Poetry

My daughter has been learning about poetry at school. All different kinds, in fact. But this week she had to write several poems for an assignment. She had to write a freeverse poem and a Blues poem and a ballad poem. Let me start by saying this is where her brain and my brain work so much differently. She is a math whiz - well, whiz might be stretching it, but she gets it and she enjoys it and she can do a lot of it in her head if she engages her brain. But ask her to write a story or a poem, for goodness sakes, and you'd think someone had asked her to chop her own arm off. I cringe when she has writing assignments because, number one, it's like pulling teeth for her. She struggles with writing so much (something that seems to come so much more naturally for me). I, on the other hand, still use my fingers to add or subtract at times and couldn't tell you off the top of my head how to find the hypoteneous of a triangle. This, my friends, is where the girl and I are exact opposites.

Number two, these writing assignments are hard for both of us. I could take her topic and run - but I have to sit and talk her through it - sometimes painstakingly. I'm not exaggerating. (She probably feels the same way when I ask her a math question!). So, of course I help her - usually by trying to talk her through it. Giving her little ideas, little tid bits along the way to try to keep her creativity flowing.

The other night we had greulingly made it through a blues poem that I helped her with probably way more than I should have. She did have all the points already picked out that she would write about - and she did help form a lot of the stanzas, but if I'm honest I did most of the work. You can judge me if you want to.....but obvioulsy she wasn't getting it. At all. So, some guidance was necessary (if for nothing more than both our sanity).

We finally finished that one and I thought we were finished. But lo and behold she announces she has to also write a 7 stanza ballad! I wanted to scream! I'm not even kidding. Did I mention by this time it was 10:00 p.m? So, we start brainstorming. She writes down several ideas, but nothing was jumping out for either one of us. I finally told her - you need to write about something that makes sense to you, something that interests you. And all of a sudden the lightbulb clicked on. She yells, "I've got it." and starts writing out her "plot" for the ballad.

She ran with it. I admit I did help her on this one, too, but not near as much as the other one. This one is hers, all hers - with a little guidance on rhyming, staying on topic, and how things "flow." I think she did a great job!

Ballad (by Dakota)

My name is Dakota
I like to show pigs
I wanted to win
and I mean win big

I picked out a pig
my dad thought was a loss
I said, "He'll be fine"
and I named him Boss

I brought Boss home
to give him a try
I fed him and walked him
I don't have time to tell you why.

My dad came around
to my good choice
He thought Boss looked good
I could tell in his voice

Around came the fair
Boss weighed 272
Would it be enough
to win the big blue?

The night of the show
we'd been in the ring for awhile
When the judge shook my hand
I put on a big smile

We did it! We did it!
I told you so, Dad
We'd won Grand Champion
and my dad and I were so glad!

(And by the way, when she finished this one she was on fire. After she finished the ballad she kept writing little, smaller poems for extra credit. She was truly on a roll!)

I hope she gets a good grade on it so she will be encouraged. As I said before, this area is a true struggle for her. But I thought she did great this time.