15 Sentence Portrait

One of my favorite writing exercises is one that I was introduced to about ten years ago. The 15-Sentnece Portrait was developed by the late Wendy Bishop. It is an extremely guided writing exercise. Each of the 15 sentences in the writing assignment has an instruction on what to include in that sentence. It could be a color, a wish, a body part, a specific number of words, etc.

In the abstract, it sounds like a straight jacket, but I have seen it produce some really excellent writing from my students over the years. And this year is no exception. I have an instruction page for it on my class website and even created a step-by-step PowerPoint to guide my students through writing one.

15 Sentence Step by Step Instructions

View more presentations or Upload your own.

I have shared this idea with others, and have had reports of similar good results. Give it a try and let me know how it works for you.

National Poetry Month and My Students Are Publishing

In honor of National Poetry Month I am featuring quotes by poets on my Almost Daily Quote blog. I am also going to do my best to write a poem a day for National Poetry Writing Month (NaPoWriMo). I will keep these on my poetry blog. Any feedback is always welcome.

I am not the only one publishing this month. My students are at that point as well. Last week I got them to start typing up some of their assignments on Google Documents. Even with my prior rant on Google Docs, I still find the service to be very valuable. After my students write up their assignments I require them to add me as a collaborator so I can help them edit their work.

Then, this week, I had them join wikispaces.com. My class website is located there. After they join wikispaces, I have them join my class wiki so they can add their own content to it. Each student is provided with their own webpage. On that page, so far, I have had them write a brief intro (this was freestyle--no explicit instruction past no last names used). Then they were to type in "Table of Contents," "Portrait Poem," and "Memory Paper."

Then we went back to Google Docs. I showed them how to publish their documents as webpages and had them copy the URL. Then back to wikispaces, where I showed them how to link from their webpages to their documents.

Most of them have at least made a start on doing this and are at various stages of completion. But, if anyone is interested in taking a look and leaving a comment, please feel free. Please try to keep comments constructive, these are beginning writers.

Happy National Poetry Month!