Provides a chapter-by-chapter list of possible writing exercises to be used in conjunction with Frederick Douglass's "Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave." States that the aim of the exercises is to encourage complexity of thought and feeling. (PA)

Suggests three ideas for writing poetry: photographic portrait poems (writer looks at a photograph and describes it); fashion statements (writer picks out a style of dress and writes about what it suggests); and advice poems (writer gives advice to himself/herself in the form of a poem). (PA)

Provides step-by-step directions for various creative writing strategies for teachers to use with their students. Illustrates each strategy: the sneak attack; the poetry cafe; videotaping a poem; and choral reading and coloring meaning. (PA)

Notes the villanelle is one of English poetry's most demanding forms. Discusses two distinct ways in which a villanelle unfolds - as a satellite or as a snowball. Describes how the meaning of the repeating lines in a snowball villanelle change and increase with each recurrence. Presents exercises for teaching the villanelle. (SG)

Discusses four poems by William Carlos Williams used to teach creative writing to college students. Uses "Portrait of a Woman in Red" and "The Last Words of My English Grandmother" because they contain speakers who are clearly not the poet, which gives undergraduate students opportunities to discuss details Williams uses to…

Discusses "January Morning," a poem of William Carlos Williams, wherein the 15 sections come in no apparent order and are "unparallel" (varied in content, tone, length, etc.). Finds the language colloquial and conversational, with casual notation. States the poem, with its free format, can be used successfully in college poetry…

Describes an experiment conducted with students in grades two through six and grade nine. States that the focus was on writing about old age. Reveals stereotypes about the elderly. Discusses how students were encouraged to write about the aging process and their feelings about aging. Concludes that aging is thought of as a major human concern, but…

Describes a 10-week workshop at an alternative high school in New York City that explored how words come into a language and that involved students in writing their own reference books of words not yet in any dictionary (their "personal dictionaries"). Contains a 22-item annotated dictionary source list. (RS)

Describes an informal class for teenaged writers on sonnets. Shows that the young writers, after reading some actual sonnets, can work with this 14-line poetic form. Illustrates with examples of the sonnets written by the participants. (PA)

Describes the use of "poemakers," sheets of white paper with special drawings pre-printed on them that have blank lines where words go. Describes using these poemakers as springboards for writing in poetry workshops for students from first grade through twelfth, as well as with college students. Includes one finished example, followed by four…

Presents a three-part exercise that deals with poetic excess: heightened exaggeration of deliberately conflicting ideas. States that part 1 deals with hyperbole, part 2 with paradox, and part 3 with combining hyperbole and paradox in a single poem. Gives examples of students' poems using the technique. (PA)

Contends that an important theme for children in the middle grades to explore is that of identity, the task of self-definition States that good poetry and fiction can lead such students to do writing that helps them along the "slippery path" to self-definition. Describes several writing exercises that address middle school children. (PA)

Offers two expository writing exercises that, machinelike, move from word to idea to arrive at rich and evocative connections. Shows how the first exercise, the four-column association, produces a free-form paragraph or poem following a freewriting warmup. Uses the term "placket" to describe the second exercise, a poem that has a set of…

Aims for students to explore spontaneous ways of finding material for their poems by suppressing control over their subject matter and letting their unconscious minds do the work. Uses a poem of William Carlos Williams, "Red Wheelbarrow," both with K-2 students and adults in a poetry workshop. Illustrates class procedures and activities…

Presents a writing exercise for students in grades 3-8 that helps students write about themselves. Asks what will be found inside an individual's mind. Illustrates the lesson with examples of students' poems. (PA)