"All Together Now" Festival: Color Out Poems

 

Local Arts Family Festival:

As one of the Stark Arts SmARTS artists in residence as a poet in the schools, I was invited to host a "Make and Take" table. I sponsored "Color Out Poems."

How to do it with kids yourself: 

1. Let students choose a page of print from a book you rip up, or from an online source,
which you can find by searching for "Blank pages to use for Black Out Poetry." I had both, thanks to the Stark Library book sales and my own search.

2. Show them some examples and tell them to seek out their own poem in the page. Remind them that it won't be the original narrative or essay, but different, that they may be capturing a feeling or an idea. I made three titled "Words I," "Words II," and "Words III," and printed out several from online, plus  this great example from California poet, Ruth Bavetta:

3. Have them circle the words that create their poem.

4. Color out all the other words, using blocks of color, blocking out lines, or drawing pictures with markers, crayons, or colored pencils. 

I was worried that it might be too hard for the littlest kids that showed up, that it might take too long, but I found that every child found something for themselves and many were devoted and thrilled to spend lots of time coloring.

Here are some of my favorite examples and moments from the day, leaving out faces on purpose:

Loved her t-shirt, "I AM THE FUTURE"

Everyone was so intense

My favorite poem of the day

My high school classmate, Lois Plante, brought her neighbor kids
to see her son as one of the clowns & they stayed to poem.