Monday, June 27, 2011

LOVELY LADIES OF LEHUA


LOVELY LADIES OF LEHUA WRITING PROJECT

Waiting for the babies to arrive
You are flamboyant, a float on an ocean of dreams
You are the anchors in your classroom, in your home
You are the harbor of safety,

Your embrace, a ship to sail on and come home with.

Your song filters through grandmother’s plumeria tree
Is wrapped up in red ti and puakenikeni offerings.
Your voice sure as echoes from that other time
Singing soprano, lilting chicken skin.

Sing again, the joy reverberates, resounds.

You have come from child-spaces rich with wonder
Granite garments, oasis of opportunities
Your child-scapes murmur with creamy clouds
Burst with grandparents’ goodness.

Remember, your memories cherished.

Count the moments as marquise-cut diamonds
Words broken apart and put back together
Between the pages of “Hatchet”
Between the marungay and pickerel plants

Cut opened as squids, your ink marks the spot.

Lovely ladies of Lehua
You are the red birds with curved tongues
that weave baskets of patience
at Honaunau, at Kaloko Honokohau

At Kealakehe, you plant dewdrops of love.

                                                                                    --Tamara Wong-Morrison

Sunday, June 26, 2011

I AM FROM A PLACE


I AM FROM A PLACE

Ancient mango trees and
Moss covered lava rock walls
A child cave, carved out of the koa trees.
Embrace my small kid time

Where brothers hunted mounta’ doves
Pink-breasted and teriyakied
Roasted on open fires
Pilgrims-in-training.

I made curtains for the clubhouse
Tidied the cooking area
Placed purple lilikoi flowers in a vase
And reveled in the perfection of home.

Home where I polished the calabashes
With kerosene so they would shine
Dust free for a week
Reminders of another time, come and gone.

The safety net secure with salted visions
Tide pools filled with possibilities
Changing clouds shaped with certainty
A foothold firm in the red dirt.

Change came slowly
Thirty-five-miles-per-hour
As we drove to Tutu-Lady’s in Kapa’a
Stopping at Halfway Bridge

To pick mountain apples and pee
Talk story with whoever stopped there
Small town, small island
We know your family.

So be good,
No shame the family
Work hard, take care, no be lazy
I going tell your ‘mada and your fada’!

Then the influx of the new
Different ways, disconnected desires
Empty church pews and colored tee-shirts
Replace the plain, pure white ones.
Beaches spotted with tourists
Mai tai’s and “Komo Mai” come enjoy!
Alo-o-o-ha!  Alo-o-o-ha!
The new sugar for sale.

The old chants replaced with
“Keep Kaaawa County, Save Nukoli’I,
Protect Kaho’olawe, Malama Maha’ulepu,
Save Waiahole-Waikane, Stop TH-3, People Not Profits”

Sand through our fingers
The land and the life slip away
Retreat to the valleys
To the dirt road, to the end.

Now Leilani wears her culture
Like the clanking gold bracelets on her arm
And Keoki tattoes his legs with
Swirls and symbols of a warrior.

Radicals!  Some call them.
Marines on the front line, I say.
Like Skippy Ioane from King’s Landing said,
“We need them all, Marines, Air Force, Army . . .”

The half-naked brother at Honaunau
Gives us stink eye for talking too loud
The weak chanter’s words
Lost in the videotape and cameras clicking

It is a war we are fighting
Trying to hold on to what fed our ancestors
Trying to remain Hawaiian in a poly-pressured world
It is a war we are loosing.

Too much land has been quiet-titled,
Too many songs have been uprooted,
The essence is diluted.
Another end is near.

Listen again to the windsong
Look again to the mountains
See beyond the horizon
They are talking to us.

Thursday, June 23, 2011

MOKU KEAWE (poem)


MOKU KEAWE!

You are a man
Muscled and mangled
Spread between
The sparing sisters.

Their breasts
High peaks of ice and fire
Do not touch
Both will break you.

O Keawe, handsome chief
You know not to tempt their wrath
You know how to dance
Between cold flames!

Keawe nui, big chief
You are their treasured one
Strong enough to know
When to surrender.

Surrender to the sisters
They are beyond human
They are beyond time
They are beyond rules.

Moku o Keawe
This land erupts with possibility
This land swelters with song
Earthmoving rhythm,

Earthshaking knowing.
We rest easy on you.
Take what you must,
Spare us our breath.

Oli Komo (Welcome Chant)


Li’u li’u wale i ka uka hola ----lele
Mauka makai o ka papala e ------
E komo, e komo aku ho’i au maloko
I na ---- ka pu’u nui o waho nei la e ----
He anu e ------ He anu e ----
He ko’e koe wale no ---------- a ------- e!

Response:
E hea i ke kanaka
E komo maloko
E hanai ai a hewa i ka waha
Eia no ka uku la o ka leo
A he leo wale no --------a----------e!

FROM NARRATIVE TO FREE-VERSE POEM FORMAT LESSON


LESSON:
REWRITE OF CRITICAL NARRATIVE INTO A FREE-VERSE, NARRATIVE POEM FORMAT by Tamara Wong-Morrison (6/14/11)

Rationale:            Students need to find the rhythm in their writing.  Narratives by
new writers often lack rhythm because they are focused on the
story.  When a writer distills one’s narrative piece into a free-verse
format, the “internal” rhythm and the sound of one’s voice intensifies.
Also, when a writer knows how to create and use an X of Y metaphor, one’s writing becomes more creative because, “A picture paints a
thousand words, but the right metaphor paints a thousand pictures.”
(Daniel Pink)
.

Core Standards:             CONVENTIONS IN WRITING & SPEAKING:
                                    MAKE EFFECTIVE LANGUAGE CHOICES:
Gr. 3  Use words for effect.

Gr. 4: 
a.     Maintain consistency in style and tone.
b.     Choose words and phrases to convey ideas precisely.

Gr. 5: 
a.     Expand, combine, and reduce sentences for meaning,
reader/listener interest, and style.

                                    Gr. 6:
a.     Vary sentence patterns for meaning, reader/listener
interest, and style.

Gr. 7:
a.   Choose words and phrases that express ideas concisely,
eliminating wordiness and redundancy.

                                    Gr. 8:
a.     Use verbs in the active and passive voice and in the
conditional and subjunctive moods to achieve particular
effects.

                                    Gr. 9-12 standards to be included later.

Performance Indicators:              SWBAT (student will be able to!) convert narrative piece into a free-verse (narrative) poem format by
                                                highlighting, specifically chosen excerpts from
                                                narrative.
                                                SWBAT cut-and-paste these excerpts and re-space
                                                or align these into free-verse poem format.
                                                SWBAT identify free-verse poem format.
                                                SWBAT identify rewrite of narrative into new form
                                                as a “Found Poem” teaching strategy.
                                                SWBAT create and use an X of Y metaphor form to
                                                enhance, emphasize an excerpt or image.
                                                SWBAT revert rhythm and sounds from poem form
                                                into narrative forms of writing.
                                                SWBAT create and use Core Standard for grade level.

Assessments:                           Formative:  Peer and teacher comments on drafts.
                                                Summative:  Rubric (to be developed) on FINAL version.

Instructional Component & Development (50 minutes total):

15 minutes                                   
(Explanation/                                    Teacher explains schedule:  15 minutes instructional,
  Discussion)                                    25 minutes rewrite, and 10 minutes to pair-and-share.
T. asks students “What three things are in every poem?”
T. writes correct answers on board when students have identified them:  meaning/feeling (“Disguised words from the heart—Robert Frost), sound (sound of words strung in sequence:  Words are sacred.  If you get the right ones in the right order, you can  nudge the world a little” – Tom Stoppard, playwrite), and rhythm!
T. elicits discussion on which of these three is the
most important.  Answer:  All three things are equally
important.  Some will argue that sound or rhythm are
more important because they will elicit meaning/feelings faster than meaning/feeling without
specific sound and/or rhythm..
T. asks for a student author to share his/her narrative piece by slowly reading aloud the piece.
Before student author reads, T. asks student-audience to listen carefully for the words-lines-excerpts that are significant-important-memorable.
T. tells student audience to raise their hands when
they hear the memorable excerpt.
T. will write-note excerpt on board that a lot of students
have identified by raising their hands.
T. tells students that these selected excerpts will be
realigned, re-spaced into a free-verse poem format
that does not have strict end-rhymes or meter.
T. says that after the student-audience has identified the
awesome excerpts, the author of narrative piece will add an X of Y metaphor to enhance the poem.
T. models creating an X of Y metaphor by writing on
board, “Sea of ______” and asks students to fill that
metaphorical sea with anything BUT things that are
actually found in the sea.
T. writes student suggestions on board, i.e. Sea of stars,
sea of surprises, sea of sorrow NOT sea of starfish or
sea of water because starfish and water are found in
the real sea, not the metaphorical sea.
T. tells students that metaphors create magic because
they create things that can only happen in our imaginations.  Yipee!
T. jumps up and down and acts crazy while students
wonder what’s going on.

25 minutes                                   
(Selection Activity/                        T. asks student-author to slowly read piece.
  Focused Engagement)            T. writes-notes excerpts on board that audience has
                                                identified as significant by raising their hands.
                                                Student-author continues slowly reading piece.
                                                T. continues writing significant excerpts until the
                                                entire narrative is completed.
                                                T. asks student-author to re-read the free-verse
                                                poem.
                                                T. asks audience to identify places in the poem where
                                                the author could insert an X of Y metaphor,
                                                i.e. “A metronome of disppointment” (Mahalo Jessica)
                                                      “An oasis of pain” (Mahalo Beth)
                                                T. suggests that author may use suggested metaphors.
T. tells students that they are the FINAL EDITORS of their writing and suggests that they READ ALOUD their piece THREE TIMES and listen for their “internal” rhythm.
                                               
10 minutes
(Closure)                                 T. asks students to pair-and-share their free-verse
                                                poems.

Extension Activities:              Students post a blog with their narrative piece and
                                                rewrite of it in free-verse poem form.  Peer reviewers
                                                create Venn Diagram comparing/contrasting both.
Students select a poem and convert it into narrative form, i.e. “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening” by Robert Frost is converted into narrative format.

FIGURES OF SPEECH & METAPHOR FORMS


Name: _______________________

 FIGURES OF SPEECH & METAPHORS      

Figures of Speech are creative expressions that INTENTIONALLY DEVIATE, on purpose are different  from their normal, literal
meanings so as to create a MORE VIVID, FANCIFUL EFFECT.
Some figures of speech are:  oxymoron, synesthesia, metaphor,
personification, simile, etc.

METAPHOR:  a metaphor is when one thing is spoken or written of as something else;  “I am the apapane.”    “He is the alien ant.” (x is y)


OXYMORON (x + y’s opposite or x’s opposite + y): 
two opposite words together:
frozen fire, quiet riot, smart fool, intelligent idiot, soft rock

1) _____________   _____________          4) __________   ___________

2) _____________   _____________         5) __________   ___________

3) _____________   _____________          6) __________   ___________


SYNESTHESIA (x’s sensation + y=onomatopoeia): 
two sense words together:
(fragrance/smell + sound, or color/sight + sound)
maile melody, ginger giggle, honey hum, lavender laughter,
vinegar voice, turquoise splash, crimson clatter, scarlet sigh,
purple patter, cobalt clash, copper tinkle, indigo whir

1) ____________  _____________         4) ___________  ___________

2) ____________  _____________         5) ___________  ___________

3) ____________  _____________          6) ___________  ___________



ANOTHER WAY TO MAKE A METAPHOR IS:
___x__     of   ___y___.
Combine two unrelated nouns with the word “of.”
waterfall of gardenias, bouquet of silence, mountain of words,
 wings of light, tears of darkness, ribbon of echoes, echo of emptiness.

1) ___________  of ____________        

2) ___________  of ____________        

3) ___________  of ____________        


ANOTHER METAPHOR FORM:  X’S Y
TO CREATE THIS METAPHOR, SIMPLY REMOVE THE “OF” FROM
THE ABOVE METAPHOR, AND ADD A POSSESSIVE APOSTROPHE.
The waterfall’s gardenias, the bouquet’s silence, the mountain’s words,
The wing’s light, the tear’s darkness, the ribbon’s echo, the echo’s emptiness.

SIMILE:  a simile is when one thing is compared or contrasted to something else using the words “as” or “like”:
“She is smart as sun knowing when to shine.” 
“He is handsome like the dolphins spinning in the sea.”

ORDINARY SIMILES are ones used a lot of the time; they are tired,
DO NOT USE THEM (fast as lightning, good as gold, sweet as sugar).

USE ONLY EXTRAORDINARY (unique, one-of-a-kind) SIMILE:
(You have to think harder because these simile are brand new and
  have never been heard before):

    Simile:                  Ordinary:                           Extraordinary:

1)  Soft as             _________________         ____________________.

2)  Fast as         _________________         ____________________.

3) Smart as          _________________         ____________________.

4)  Stupid as         _________________         ____________________.

5)  Bright as         _________________         ____________________.



INSIDE OUT BOOK REVIEW


BOOK REVIEW OF
“INSIDE OUT, STRATEGIES FOR TEACHING WRITING”

Chapter 1:  Effective Teacher of Writing
*  Writing is social, best is collaborative/communal setting.
*  Practice, practice, coach, coach, talk, share, talk.
*  Focus on FLUENCY FIRST, not the forms.
*  Emphasize process so do not score drafts, instead offer
strategies for improving content.
*  Have many short writing assignments and few large ones.
*  Growth takes time.
*  Turn beliefs into action:
*  TEACH WRITING AS A CRAFT.
*  Student-developed rubrics are good.

Chapter 11:  Writing Poetry
As a former poetry resource-teacher, I grade this chapter a
“C-“ because it does not dissect the essential elements of what makes a poem: metaphor, rhythm . . . .!  Also, the authors list simplistic poem forms (name acrostic,
cinquains, etc.) – poetry has been dumbed down again.  They misspelled Gary Snyder’s name!  Sacreligious! 
AGREE with their final thoughts:
1)   Read poetry aloud a lot,
2)   Use your favorite sources for poetry
DO NOT AGREE with:
3)   Use the simple List Poem (No! No!)
4)   Cluster a Poem (Please NO!)
Recommend they revise this chapter and focus on metaphors, similes, other figures of speech instead of fixed forms, rhythm, feeling, and sound.   Agree that “Most teachers are intimidated about writing poetry, although they teach it effectively as literature” (pg. 150).  Why?  I surmise that a lot of teachers
have not played enough with writing their own poems.  Once teachers know the craft and elements needed to compose their own poems, they can effectively teach it.
Poetry “prompts” suggested were:  name acrostics with  simple one word lines or expanded to “ministory”, prose converted into poem form, paraphrased
poems, found poems, Dada (nonsense) poems, class or collaborative poems, and
“Being the Thing” poems where students write as if they were something, “If I was
wind . . .” (which is the x is y metaphor form).

Chapter 13:  Crafting Essays
“Contemporary Essay” is the new label for “Expository Essay” because it is taking on new forms (memoir, monologue), beyond the traditional five paragraph format.  According to the authors, essay topics cannot be “canned” – made up by the teacher; they need to be generated by the students about things  they really care about.  The contemporary essay form should be anything but the five paragraph!  “Too often, we settle for idealess and voiceless papers with impeccable structure.”
We teachers have a hard enough time getting them to write in paragraphs; some structure is needed for any form of writing.  The authors of this book have a bias against six-traits writing because they think it is institutionalized and stifling.  I argue that our students need to start somewhere in their writing,
then experiment with other forms.  The standard five-paragraph essay is
a good starting form.
            Content over form should be foremost.  Brainstorming in a group, creating
scenarios, guided thinking using higher-order-thinking questioning, storyboarding,
and an ocean of discussion should engage students to think before they select a
form to write it in.  Once students have discovered a topic that ignites their curiosity, a variety of forms should be introduced.  This section was a smorgasbord of delicious suggestions: critiques/reviews, editorials, investigative reports, anthropological case studies, problem/solution pieces, etc.  They’ve also introduced comparison-contrast memoir, action research, writing about an author, and composing a multi-genre paper.  I definitely will tag this part of the book to offer
to my middle school students.
VOICE:  “Students who have found a voice in journals, in stories, or in poetry suddenly lose confidence when they undertake the dreaded essay” (pg. 196)  WHAT IS WRONG WITH THAT?  The authors recommend, “. . . we should employ the same strategies we use when we teach students to write poems, short stories, or chapters for a book: (pg. 197).  Totally agree with this.

Chapter 14: Grading and Evaluating
            Love the opening saying, “Assessment should begin conversations about
performance, not end them.”  The authors suggest: 1) grading should be deemphasized, 2) drafts should not be graded, 3) developing grading with
students, 4) students grade and evaluate also, 5) GRADE THE PROCESS AS
WELL AS THE PRODUCT, 6) focus grading (commas one week, capitalization
another week), 7) give ideas, inventiveness, and content.  Especially love the
part about grading the process, not just the product. 
            “We honestly believe that the development of fluency through
extensive writing practice brings with it growing control of the language.”  In
other words, get our students to practice and write very frequently.  Also,
give students the option to rewrite/revise their piece for their final grade.
            Other ways to grade:  non-grading approach (not used in public schools),
a performance system where students are graded by just turning in a piece,
not necessarily on the quality of their work (nope, will not use this!), a holistic
grading strategy (authors like this approach) where student writing is scored
with an efficient guide that identifies high, middle, and low.  Other grading
approaches include: roundtable holistic where students are trained to score
each others’ work (works well with AP students), portfolios (performance,
showcase/final products, process portfolios that include drafts, analytic
scales: Diederich (50% content & organization, 30% style, and 20% mechanics)
and 6-Trait scale.
            Six-Traits scale:  According to the authors, “The disadvantages of this
particular scale, to us, outweigh its advantages” (pg. 230).  The scale itself has
become institutionalized, “as though it were a genre of writing, not an evaluation
scale.”  A second disadvantage is the 6-traits scale is used to evaluate all types
of writing.  The authors prefer that various forms have different rubrics.
Another disadvantage is the scale is used to evaluate the high-stakes tests,
according to the authors. 
            “BY FAR THE MOST EFFECTIVE RATING GUIDES FOR STUDENT
PAPERS ARE THE ONES TEACHERS THEMSELVES DEVISE” (pg. 231).  I
wholeheartedly agree.  The authors have reproducible scoring guides on
pages 232-233 for memoir and an opinion paper.  I agree with their criteria
in these papers, especially the section in the opinion paper that focuses
on language, “Weasel words. Use more forceful language.”  I will
probably replace “weasel” with “mongoose” just for fun.
            Peer evaluation could be controversial, but is very good for students
because the process teaches them how to improve their writing.  It also
allows for them to become responsible by being careful critics.  Some ways
to evaluate include:  cooperative grading where the teacher and two students
picked at random score the work,  round robins (three members), and
Peter Elbow’s “center of gravity” with five members.  In summary, grading
and evaluating should be done collaboratively, NOT BY THE SINGLE
TEACHER.

Chapter 16: Resources
            This section is very well organized by questions:
            Should I set up a writing workshop & how do I do it?
            How do I encourage kids to begin writing?
How do I help  my students thin and write about important topics?
How do I help my students sustain their writing?
How do I confer with individual writers?
How can I help my students write with clarity?
What is memoir?
Research with voice and passion?
I-Search paper?
Voice Lessons in persuasive writing.
How do I teach grammar?
How respond to and evaluate student writing?
Writing theory?