Bill and Keith, Thanks for reminding us of this; I can't wait to do this again! This is such a wonderful opportunity to connect with other middle schools. My students last year had so much fun with this; we were partnered with Bev's school in Little Rock. The highlight was knowing other kids and teachers could read and comment on their poetry and they could read other student's poetry and comment. As a culminating activity, we did a poetry slam in the library and invited parents, teachers and siblings. We served punch and cookies for the kids and coffee for the adults. One of my toughest students, Stephen, wore his "church clothes" that day and decided to keep them on all day. He was so proud of his project (he presented the song "Dear Mama" by Tupac and what elements of poetry it had that he felt made it good poetry. I videotaped the whole thing, and couldn't have been more proud. I'll be honest: I was worried about teaching poetry prior to this, and now I would never dream of not including it! Here in New England, where we wait anxiously for Opening Day and spring, it is something that I consider part of our spring tradition! Thanks so much to the dynamic duo of Keith who is the man behind the scenes, handling all the technology and Bill, who moderates our Lit Group, and makes the Poetry Slam a reality.
Laurie Wasserman, NBCT/TLN Grade 6 Special Needs Teacher Medford, Massachusetts [EMAIL PROTECTED] _______________________________________________ The Literacy Workshop ListServ http://www.literacyworkshop.org To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go to http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/lit_literacyworkshop.org. Search the LIT archives at http://snipurl.com/LITArchive
