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Students had to find objects around the room, match them with vivid verbs, and personify them. Then they had to create their own poems about the objects they'd brought to life. There are only a sample of poems here, picked randomly.

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Students were given a choice between reading “The Most Dangerous Game” and selected poems that highlight personification. See assignment on Wednesday’s column. Here are a few samples from students. We will share results with each other on Tuesday.

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Describing Friday's Activities Focus Write

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Describing Friday's Activities Focus Write

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Students read two nature poems and searched for personification. They discussed the meaning of the poems and how poets use figurative language to develop a bigger meaning. Students then used the poems to play Personification Charades and to write their own "I, Spy" poems. This took place on Monday and Tuesday.

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This week we focused on personification and reading skills. Students began by reading poetry and figuring out its meaning as well as seeing how authors used personificaiton to create imagery in their poems. This included playing Personification Charades and writing an "I, Spy" poem based on objects they saw around the room. Wednesday and Friday students were given choices as to what they wanted to read and how they wanted to write. Choices were between poetry and a short story and they could choose to write a poem, create a cartoon to show the reading skill of visualization, write a news article based on a story (highlighting critical reading skills by needing to pick out key plot points and retelling them). Another skill in this assignment is time management. Students not only had to decide what project to do, but also needed to figure out all the tasks that would be needed in completing the project and then estimate the time that would be needed to complete each task. On Thursday, Carolyn taught a "Show Not Tell" class designed to get students to use more descriptive approaches to their writing. I am sorry I missed this as it's always a highlight as she acts out the difference between showing v. telling and in the past years this has resulted in white board markers flying around the room, a broken classroom door, and thoroughly entertained students.

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William's three sentence example:
Carolyn nervously paced back and forth, her whole body shaking. Her body was scrunched up, fists clenched, eyes shining.Carolyn's anger was like a hurricane, destroying everything it saw, throwing popsicle sticks, and kicking chairs.

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From Carolyn on her Showing v. Telling Demonstration

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From Carolyn on her Showing v. Telling Demonstration

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The whiteboard calls out,
Desperately wanting use.
It growls at those who pass
angry with the treatment.
It yells at you,
luring you in to eat you.
And it cries,
it cries at being left alone,
It is lonely.
It looks longingly at the door,
Sitting and waiting.
But it’s alone.
By Jonah

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Notes from Carolyn's Showing Not Telling Demonstration

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Notes from Carolyn's Showing Not Telling Demonstration

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Students Practiced Showing, Not Telling by Writing Vignettes. A few randomly selected examples below.

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Students Practiced Showing, Not Telling by Writing Vignettes. A few randomly selected examples below.

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The cat approached me on her delicate paws. I held out my hand and let her nose kiss my fingertips. It felt like wet leather against my hand. She stepped towards me. Her every footstep felt purposeful. She gently put one of her tiny paws on my  lap, and looked up at me with with liquid eyes, asking my permission. I looked back. In that moment, staring into her eyes, I felt as if I was traveling through her mind. As I stared into the galaxies that were her eyes, I could feel myself leaping through the stars, hopping from planet to planet in a never ending dance. I was running across the rings of Saturn and flying through the endless pools of velvet darkness. I felt a connection form between us that could never be broken, a golden string strong as starlight and undying as the universe contained within her mind. Just like that, the moment was over. She clambered into my lap.

By Alice

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Through a field of daisies, dandelions, and sunflowers, there stood a cat. A much peculiar cat one would say. Its eyes, were as red as blood, ears as pointy as an elf, and whiskers as sharp as a needle. Like no cat I had ever seen before. Now it wasn't just how this cat looked, but how it smelled. It smelled like Candyland. Like Halloween. It's like I can see candy through this cat's body. I wouldn’t be surprised if you could’t smell it from a galaxy away. As it walks toward me in a very upright position, I can barely smell anything but candy. I can almost hear the candy talking to me as the cat gets even closer; the smell is hypnotizing. As the cat creeps closer,  it seems like it is getting ready to pounce, with pupils shining in the sunlight, and claws bursting out of its paws. With one leap, the cat is flying in the air. It had to be at least thirty feet in the air before it slowlyslowely descended to the ground. As it flew, I noticed its fur. A bright purple. A violet flower freshly picked from a garden. Its texture mirrored a fresh batch of cottoncotten candy. I don'tdont know why Ii didn'tdidnt notice its distinct coloring, but clearly I was focused on its other unique features. I could feel the warmth of its belly as it was in the air trying to withstand the cold rush against it. The cat reached the ground and buried himself in the array of flowers.

By Natalya

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I sat on a bench near a street corner, watching the people go by, when suddenly I felt the urge to check my watch. This was my favorite watch, found at a thrift store by my brother, and given to me as a gift at some occasion that required a gift to be given. The time was 3:57 and in that moment the hands of the watch seemed to stretch as the strap tightened.  The hands became longer and longer and the strap tighter, until I realized the tail of a cat had slipped through the straps of the watch and was pulling it from my wrist with impossible ease. By the time my hand was clamped over my wrist the watch was already gone. My fingers dug into my flesh, still half convinced they were protecting the watch. When I looked down I saw my watch had been flicked by the cat to the cement about five feet from where I was sitting. I still sat however, vaguely curious of what would happen next, as if I was just a spectator. I could have stood up but it was as if there were a wall, preventing me from wanting to. The cat stalked around my beloved timepiece that I didn’t stand up and get. I could already feel my heart detaching itself from the watch, as if it were already gone. The cat seemed to taunt me, telling me how easy it would be to get the watch, but somehow knowing I wouldn’t. I felt myself sinking into the bench, finding comfort in the hard plastic, pretending it was comfortable. That was when I felt my jacket which was tied around my waste, become like a chain. Now I was really stuck. Maybe the cat was the wall, or just the one creating the walls and the chains, in any case the cat was the one preventing me from taking action. I didn’t do anything though. I just sat there as the cat decided enough was enough and picked up my watch and left. Even then though, my jacket was still a chain. The bench was still a pretend cushion I could sink into.

By Ruth P.

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The cat’s purple fur glinted in the sunlight, it was a rather peculiar sight. It was the first thing I saw when I opened the door and glimpsed the cat. Her fur caught the morning light and shone like nothing I had ever seen before. The shades of purple rippled down her back, the tips of her ears were as purple as plums, they faded all the way into a lilac bush in full bloom. The purple exploded into a million shades. At the end of her long silky tail was a lavender dollop. She looked like the kind of cat that belonged to a grandmotherly witch who painted the air with the smell of cinnamon-sugar cookies. All the same stune crossed my face at the thought of a purple cat, but she shone beautifully. The cat twirled around and stared straight at me, and she began to talk, she paced back and forth yowling. Time and time again I was struck by the beauty of her fur. A gradient that seemed to contain every shade of purple in existence. When I bent down to pet her, she quitted, as I ran my fingers through her glimmering fur, all the tension released from my body and I felt free. She chirped as I kissed her forehead, her soft fur brushing against my cheek. Her beautiful black eyes gazed lovingly into mine, my heart swelled as she rubbed her head against my face. Fur danced in my mouth but I didn’t even care, I didn’t care about anything anymore. As I scritched under her chin, her short plum furrs tickled my fingers, a purr echoed in her throat and roared its way up like a lion. A calm sense floated over me seeping into my whole body.

By Susan

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The chair was sprinting
Making marks
In the ground
It was hopping
Up and down
Everywhere
Around town

By Dylan

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The binder was lonely in the corner of the dark classroom, staring into space. Across the room the stapler clicked as if it was a chick. The classroom is dark, the moon staring into its eyes.

Outside the wind is whistling and the cars are rushing back home in the streets, store lights shutting off. You can hear the sound of rushing water. In the yard the ball sits still and in the trees the birds start to fall asleep. In the music room the instruments sit still. I love the night.

By Malcolm

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A bright bolt of color, whiskers, and fur blasted past me, the fluffy blob far around the corner with beady little eyes watching me in a food- ready fashion. I was on a sidewalk with towering trees with an empty street. I was ready for the sniffles, the itchy eyes, but I know that I'm going to pet that cat. Sometimes when I visit a friend with a cat it feels as if my face is on fire but I can not resist the FLOOF.

I was sitting on the sidewalk contemplating how to get the cat to hang out with me, when I thought of something. With bags in arm I slowly scooted over to the kitty and realized that I thought no further ahead than scooting. The fur baby  was in sight, when I saw something odd about the cat, the left ear was dark as midnight, the right was orange as a tangerine. This cat was split down the middle with a pitch black cat on one side and a tabby on the other. I rubbed my eyes in confusion forgetting the existence of allergies and my face felt as if I smushed it into the sun. the rustling trees and passing cars must have been laughing at me as I just decided to go full in and pet the cat like it was the first cat I've ever seen.

The kitty sat there like a lazy little blob in the sun getting scritches. It rubbed its fuzzy face against my hand, certifying myself as its own. And as fast as it had come it got up and zoomied away leaving me in a cloud of fur and allergens. I wept at the moment partly because of the fur in the air and how the kitty touched my heart.
By Marion

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Sample pages from Emma’s book based on a Langston Hughes poem.

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By Clara

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-Rosh Hashannah
-"Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid"
-Topic Sentences and Supporting Evidence
-TRIAC Paragraphs (analytical writing)