All posts in Perez

“When I feel down, I come back and laugh in joy.” 

This week we read a translated excerpt of Mario Benedetti’s poem No Te Rindas, or Don’t Give up. We’ve reached the time in the school year when students have to a lot of mandatory […]

I’m grateful for my beautiful life…

This week we read a beautiful poem called prayer by Jorge Argueta, where he expressed gratitude for may simple things we take for granted on a daily basis. Students worked on a brainstorm exercise […]

Revise, revise, revise…

“If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.”—Elmore Leonard This week, instead of reading a new poem or introducing a new concept we discussed the importance of revision and editing in poetry. It was […]

Snow Ball Poems

This week we had in indoor snowball fight! Well, sort of. We used a fabulous lesson plan by fellow CPC poet-in-residence Musu Bangura where students write down responses to winter-inspired writing prompts on different […]

The Tools of A Writer

This week I introduced students to some of the tools I like to use on a regular basis in my personal writing practice. As a teaching artist, and “professional” writer, I like to let […]

Emotion Machines

If your sadness was a machine how would it work? This week we started off by exploring Ada Limon’s poem “The Quiet Machine”. In it Limon uses the structure of a prose poem to […]

Food Glorious Food

This week we wrote about all things edible! This is one of my favorite lessons to work on with students of all ages. Food is such a great way to engage all five of […]

No Silly Questions

Do all questions have an answer? This question was our jumping-off point for this week’s lesson as we read excerpts from Pablo Neruda’s Book Of Questions. After a lively discussion about the nature of […]

Weekend List Poems 

What does a perfect weekend look like to you? This week we read Pat Mora’s “To Do List” and came up with our own poems using the structure of a list poem. In her […]

I Am Poems

How would you describe yourself to others, and how would others describe you?  That’s the question we started off with this week to open up the topic of the “I Am” poem. Students had […]

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I’M FROM THE CITY LIGHTS / STREAMING OUT IN THE NIGHT / AND HUGE SKYSCRAPERS / TOWERING OVER THE LAKE – MELISSA E., 7TH GRADE POET