some guidance as to what kinds of books fit their categories. Next, read through the comments left by others. Please make sure your book isn't already listed. Click on "comments" and type in the author and title. That's it! It's simple! Remember that multiple listings for a title mean nothing in the nominating process. This is all about providing the panels with a wide range of great books to choose from. Once we whittle down the nominations to five finalists, then the judges will duke it out to select a winner.

C'mon, won't you join us? It's going to be great fun. Help us out by nominating the best books of 2007.

Monday Poetry Stretch - The Fib

In a few short days I head to Chicago for the 1st Annual Kidlitosphere Conference. I'm so excited about finally getting to meet many of the people I've been reading and who have visited my space on the web. One of the folks on the guest list is someone I am hoping to have some time to talk poetry with, and since he introduced us all to the Fib as a poetic form, I am choosing it for this week's stretch.

Greg K. from GottaBook posted his first Fib entry on April 1st, 2006. Was it an April Fool's joke? I think not. Here is an excerpt that describes the form of a Fib.

I wanted something that required more precision. That led me to a six line, 20 syllable poem with a syllable count by line of 1/1/2/3/5/8 – the classic Fibonacci sequence. In short, start with 0 and 1, add them together to get your next number, then keep adding the last two numbers together for your next one.

In the post More Fibbery, Greg talks about some of the rules he follows when writing. Here are a few of them.

Since I started Fibbing to focus on word choice, the one rule I've held myself to is "no articles in the one syllable lines." I also try not to use conjunctions, though part of that is that when I use them, I start singing School House Rock and annoy the neighbors.

You can read lots more about Fibs at GottaBook. So, just a reminder, here is the sequence for your Fib. Each of these numbers represents the syllable count for that line.

1
1
2
3
5
8

You can keep going if you like, just remember to add the previous number to the current line to get the next number of syllables.

Here are a few Fibs of my own creation.

Two
small
oval
treasures hold
the promise of song,
magic of flight, in hollow bones.

three
toes
clinging
upside-down
to jungle branches
moving slowly, sleeping, sleeping

So, do you want to play? What kind of Fibs will you write? Post your creation on your blog and then leave a link in the comments. Once we have some poems, I'll link them all here.

Poetry Friday - How Are We Connected?

I had the distinct pleasure of hearing John Green, author of Looking for Alaska and An Abundance of Katherines, last night at the University of Richmond. The title of his talk was "How Are We Connected?" John was much more eloquent than I will be in summarizing his thoughts, but I wanted to share his ideas, today particularly, since he used poetry to help make his points.

John began by quoting a brief passage from Walt Whitman's A Song of Myself.

I bequeathe myself to the dirt, to grow from the grass I love;
If you want me again, look for me under your boot-soles.

You will hardly know who I am, or what I mean;
But I shall be good health to you nevertheless,
And filter and fibre your blood.

He suggested that good books acknowledge the reality of human feelings, and that books can help us to connect in four ways. They are:

1. Self to Other - by giving us access to voices that cannot easily be heard
2. Self to Collective - by helping us see that we are part of the human experience
3. Readers to Writers - by allowing us to engage in quiet conversation with an author through the act of reading
4. Living to Dead - because text can help us endure and prevail

In talking about the second point, John told us about spending a summer in Alaska and how incredibly isolating it was. For a long time he believed no one understood how he felt, at least not until he read this poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay.

Night Falls Fast
Night falls fast.
Today is in the past.

Blown from the dark hill hither to my door
Three flakes, then four
Arrive, then many more.

In talking about the last point, John quoted William Faulkner's Nobel Prize Speech, saying that reading this each day is what kept him going while writing Alaska.

I decline to accept the end of man. It is easy enough to say that man is immortal because he will endure: that when the last ding-dong of doom has clanged and faded from the last worthless rock hanging tideless in the last red and dying evening, that even then there will still be one more sound: that of his puny inexhaustible voice, still talking. I refuse to accept this. I believe that man will not merely endure: he will prevail. He is immortal, not because he alone among creatures has an inexhaustible voice, but because he has a soul, a spirit capable of compassion and sacrifice and endurance. The poet's, the writer's, duty is to write about these things. It is his privilege to help man endure by lifting his heart, by reminding him of the courage and honor and hope and pride and compassion and pity and sacrifice which have been the glory of his past. The poet's voice need not merely be the record of man, it can be one of the props, the pillars to help him endure and prevail.

It was an inspired talk. John talked about wanting to write honest fiction. What I came away with was the same notion I had while reading both of his books. John Green not only writes honest fiction, but smart fiction. His knowledge of books and authors also reminded me how important it is for writers to be readers.
Poetry Friday is being hosted today by AmoXcalli. Please stop by and check out all the great entries, but before you go, do be sure to read the results of this week's poetry stretch. Happy Poetry Friday, all!

Another Cybils Confession

Everywhere you look these days you'll find some list of Cybils panelists and judges on another kidlit blog. I guess it's about time I confessed to my total inability to say NO and admit to being honored to serve this year on a panel with an amazing group of folks. Go ahead, just try and guess which category.
This fall you'll find me working hard on the nominating panel for nonfiction picture books (surprise!) along with these lovely bloggers:

• Andrea (Just One More Book!!)
• Emily (Whimsy Books)
• Fiona (Books and 'Rocks)
• Jennifer (Kiddosphere)

Our fearless leader is Eisha of Seven-Imp fame. You can read about her here and here.

Nominations open on October 1st. I hope you're ready to contribute some great titles for us to wade through. I'm secretly hoping that our group selects such a fabulous group of finalists that the judging panel experiences a few sleepless nights and teeny, tiny bit of agita in selecting the winner. (Oops! Did I really say that out loud?!) The judging panel consists of the these awesome bloggers:

• Chris Barton (Bartography)
• Jackie Merchant (Tiny Treasury)
• Adrienne Mason (Tough City Writer)
• Becky Bilby (In the Pages)
• Adrienne Furness (What Adrienne Thinks About That)

See how great they are? I have every confidence that they'll do a fantastic job.

For more info, visit the Cybils web site or blog. If you want to get involved in the discussion, join the Cybils forum and share your ideas.

T-Shirts for Readers

On the blog Deaf Characters in Adolescent Literature (thanks to Besty over at A Fuse #8 Production for the link), there is a great interview with author Sarah Miller in which she is pictured in a t-shirt with a strikingly familiar pigeon. I just had to find that shirt! After a bit of searching I found a great site with T-shirts for those of us who love to read. Check out Wonder-Shirts and get yourself a beauty with illustrations by Mo Willems (Driven to Read), Betsy Lewin (Click, Clack, Read), Kevin Henkes and more. I must admit that the teacher in me is crazy about the Miss Viola Swamp shirt.

Poetry Stretch Results - Bouts-Rimés

People seem to be getting good with this form. I find these poems difficult to write, feeling constrained by the words I must use and the order in which they must appear. For this bouts-rimés, writers were given these words:

hour, tower, thought, fought, hand, grand, teem, dream

Here is what they did with them.

A warm welcome to sister AE at Having Writ who gives us The Plan.

Tiel Aisha Ansari at Knocking From Inside shares XVI -The Tower.

Terrell at Alone on a Limb gives us Alone.

Cloudscome over at a wrung sponge presents the lovely Quaker Meeting Poem.

Here's my own offering.

I stand at the window awaiting the hour
Eyes cast down from the guarded tower
Through bars I peer while lost in thought
Fear and tears cannot be fought
Jingling keys I hear in hand
Prepared for the march to the gallows grand
Faces and memories in my head teem
A shout! Awake! It's just a dream.

Still want to play? Read the rules here. Then leave me a comment about your poem and I'll include it on the list.

When Science Mattered

I must share one more article. When working on my Masters and later PhD, I spent a great deal of time studying the history of science education since the launch of Sputnik. In today's New York Times there is an article entitled When Science Suddenly Mattered, in Space and Class.

While the launch of Sputnik spurred unprecedented reform in science education, these efforts had fallen off by the early 80s. In 1983, a bipartisan committee produced a federal report called A Nation At Risk, in which they cited the steady decline of science achievement. More than 20 years later, this situation has not changed. Fewer and fewer students these days want to pursue careers in math, science and engineering, with the number of minority students a startlingly small portion of those who do.

This article highlights a bit of the history of science education and attempts to address some of the problems plaguing us today. Here's one problem that is cited.

Dr. Malcolm said some of the blame must go to the way classes are taught, with too much emphasis on memorizing terminology and not enough on concepts. Most students receive teaching-to-the-test instruction, she and other experts say, in which science laboratories are organized like cookbooks, with ingredients, equipment and instructions — and results — known in advance.

It's a great article with much food for thought. Do head on over and check it out.

Academics or Culture? How Best to Raise Achievement

We devote a great deal of time in our pre-service preparation program to helping our future teachers grapple with issues related to teaching diverse groups of students. In a course called Diverse Learners and Environments, we introduce the wide range of diversity that exists across today's general school population and examine the increased professional demands that this diversity makes upon teachers. We explore a range of diversity issues including economic, social, racial, ethnic, religious, geographic, and physical and cognitive abilities and backgrounds of children.

Through field experiences, upper division course work and finally student teaching, we attempt to get students into schools where they will experience the full range of this diversity. We also share current research and approaches to working with different student populations.

Given our emphasis on developing teachers who are sensitive to the needs of all children, I was particularly interested in this recent article from Education Week on strategies for Native American students. Entitled Varied Strategies Sought for Native American Students, the article examines approaches taken in states where Native American students make up a large portion of the minority student population. The two contrasting approaches highlighted are worth considering and discussing. Here is an excerpt:

Subscribing to the philosophy that Indian students are best served by a focus on core academics was Ben Chavis, a former principal of the American Indian Public Charter School in Oakland, Calif., who gave a keynote address on the first day of the conference.

Mr. Chavis told how over five years at the school he helped change the academic performance of students by paring down the curriculum to focus on language arts and mathematics. The school went from having one of the worst academic records in Oakland to having one of the best, he said. It also grew far more diverse, from having 27 students, most of whom were Native American, to 230 students, 12 percent of whom are Native American.

Mr. Chavis said that when he started as the principal in 2000, students were spending an hour each morning in a practice derived from Native American culture called a “talking circle,” in which they were “sitting around in the circle passing the feather.”

Though he grew up attending segregated schools for Native Americans in North Carolina, he saw that practice as a waste of time and eliminated it. He also moved cultural electives such as music to after-school programs, so the school day could be spent on core academics.

But in a breakout session that followed Mr. Chavis’ address, Sandra J. Fox, a member of the Oglala Lakota Nation, and a consultant on Indian education, said she encourages schools to take a very different tack—in one school, she quipped, “we instituted a talking circle.”

In general, Ms. Fox stressed the importance of incorporating Native American culture and history into lessons and teaching in ways that are compatible with that culture. She said, for example, that many Indian parents teach their children by doing or showing, rather than telling, and that such a method works well also in school with such children.

“Indian children watch and watch and watch, and don’t want to try it until they think they can do it,” she said.

Ms. Fox also recommended that teachers use “instructional conversation,” in which they sit in a circle with students, informally introduce a subject they are about to teach, and ask for student input. She said that Native American children also respond well to hearing lessons in a storytelling form.

I must admit that even though the first method described has raised scores, it is the same approach we are seeing in our urban schools here and one that concerns me greatly. Yes, core academics are important, but if we choose to diminish the importance of science, social studies, the arts and other experiential parts of the curriculum, we run the risk of creating children who narrowly focused, unable to see connections among disciplines and how we use these skills and ideas in the real world, and poised to see little value in their schooling. We must do more than teach/prepare students to pass a test.

That said, I'm all for Ms. Fox's method of reaching students, and think it holds promise for students who may come from different cultural backgrounds. We must learn to value who students are and what they bring to the classroom if we expect them to value what we do and can offer them in return.

Okay, I'm off my soapbox now. Fire away.

Monday Poetry Stretch - Bouts-Rimés (Again)

Now that more people are engaging in these poetry stretches with me each week, I decided it would be fun to revisit a form. Here is a description of the form bouts-rimés.

A bouts-rimés poem is created by one person's making up a list of rhymed words and giving it to another person, who in turn writes the lines that end with those rhymes, in the same order they were given.
(Adapted from The Teachers & Writers Handbook of Poetic Forms.)

You can read more at Wikipedia and learn a bit about the history of this form.

Here is the word list for today's stretch. Your poem can take any form, but your rhymed words must appear in the order given.

hour, tower, thought, fought, hand, grand, teem, dream

So, do you want to play? What kind of bouts-rimés will you write? Post your creation on your blog and then leave a link in the comments. Once we have some poems, I'll link them all here.

Weekend Wordsmith - Poetry

Bonnie Jacobs hosts a blog called Weekend Wordsmith. Each Friday she posts a word, hoping to appeal to the inner wordsmith of her readers. If inspired, folks write about it on their blogs. Last week's word was poetry. How could I not respond? Here is the intro from that post.

POETRY ~ Do you have a favorite poem? Should poetry rhyme? Are you a poet? Do you remember a poem you had to memorize in school? Maybe you'd like to compose one this week?

The first poem I ever memorized was Trees, by Joyce Kilmer. It is below.

I think that I shall never see

A poem lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the sweet earth's flowing breast;

A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.

While most of my classmates (3rd grade) hated this poem, I loved it. Years later, I could still recite it. When I was in high school, our choir director chose an arrangement for the women based on this poem. It was lovely to sing, and again, I was one of the few folks who enjoyed it. However, I can no longer recite the poem. The alto part is stuck in my head, so whenever I hear it, I feel the need to sing that darn part.

I wish more teachers would encourage kids to memorize poetry, or at least think about delivering a poem aloud. I learned so much by thinking about the poem's meaning and attempting to find the right voice to put those feelings into words. I also wish more teachers use poetry as a means to introduce topics of instruction, or use the writing of poetry as a way to assess what has been learned. There is room for poetry everywhere in the curriculum, not just in the language arts portion of day.

I recently purchased a copy of Bobbi Katz's new book, Trailblazers: Poems of Exploration. Inside it reads:

Where do you want to go?
An Internet map will tell you precisely which road to take and which turns to make.

Slowly spin a globe. Notice how vast the oceans are? Wherever you choose to go, an airplane can fly you there in hours. Travel wasn't always so fast or so easy.

Imagine an earlier time . . . . There are no maps. The globe is blank. What lies behind the mountain, beyond the sea--beyond Earth's atmosphere? Who will risk life itself to find out? Who is making new discoveries right now?

The brave men, women, and kids you'll meet in Trailblazers: Poems of Exploration. In more than sixty poems, some serious and some lighthearted, you'll find dreamers, schemers, conquerors, patriots, pirates, pilgrims, scientists, teachers and the incurably adventurous!

If that isn't inspiration enough to include poetry across the curriculum, I don't know what is. As I read through these poems, I'm already thinking about how I can convince my secondary social studies folks to give them a try this semester. It's a terrific collection that should find an honored place in every social studies classroom. (Cybils poetry folks, I hope you're listening!)

I have written before abut poetry across the curriculum, though I'm generally spouting off about science or math. It's a great resource, particularly when nonfiction can be so intimidating. Won't you think about trying some in your classroom? Here are two of my favorite original poems, written for my middle school science kids.

Chiroptera
Nocturnal navigator
aerial magician
drop!
and flip
stall!
and grab
erratic flights of fancy

Not feathered
friend
but
mammal
on the wing

My Shell
Carapace of brown and black,
heavy shield upon my back.
Ribs and backbone fused to it,
all to my body carefully knit.
Protection of the toughest kind,
impossible to leave behind.

Seen and Heard This Week

In addition to my regular work week adventures, I attended a summit on civics education at the Capitol building in Richmond and an advisory board meeting for VA's Agriculture in the Classroom program. During the course of the week I saw and heard many interesting things. Here are a few of them.

Dr. Michael Cornfield spoke at the Civics Summit on New Media, New Citizenship and American Politics. He likened the presidential race this year to The Amazing Race, largely because of the diversity of candidates, and a treadmill dance, because so many underlying factors are keeping candidates in motion. To help you understand this phenomenon, take a look at the video Dr. Cornfield shared.



I ran across this short line in an article I read:

For busy teachers (is that a tautology?) . . .

My response? Absolutely.

William was chosen as last week's Star of the Week. As part of the honor he got to bring books from home for read aloud. His choice for Friday was one of our favorites, A Day in the Life of Murphy. If you haven't heard it discussed and read aloud by Daniel Pinkwater and Scott Simon, you're missing out. We listened to it Thursday night just before bedtime. (This was part of effort to settle down after the 6 chocolate bar dessert!)

At the end of the week, William came home with a book where each classmate had written and illustrated a page about him. While I was shocked by the number of times handsome or cute came up, I was thrilled to read words like nice and kind. I was also happy to read the number of entries that said William "shares great books." AMEN to that.

As we read Big Chickens and Zinnia and Dot again (and again) this week, my mind turned to thoughts of Susan at Chicken Spaghetti. Yesterday when we went to Maymont, William suggested I take a picture for the "chicken lady." So, this one's for you, Susan!
Finally, one of the best sights this week also came during our Saturday morning wanderings at Maymont. We watched the river otters play, the foxes sleep, climbed rocks, explored the gardens and fed the animals. In the end though, we were absolutely entranced by the black bears.
That's it for this week's sights and sounds. I hope your week ahead is a good one.

Writing Meme

Bonnie over at Words From a Wordsmith tagged me for a meme on writing. The idea is for me to describe my strengths as a writer. Okay, ugh! While it is so easy to point out all the areas in which I am deficient, it has been very difficult for me to think about what I do well. This is one of the reasons it has taken me so long to respond. I'm now done stalling and ready to write. I hope I can come up with five.

• I am an avid reader. I do believe that this makes be a better writer. Not only do I read a lot, I read a great variety of genres. I take recommendations and always try to take some lesson away from every book I read. I read for language, for character, for time and place, for example, and most of all, for the sheer pleasure of the work.

• I am determined/persistent/relentless. Even when I don't want to write, I write. I never go anywhere without a writer's notebook. I have a collection of journals in many sizes and have one close at hand. I even write in the middle of the night. I keep my book light, paper and a pen near the bed. When I wake up in the wee hours of the morning and words are keeping me awake, I scribble them down as fast as I can. Sometimes it's an interesting turn of a phrase or an idea for a story or project, but more often than not, it is a poem.
  

• I love words. I love how they sound, how they're spelled, and the magic they make when strung together in interesting and surprising ways. I love word play. Here are two examples of the types of word play I enjoy.
  

  I love the work of Douglas Florian, in large part because of the way he plays with words. Here is an example from mammabilia.
  

  Aardvarks aare odd.
  Aardvarks aare staark.
  Aardvarks look better
  By faar in the daark.
  
  

  This second example is a quote from the series M*A*S*H where Hawkeye is set to take over as OOD.
  
  "I'll carry your books, I'll carry a torch, I'll carry a tune, I'll carry on, carry over, carry forward, Cary Grant, cash and carry, carry me back to Old Virginie, I'll even 'hari-kari' if you show me how, but I will not carry a gun!"
  

• I am a lifelong learner. I know this phrase is tossed around a lot these days, but the truth is, I teach because it keeps me learning. I know that I am not a great writer, but I truly believe that my work will improve with practice, and that I can learn new skills. This is one of the reasons I continue to write. It's also why I started the weekly poetry stretch. I am enjoying learning about these new forms and the challenge of trying to make them work with my words and ideas.

Well, that's only four. Perhaps with some more thought I can come up with a fifth. I'm tagging my writing group buddies, Libby and Terry. If anyone else reading this wants to play along, please do write about your strengths as a writer and then post a link to your response in the comments.

Poetry Friday - Found Poetry and More

I have a collection of notebooks in many sizes that I use as my writer's notebooks. I never go anywhere without one of them. Whenever I'm out and about these days, I look for new journals or notebooks that will inspire me. While visiting my sister last year I bought several single subject notebooks, small in size, and covered with stars. On the name label they read, "All tiny things are pretty," and on the bottom corner of each cover is this poem.

Sweet strawberries, stars,
flowers, four-leafed clovers
and my heart ached for you.

Here is one of my original poems from inside. It is, as yet, untitled.

Blue skies through
time and space
memories
cannot erase
the crashing waves
the roaring sound
heard in the
shell
that I had found.

This third one is for Kelly at Big A little a. In her post on Everyday Etiquette this week she asked how to stop those "talkers" who keep meetings going on, and on, and on. My advice? This little bit of Mao. I think every meeting room should have a poster like this. This particular piece of art was hanging on the wall of conference room at Beijing Normal University.

Just in case you can't read it, it says:

Talks, speeches, articles, and resolutions should all be concise and to the point. Meetings also should not go on too long.

Finally, my last bit of poetry takes the form of a SmilE. When I got home from choir practice last night, I arrived to find my husband at wit's end. I'm sure the fact that he gave our 6 year old 6 chocolate bars for dessert had absolutely nothing to do with his sorry state. When William, who normally goes to bed at 7:30, greeted me at the door at 8:20 with "Guess what Dad did?" and then proceeded to run laps around the kitchen, I had to . . . well, you guessed it, smile. Really, what else could I do? I hope this story brings that same smile to you.

That's it for me today. Poetry Friday this week is being hosted by the incomparable Sara Lewis Holmes at Read Write Believe. Head on over and read all the great posts. But wait! Before you go, check out the results of this week's poetry stretch on blues poems. Happy Poetry Friday, all!

Creating Readers - Part III

The final installment in the three part series on creating readers is now available. In Part III, Donalyn Miller talks about SSR, AR, DEAR and more. Don't miss the end of this terrific series.

In case you missed the first two posts, here are the links.
Part I
Part II