teaching haiku

i'd be lying if i said i wrote these poems specifically for teaching the haiku form to grade seven students. but they sure did get a kick out of them.

Batman is awesome.
He fights villains in Gotham.
His parents are dead.

Batgirl is super.
She used to be called Barbara;
now Stephanie Brown.

The acrobat is
Robin. He's the Boy Wonder.
Underwear outside.

(i know, these are senryu because they don't deal with nature. i did make that distinction to the kids, and gave them the option of writing either.)

one-minute haiku was a successful activity. once they got the hang of writing a haiku in under a minute, students were racing to see who could finish two or three poems before the time limit. not bad, considering this class had a number of students who "hate writing."

and now i'm blogging instead of finishing a paper, so it must be a really productive day!