Welcome to my National Poetry Month project for 2017! Students - Each day of April 2017, I will close my eyes, and I will reach into my box of 64 Crayola crayons.
Aerial View of Crayola Box
Photo by Georgia LV
Each day I will choose a crayon (without looking), pulling this crayon out of the box. This daily selected crayon will in some way inspire the poem for the next day. Each day of this month, I will choose a new crayon, thinking and writing about one color every day for a total of 30 poems inspired by colors.
As of April 2, it happened that my poems took a turn to all be from the point of view of a child living in an apartment building. So, you'll notice this thread running through the month of colors. I'd not planned this...it was a writing surprise.
I welcome any classrooms of poets who wish to share class poems (class poems only please) related to each day's color (the one I choose or your own). Please post your class poem or photograph of any class crayon poem goodness to our Writing the Rainbow Padlet HERE. (If you have never posted on a Padlet, it is very easy. Just double click on the red background, and a box will appear. Write in this box, and upload any poemcrayon sharings you wish.)
Here is a list of this month's Writing the Rainbow Poems so far:
And now...today's crayon. Wild Strawberry!
Life is Full of Questions
by Amy LV
Students - Oh my. Another food! If you have been following along this month (or if not, just look above) you will know that many of my crayon pulls have included food names. Yesterday even brought ASPARAGUS.
Since I am not trying to write a collection of poems about a city-dwelling child who eats through a week (as the caterpillar does in Eric Carle's THE HUNGRY CATERPILLAR), I have been seeking ways to include these beautiful nature and food related names to other objects and memories.
One way I have found ideas for this month is to imagine this project's apartment building, child, neighbors, hallways, everything...in black and white. I then scan to see if my crayon-color-of-the-day wishes to pop out anywhere in my mind-picture. For today, yes. I saw fingernails.
When I was in fourth grade, my friend's mom became pregnant. This mom had long pointy nails, and I remember worrying and wondering for months how she would hold and take care of her baby with those nails. How would she not scratch the baby by accident? For today's poem, for some reason, that memory resurfaced.
Today's lines do not rhyme. I realized that I've been rhyming along all month, and it's a good thing for me to work with words that do not rhyme, to listen to sounds and rhythms in other ways. I enjoyed ending today's free verse poem with two questions.
If you are Writing the Rainbow with me, perhaps your color for today will bring back a memory from your life, or perhaps it will remind you of some questions you have wondered about, either recently...or long ago.
Colors can take us anywhere. And if you'd like to join in with your own poem at our Writing the Rainbow Padlet, please do! It is one colorful and beautiful place to visit..
And please don't miss the links to all kinds of Poetry Month goodness up there in my upper left sidebar. Happy twenty-fifth day of National Poetry Month!
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