ELA Final Class: Blogging, Exit Survey, and Found Poems

Happy final day of class!!!  We did it!!  Way to go!  To finish off the year, you have a couple of ends to tie up today.  First of all, you need to finish the tasks I introduced Friday:

• Blogging Challenge #8: Today is your last day to post and comment on the blog.  After you finish challenge #8, make sure that you have all eight blogs posted.  Also, take some time to comment on your peer's blogs.  Make sure everything is in top form before final grades!
• Third Hour
• Fourth Hour
• Exit Survey

After that, we'll move onto poetry writing!  You have a couple of options for poetry writing today.  Click on the links below to get started:

• Autobiographical Spoken Word Poems
• Free form Spoken Word Poems
• Found Poetry 

Prayers in a Song

Here's the music video we watched in class, "Prayers in a Song."  To learn more about the context of the song, click here. To hear more from Tall Paul and learn about Ojibwe and Native Culture, check out the website The Ways.

Spoken Word From Today's Class

Today our class had an informal Poetry Slam, where we shared our spoken word poems.

To give us some inspiration, we watched a trailer for the film Louder Than a Bomb.




If you were interested in the trailer, you can check out the whole movie.  It's on Netflix, for free!  I've also included several clips of students performing poems in the movie below:







Also, here's the video of the Black Bruins we watched in class:

Where I'm From

To introduce ourselves this week, we will be writing and sharing "Where I'm From" poems.

Background:

These poems are based off the poem "Where I'm From" by George Ella Lyon.  However, the final product does not need to resemble anything like her original poem.

Your Task:

Write a "Where I'm From" poem.  You may use the template provided, modify the template provided, or totally create your own structure.  Use the poem as a creative space to introduce yourself, and tell us a little about your life.

You will be sharing these poems in small groups, and you will have the opportunity to share your poem with the class.

Creative Inspiration:

To read George Ella Lyon's original poem, click here.  To listen to George Ella Lyon's poem, click here.

For more modern inspiration, check out the video by Chief the Poet below:



Note:  In class, we've been using this video starting at the 2:46 time.

Additional Materials:

For the copy of the poem and the poem template, click here.

Note: Visuals are not required