I’ve been using Daily Sparks (video writing prompts from National Park Rangers) from Write Out each day with my students to write our way into our day.
They have enjoyed the videos that share the view of the Grand Canyon and time’s impact on our planet; the exploration of engineering at the Springfield Armory with the Blanchard Lathe (with a video in English and a video in Haitan Creole, which fascinated my sixth graders); and yesterday, they learned about George Washington Carver (most of my students didn’t know a thing about him, so it provided me an opportunity for a mini-lesson on this amazing Black scientist and innovator) before we headed outside to write.
It was a beautiful day, perfect for finding a place to write and make art. My variation of the prompt from the ranger about making an art journal was to choose one of the trees on our school lawn, and use it for inspiration for a story, or poem, or letter, or comic, or art.
I wrote, too.
It took a few minutes for them to find the quiet they needed for the activity, but once we were settled in, they enjoyed the change of location for our writing activities, and were able to be mask-free writers for a bit of time (always a bonus).
After some sharing, we moved on to our other lessons, but this slight reprieve in the outdoors air with our writing notebooks was just the break that we needed on a Friday to remind ourselves that writing out can be as simple as stepping outside the school or home, and finding a place to sit and observe and become inspired.
Peace (sharing it).,
Kevin