19 June 2006

incubate small moments

The person who invented the Magnetic Poetry Kit deserves every penny he or she has earned. They are the coolest things ever and I can't believe I waited so long to try them. I had my kids work on different poetry activities, and one of them involved using the kits to write poems. The kids who chose to work in the magnetic poetry center wrote really amazing things. I also had to tear myself away from them so I could circulate and see what the other little buggers were doing.

Of course, one of my boys comes to me, saying, "Look, this is my favorite word." His hand was cupped around a magnet with the word breast on it. I wanted to say, "Kid, don't even THINK about looking at one (or two) of those until you have your diploma." But I managed to give him my stern look and he slunk back to his table.

2 comments:

HappyChyck said...

I've kept a set or two on the side of my file cabinet for years. Oh yes, the students can make up the most risque poems using the most mundane words. Amazing.

I have a similar activity I call Sticky Poems, which is the same thing only with paper words, which you then glue down on paper. It's work intensive to get the words typed (I had students make lists of words) and cut, but I have a basic set I just copy year after year. It's cool to say, "Go grab a handful of words and see what you can create!"

Anonymous said...

They actually made a game out of them. I think it is kind of a board game. My students skipped the game part and just made poems.