kid-happy, pet-inspired poetry writing: haiku and cinquain

We’ve been dumped on.

Big time.

Tons of snow has kept us indoors for the last few days, save from the few hours we’ve spent freezing our tails off in the white fluffy stuff.

So we’ve had more than enough time to do some kid-happy, pet-inspired poetry writing. And we’re not messing around.

We’re going big-time here, rockin the haiku and cinquain.

Bam.

We all listened, supported, and gave Maddy feedback on her entry into Pets Add Life’s 6th Annual Pet Poetry Contest.

YAY!!!

And after paging through the entries, my Maddy decided that in order to set her poems apart from the rest, she was going to have her poems follow a slightly different format, a format that she’s recently learned in fourth grade and one that she really loves writing.

She couldn’t decide between the haiku or the cinquain, so she did both.

One stanza is haiku and the other is cinquain, and together they make her rockin entry into the contest. I mean, how can a person decide between those two options? They’re both awesome, right?

So we brainstormed, refreshed her memory about the specifics of the haiku and cinquain, and did some kid-happy, pet-inspired poetry writing.

Here’s the skinny. . .

• Kid-Happy, Pet-Inspired Poetry Writing — Haiku and Cinquain:  Really, now that she’s in fourth grade, Maddy led the show with this.

She knew she wanted to write about our birds because she thought they would be a unique pet and that not that many kids would be doing the same.

She also knew the basics of haiku and cinquain format but wanted me to double check for her.

So she and I searched ‘haiku writing for kids’ and ‘cinquain writing for kids’ and came up with two really easy-to-follow resources:

• readwritethink.org haiku pattern
• readwritethink.org cinquain poems

A quick refresher:

• Haiku is all about syllables. It’s a three-line poem, with 5 syllables in first line, 7 syllables in second, and 5 syllables in the third.
• Cinquain (pronounced sin-kane) is a five-line poem with a pretty specific formula:
  

  a one-word title, a noun
  two adjectives
  three -ing participles
  a phrase
  a synonym for your title, another noun

She grabbed a piece of paper and started jotting down some brainstorming notes, starting with the cinquain and then moving onto the haiku.

When questions arose about word choice, she asked.  I need some help thinking of -ing words about the birds.  What sounds better: ‘budgie’ or ‘parakeet’? 

Owen and Cora were nearby, and though they are too young to enter the contest (boo-hoo!), they were on hand to help their sister.  And after a few drafts and several revisions, her poems were finished.

Though she loved writing her poem, I am willing to bet that Maddy’s favorite part was entering it on the computer, on the PAL website.  My kids love using the computer, any time of the day.

And after she finished, she and Owen re-read the entries, trying to narrow down her competition.

Talk about some fun reading–they laughed at the funny ones and got teary at the sad ones.  Some of those poems, written by kids are pretty darn good.  Gulp.

Really, kids can write haiku, cinquain, or any sort of free-verse or rhyme poem inspired by their pets any day of the year. Pets are a super topic because kids often have seriously strong feelings about their fuzzy, scaly, feathery, slimy brothers and sisters.

Find a funny pet photo or recall a silly memory of a pet’s naughty behavior, and you have ideal pet poem content!

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But now is a particularly awesome time to get your kids writing in the name of their pets because the PAL Children’s Poetry contest has some pretty great prizes.  Kids in grades 3-8 may enter, and prizes are a $250 gift card for each age group and $1000 for the winners’ classes!

And aside from the prizes, kids feel awesome when their writing has a real purpose.  A real-life application. But the deadline is January 31, 2014, so you have to act quickly.

Check it out.  Share this blog post or the Calling All Creative Kids! post with your friends and your kids’ school.

Or just share the Children’s Poetry Contest site with them, and you’ll still be good.

fyi: This is a sponsored post; I was asked to share information about this contest by my friends at PAL, and I gladly obliged knowing it’s a serious win-win!