This lesson inspired by one at ReadWriteThink: http://www.readwritethink.org/lessons/lesson_view.asp?id=868
Students will be able to ...
1. Do Now: In Writing Workshop - pick an object in this room and describe it the best you can. We will share and I will push students to come up with synonyms for their words.
2. I will show students how to use the thesaurus and demonstrate today's activity.
3. Students will pick an object out of a bag. The objects will be arious ordinary objects like erasers, paper clips, strips of newspaper, etc.
4. Once students have their object, they will come up with four adjectives that help describe it. After they have come up with the adjectives, they will then turn to their thesauri and look up synonyms for each adjective. They will then write a form poem as described on the web link above.
5. After they have finished a form poem for each adjective, they will get a piece of white paper. They will draw or write the name of their object in the center of the paper and then write their four form poems around the name.
Looking at students' final products, are students coming up with viable synonyms for their adjectives? Looking at their stories and during conferences, are students able to do the same thing with their formal writing?