LET’S SHARE A LITTLE CREATIVITY WITH EACH OTHER…

Here’s the assignment:

Write me a haiku BASED ON a significant relationship in literature. This relationship may be romantic if you choose, but it might also be platonic, “it’s complicated”, or another completely different dynamic.

In your limited space of 5/7/5, your poem should cleverly accomplish the following:

• Make the literary work clear to the average reader (me! If I don’t know the story, I’ll clear it up with you on IG!)

• Write the poem in the voice of one character TO another character (see above: Tom —> Daisy; Daisy —> Gatsby, etc.)

• Submit your work in the form below!

I will be selecting FIVE WINNERS and sending each winner a book from their Amazon classroom library or personal wishlist!

ENTER BY FEBRUARY 13TH at 11:59PM CST to be entered to win. Winners will be selected within 48 hours and notified via email and Instagram!

I love doing this lesson with my students especially when I want to do something “holiday-ish” but not break my stride in whatever we’re doing in the current unit at the moment. This is the perfect creative writing exercise for any novel unit to get students to examine:

• Point of view

• Tone

• Characterization

• Motivation

• Conflict

…aaaaand you can also just have fun. Permission granted to skip the academic part and just have a blast watching students suggest people and objects that their characters could be speaking to. I once collected a poem that was Gatsby’s POOL written to Gatsby — it was gorgeous (and I think lost forever. Cue wet, fat tears!).