Hey, Bug!

Last week and this week the students have been reading and writing rhyming poems. Poetry is a large part of our daily reading lessons as a way to focus on fluency. We began the lesson by reading the poem "Hey, Bug!". After reading, the students brainstormed things that bugs can do which we listed on the whiteboard. The students then brainstormed words that rhyme with those things that bugs can do. This gave them a starting point for their own rhyming poem about bugs. Starting with the topic word "bug" the students shouted out their ideas for the poem. We call this "popcorning" ideas. As students would call out ideas, I would repeat them and the students would decide which one they liked the best and we would add it to chart paper. We would continue the process until each of the beginnings words that describe what a bug can do were used at least once along with a rhyming word. We then went back and read the poem as a whole to see if it made sense and if it had a rhythm. Once everyone agreed on the completed poem, the students worked in small groups to rewrite the final version on chart paper, in sets of rhyming pairs. After the students wrote their portion of the poem, the students had to agree on what type of bug it was and how to illustrate it. Then each group went back and illustrated their part.