Want more Creative Writing potion? Here it is!
- Aug 8, 2017
- 2 min read
In this fourth potion, I shall introduce another lesson I have conducted with my older students who are in upper primary and lower secondary levels.
The poem I used is "True or False" written by poet, Dave Crawley. It was published in the book, "Reading, Rhyming, and 'Rithmetic" . I happened to borrow this book at the Children's Section of the National Library several years ago. For more humorous poems, check this book out!
Similar to the previous post in which I featured "The Painted Jungle", I introduced this poem "True or False" through an Active Listening task for the students. Samples of the Listening Task are shown below.
After introducing the poem through the listening task, I got the students to do a role play. Each student began to imagine he or she was the character in the poem and spoke the lines out loud, as it if it was monologue. I wanted the students to practise varying their volume and tone to express their understanding of "Dilemma"--the feeling of being caught in a state of confusion and tough decision making process. Like what Prince Hamlet said in his soliloquy, "To be or not to be". It was also an opportunity to reinforce their understanding of "First Person" perspective in writing.
Picture from http://www.buzzle.com/articles/analysis-of-soliloquy-to-be-or-not-to-be-in-hamlet.html
After that, it was time for them to put what they had been practising aloud into writing. So I told the students, "Now, this poem is like a skeleton frame, just the bones. Let's put on some sinews and muscles and major organs!"
At this juncture, I introduced the concept of Narrative Arch and how this poem fits nicely into the arch. Basically, the dilemma experienced by the character could be interpreted as an internal conflict. As such, they could easily turn the poem into a prose.
In order to scaffold the students' writing process, I showed them an example of my own.
Subsequently, the students got to work. As some of them were emergent writers, I provided more scaffolding for them so that they could apply what they learnt.
A Student's Plan for the writing
A Student's Draft One of the writing (page 1)
A Student's Draft One of the writing (Page 3)
A Student's Draft Two of the writing (Page 1)
A word about students' receptivity towards such approach to writing. Some students appreciate that they have a structure to follow so as to write a credible story. Some students, however, feel restricted by the structure and they lament the fact they cannot exercise their creativity. To the latter, I would say this is the real challenge for them.
Imagine you had been told to create grey tone without a grey paint. What could you do? Although you could not use grey, you still have full access to all the other colours on your palette!
Trust me, I know, for I have already done it. 😉 And it doesn't even require only black and white to make grey.
"The Vase" acrylic painting on paper, by Ms Te-O
Happy Writing!
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