In Ms. Hunter-Gordon’s 1st-grade science class at CS 111, Community-Word Project students are in the final stages of revising their individual poems as well as their Community Poem. Using a worksheet showing animals from various habitats they have been studying, students identified one animal they would like to explore through writing in the first person.
Using PERSONIFICATION, students began with a prompt for their chosen animal, such as, “I am a bat…”, to think from the place and experience of that animal, and imagine what the creature might say, might want to do, and might dream about.
Emily, one of our most positive and engaged students, and always ready to step forward in class and demonstrate an idea, began writing about being a sea creature. Naturally the idea of merging her own physicality with a sea dweller emerged, and so she began to write, “I am a mermaid….!” Emily chose descriptive language about her pink tail, and how she could explore her sea domain, and personified the experience of swimming like a fish to help us understand the joys of being in the water with friends as the “cool water rushed past” her face.
Emily’s ideas and physical embodiment inspired other students in class, who shared their personification poetry lines as well. We have lions, many bats, and a few snakes. We can’t wait for the students to see their animal poetry printed in their poetry Anthology as we conclude our residency.
