Hello again, STEM Tuesday friends. Here in Utah the spring has been iffy, with bitter winds and snow as recently as two weeks ago. Now that the air is warm and filled with little white blossoms from the cherry trees, it seems like we’re finally close to summer.
With the warming weather, and our monthly theme of naturalists, my first impulse is to recommend a nature walk. When I was young, I loved looking at different leaf shapes, and feeling their various textures. I remember washing out an Altoids tin and keeping an assortment of dried flowers, twigs, and rocks. These sorts of outings are timeless.
It being poetry month, I have a wonderful resource for you: a book about writing nature poems, written for and featuring young poets called A Crow Doesn’t Need a Shadow: A Guide to Writing Poetry From Nature by Lorraine Ferra.
Indeed, the first chapter is about poetry field trips; getting into the great outdoors and experiencing the primary text of the world around us. Ferra writes,
Weather is an endless source of ideas for poems. You need only to step outside to feel the freshness of new-fallen snow, or a light rainfall. If circumstances limit your activities and keep you indoors, a poetry field trip can be as quick as a few steps to a window. From there, you can watch dark thunderclouds riding toward you like a herd of buffalo or catch sight of a rainbow before it disappears.”
While this book offers plenty of writing prompts, I’ll let you discover those yourselves (see page 21), instead opting to share some from my own arsenal.
Writing Prompt 1 | A Form Poem
Have your children try writing a seven-line diamante. It’s a little like a Mad Lib, in that they’ll need to know their parts of speech. Typically, diamante poems juxtapose two things—whether like or unlike—so the prompt is to choose two parts of nature and bookend the poem with those, like this:
seed
– –
– – –
– – – –
– – –
– –
pebble
From there, build the poem accordingly. The seven words following your first line should modify the beginning word. The seven words preceding the last line should modify the last word. Each hyphen represents a word. The double hyphen lines are filled with adjectives. The triple hyphen lines are filled with gerunds (verbs ending with -ing), and the middle line features nouns. A completed poem might look like this:
seed
patient, thirsty
uncurling, stretching, waving
stem, blossom, path, river
flying, twirling, sinking
kicked, settled
pebble
Writing Prompt 2 | Short Stories About Small Creatures
If going outside for a nature walk isn’t possible, the next best thing is bringing the outdoors in. If you feel adventurous, invite students to bring their own insects, bugs, or spiders to class (in a jar or other container). Otherwise, choose one or two to bring. Easy ones to capture might include pill bugs, common house flies, or pollinators like ladybugs. In a pinch, you can purchase some from pet stores, which usually carry live crickets (about $7 for 40), worms, and other small creatures. Several years ago, I caught a jumping spider similar to this guy in my back yard:
Encourage your students to write a short story from the perspective of one of these small creatures. What would the world look like? How could a normal object from school life, like a pencil or calculator, be experienced by a non-human? What kind of challenges might this kind of main character face? For example, what color of acrylic paint would a ladybug be most attracted to, or how many ants would it take to carry a cookie? This exercise may lead students to write silly stories, but it’s a fun prompt that encourages empathy.
Wherever you are, I hope you’re enjoying nature and the weather, helping your budding naturalists-in-the-making to observe and discover more about the world around them.
Best,
Stephanie
A nature-loving creative, Stephanie Jackson writes poems, articles, picture books, middle-grade novels, and more. Her nonfiction has been published in Cricket magazine and her poems have been published in The Dirigible Balloon and various literary journals including Touchstones, where she’s been a contributing poetry editor. Professional affiliations include the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) and The Authors Guild. She’s graduating this month from Utah Valley University with her English degree, emphasis in creative writing. You can read more at StephanieWritesforKids.com.
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