Sunday, April 17, 2016

Earth Day Prompt with Rhythm

“Oh, earth, you're too wonderful for anybody to realize you.” 
― Thornton WilderOur Town


More Earth Day Writing Prompts!

Happy Birthday to Thornton Wilder! Enjoy the video of rhythm instruments below. Get inspired for Earth Week and find something that you might normally throw away and use it to make something beautiful. For your writing prompt, write a story, poem or reflection about the people in video coming together to make music.







Friday, April 15, 2016

Writing Prompts for Earth Day 2016

American Life in Poetry: Column 456

BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE 

For Earth Day, I thought I would bring up a beautiful poem from Ted Kooser's American Life in Poetry. 

First, read Kooser's comments and the poem below. The prompts will follow the poem. 

American Life in Poetry: Column 456

Many of us feel a great sense of pride as we watch our children discover the world for the first time. Here, Kathleen Driskell, a Kentucky poet, shows us her own daughter taking that first taste of a late summer watermelon she has grown herself. 

Seed  by Kathleen Driskell

In first grade, you met Squanto,
nearly naked and
on his haunches, showing
those thick-headed pilgrims
how one must plant fish
to grow maize. And in autumn
you dove into the lobotomized
pumpkin, into the gooey pulp
and seeds, raising a clump
like a slimy chandelier
from the Titanic. And now
in late summer, daughter,
you smile, holding a ripe watermelon,
cut in half, exposing the black
seed within its bright red heart.
Your melon. How proud you are
to think you grew this delicious
thing all on your own.

You can read more poems from the column at this link American Life in Poetry

Earth Day Writing Prompts

Poetry and Nonfiction

1. Write about a memory of yourself as a child (or a child you know or have known) having an active or proud moment connected to nature. It can be catching a fish, climbing a tree, or ?????
Free write about this moment for about 5 minutes.

2. After your free-writing, form your ideas into a poem or a short memoir. Use the word bright in your poem (any other word that means bright) as an adjective not to describe the child, but to describe something from nature that is in the poem. 

Fiction

Think of a character for the little girl in the poem. Give her a name and personality. Write a short story about her and the watermelon. Make the watermelon seeds magical and make something interesting happen!

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For Discussion:

1. What are the three scenes in this poem?
2. Which two seasons are mentioned in the poem? 
3. Why do you think the poem is called "Seed"?