Bio-Poems

= = =Strategy Name: Bio Poems =

Strategy Description:
I wonder is a strategy that utilizes writing to promote good reading. Students who are curious and ask questions will be better readers. And student generated questions will encourage student engagement.

Course Description:

 * Applied Communications is a 9-week course that promotes reading and writing.
 * 5 classes of 28-30 students.
 * Classes include general education students, special education students, instructional learning disabled students, gifted, and ELLs.
 * This strategy would work with any content area class. Social studies can do historical figures; science can do animals, scientists, celestial bodies; math can do geometrical shapes—the list is endless.

Rationale:

 * Opportunity for students to synthesize and analyze information.
 * Bio Poems are fun.
 * Use as an assessment for reading comprehension.
 * The poem format forces students to be brief.
 * Discourages plagiarism.
 * This strategy allows for sharing—middle school students love to socialize.

Diverse Learners:

 * I can modify and adapt the poem template for a student’s strengths/weaknesses.
 * This strategy allows gifted learners to go beyond.
 * The strategy is visual and oral as the teacher models.

Procedure:

 * 1) Teacher models a poem with the whole class. As we are doing activists, we modeled a poem about Craig Kielburger (a young activist we had already read an article on).
 * 2) After modeling the poem, students tackle the poem on their own. In this case, each student already had an activist to call their own. They had read an article, taken T-Notes and written an informational paragraph about their activist.
 * 3) We shared rough drafts in pairs/small groups.
 * 4) We went to the computer lab to type a final draft—many students included a picture with the poem.
 * 5) At our activist tea party, the poems are on display.

Potential Issues:

 * Some students have difficulty making the inferences necessary to complete some of the lines.
 * Some students repeat information/words instead of exploring new ideas on each line.

References/Materials:

 * ** Strategy from: ** Lenski, S. D., Wham, M. A., John, J. L. (1999// ). Reading & learning strategies for middle & high school students. // Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt Publishing.

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 * In binder: **
 * 1) Bio Poem template