In this lesson, which encourages students to think about the sounds of poems and to enjoy reading them, students use lip-syncing software to produce an animated talking head.
Note: Preview all poems and poetry sites used to be sure the material is appropriate for your students.
Read aloud the sample poem or create a sample of your own. Ask students if they know who wrote the poem (Sonnet 130 by William Shakespeare) and discuss what the author was trying to say. Ask students what other poets they know and/or like.
Tell students they are going to create a class collection of poems.
Send students to Poetry 180. You might consider asking older students to find and record a poem they like at Hip Hop Poems. When each student has found a poem, ask students to make a copy and practice reading the poem aloud.
Show students the video tutorial of how to create a Flipz TV poem.
Ask students to open the Flipz TV software, paste in the text of the poem, and then remove the punctuation.
Then have students record themselves saying the poem. When they are happy with their recording, ask them to save it.
Students then can listen to one anothers poems. Encourage students to explain to the class why they chose the poem they did and what they liked best about it.
If you have a class Web site or blog, you might upload the poems for other classes to listen to.
Students are evaluated on their participation in the activity.
LANGUAGE ARTS: English
GRADES K - 12
NL-ENG.K-12.1 Reading for Perspective
NL-ENG.K-12.2 Reading for Understanding
NL-ENG.K-12.3 Evaluation Strategies
NL-ENG.K-12.4 Communication Skills
NL-ENG.K-12.5 Communication Strategies
NL-ENG.K-12.8 Developing Research Skills
Participating in Society
NL-ENG.K-12.12 Applying Language Skills