Focus Lesson Planning Sheet s2

Focus Lesson Planning Sheet

Focus Seeing with Poets’ Eyes Lesson Topic Sample poems written on chart paper, paper, pencils Materials

Writers, today is an important day. We have been reading lots of Connection poems together all year and poems have been sprouting up all over our classroom – on our walls and doors. Our room has been getting ready for us to write poems. Today we are going to learn how poets see the world in different, fresh, and unusual ways. Then we are going to see the world like poets. Explicit I brought along some poems written by my favorite poet Zoe. Let’s pay special attention to how Zoe sees the world in a fresh way. In Instruction this poem, Zoe writes about a pencil sharpener. Look at the pencil sharpener. What I see if a gray box, a machine, that makes my pencil sharp. But I’m going to read a poem Zoe wrote about the pencil sharpener and you will see what I mean about how poets see things in fresh new ways.

Read Zoe’s poem.

When I read this poem I was so surprised! I don’t usually think about our pencil sharpener like Zoe describes it. I usually think of it as just a machine that makes my pencil sharp. But Zoe imagines that there are bees inside the pencil sharpener and that they are buzzing around the tip of her pencil to make it sharp! This poem makes me see our classroom pencil sharpener in a fresh new way, and that’s what poetry can do.

Guided Zoe wrote another poem, this one about the ceiling. Look at our classroom ceiling now. Look with poet’s eyes and see it in a fresh new Practice way.

Tell your partner what you see when you look at the ceiling with poet’s eyes.

Now let’s read Zoe’s poem and pay special attention to the fresh new way she saw the ceiling. Teacher reads second poem.

What did you notice about how Zoe saw the ceiling? Encourage students to share their responses. Ex: She saw the ceiling as a sky. Or she probably pretended the lights were the sun.

In poems we see the world in ways we never imagined before. We look at the world closely and carefully; we look with our hearts and our minds. And now because of this poem we get to think of our regular ol’ ceiling as a sky that goes on and on. Send Off [for Today you are going to practice seeing the world with poet eyes. You’ll try to see in fresh new ways! For now, I’d like you all to find an Independent interesting thing in our classroom to look at. Take your paper and Practice] pencil to this special object and write what you see. Group Share What an exciting day! I heard so many ways to look at the world coming out of your poetry pencils. Let’s have a few friends share their observations.

Sample Poems:

Pencil Sharpener I think there are a hundred bees inside the pencil sharpener and they buzz and buzz until my point is sharp!

Ceiling The ceiling is the sky for the classroom.

Poems written by: Zoe Ryder White