Class Poems

Context: This was done with three 12th grade classes in Southfield, a suburb of
Detroit. This was done at the suggestion of the students during a unit on poetry,
following students writing and (optionally) sharing their own individual poems.
Previously we had discussed various elements of poetry and they had read and
listened to a number of poems.
Materials: screen and projector
Procedure:

Introduce the idea of the class poem and ask the class to come up with a
topic that can be agreed upon.
Type the topic and have it project on the screen for students to see. This
could also be done writing on the board, but I found it easier to type for
purposes of revising.
Ask for a first line and begin typing the poem based on student suggestions.
o In my experience, coming up with the first line was the easiest part for
classes. To keep the poem moving, you may ask students to popcorn to
someone else for the next line after a certain amount of time. For
example, if Jayla comes up with the first line, Naliah comes up with the
second line, and then theres a pause for a minute, you may ask that
she pick someone for the next line.
o Anyone was allowed to suggest a line at any time, but sometimes
having one person put in charge of a line helped it continue.
As the poem comes together, bring in discussion of specific poetic devices
being used. Ex:
o Do we want to continue with Shelbys metaphor?
o See how Asia used alliteration?
o What do we think of the rhyme scheme we have going?
When the poem is complete, read it over as a class and see if there are any
changes the class wants to make.
Once we were set creating the poem, we used the poem to discuss tone, such
as how they chose to convey their tone and how they interpreted the tone of
others lines.
My Results: In two classes this process went fairly smoothly, and the classes were
able to produce poems they were satisfied with. In the third class, students
struggled make their ideas cohesive with each other, and they started over several
times producing three incomplete poems. However, in all classes there was
discussion of poetry and of writing. I also saw that for many writing a poem as a
class was more challenging than writing individual poems, so it ended up making
sense that we did this activity after they had already written individually.

2nd hour 5th hour 6th hour

Lost and ashamed, Im Three Fs on my Zangle As I pull up to the gates
tired of this dirty game My GPA starts to dangle of hell
Senioritis is my middle
name
Im not looking for failure,
Im looking for fame
Getting my hair all (I just finished two
tangled essays, three exams, and
Im running cause I five quizzes)
heard Ms. Jacksons keys
jangle