Today, I bring you the wee windspark! And other ways to show the wondrous power of words!

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🌬️ Windspark Poetry Lesson

Poetic Focus: Windspark – a 5-line guided poem that blends imagination, identity, and action.

🔍 Objective

Students will write a 5-line Windspark poem using guided sentence starters to express imagination, observation, or empathy, strengthening their descriptive writing and creative thinking skills.

🔗 Connections

• Learning Connections:
  • ELA: Sequencing; applying grammar: noun, verb (-ing), adverb (-ly); using descriptive words/phrases
  • SEL: Reflecting on dreams, identity, actions, and emotions.
  • Language Skills (for ELLs): Sentence formation, WH-questions.
• Poetry Connections: Lineation, guided imagery, figurative thinking, sentence structure, and tone
• 📚 Book Connections (Suggestions): Choose texts that spark dreams, imagination, and wonder:
  • Day Dreamers: A Journey of Imagination by Emily Winfield Martin 
  • Dreamers by Yuyi Morales 
  • If I Had a Little Dream by Nina Laden and Melissa Castrillon
  • If You Were the Moon by Laura Purdie Salas and Jaime Kim
  • I Am Every Good Thing by Derrick Barnes and Gordon C. James 
  • Maybe by Kobi Yamada and  Gabriella Barouch
  • What If… by Samantha Berger and Michael Curato 

📝 Windspark Lesson Steps Format

Warm-Up (5–10 min):

• Ask: “What do you dream about being?”
• Brainstorm nouns (animals, objects, mythical things), places, verbs, and adverbs on a “windspark word-wall”

Read-Aloud & Inspiration (10–15 min):

• Choose a book from the list or a wordless picture book.
• Ask students to imagine what it would be like to “be” something in the book.

Model the Form (5–10 min):

• Write a sample poem together using the structure. Provide sentence stems.

Line	Prompt	Example
1	I dreamed	I dreamed
2	I was… (noun)	I was a paper boat
3	Where	floating in a moonlit pond
4	What (-ing verb)	glowing and spinning
5	How (adverb)	gently

Line 1: I dreamed (That’s the entire line. Don’t add anything else.)
Line 2: I was (add a noun)
Line 3: Where/setting (Describe where you were in the dream.)
Line 4: What/action (Use a verb or two to describe an action that took place in the dream.)
Line 5: How/mood, manner (Use an adverb(s) to describe how the action was done.)

Example:

I dreamed
I was a tiny frog
on a lily pad in the rain
leaping and splashing
joyfully

Independent Writing (15–20 min):

• Remind students of the Windspark form
  • Provide sheets with labeled prompts.
  • Use examples from the “windspark word-wall” or their own ‘I dream…’ ideas
• Encourage the use of vivid verbs and sensory words.

Share (10 min):

• Invite volunteers to read their poems aloud.
• Or host a mini “Dream Gallery” with illustrated poems on display.

⚙️ Accommodations & Differentiation

• Younger Grades (K–2):
  • Sentence frames and visuals:
    “I dreamed. I was a ____ (picture). I was in/on/under ____ (picture). I was ____ing (action). I did it ____ly.”
  • Dictation or drawing + single sentence summary.
• Older Grades (6+):
  • Add metaphor or simile: “I was a cloud, like a thought drifting.”
  • Combine multiple Windsparks into a stanza or poem cycle.
  • Use vivid figurative language (alliteration, personification).

🌱 Extension Ideas

• Illustrate It: Students draw or collage their poem.
• Dream Collage: Create mixed-media collages inspired by their poem.
• Movement Piece: Act out the poems—each line becomes a movement.
• Grammar Hunt: Highlight and color-code nouns, verbs, and adverbs.
• Theme Collection: Compile all poems into a class book called Windsparks of Us.
• STEAM Connection: Connect to weather/wind science—how does wind move? How might a “windself” behave?

Wandering Down Whispers of Warmth

Today’s NaPoWriMo prompt asks us to try our hand at a sonnet – or at least something “sonnet-shaped,” to think about the concept of the sonnet as a song, and let the format of a song inform our attempt, and to be as strict or not strict as we want.

My Attempt

Whispered Warmth

‘Twas a comfort when my mom fought her fight,
To keep the memories close, through years to come,
It became our bond, our shared, silent light.

In my voice, though far from perfect, I tried to hum
Songs my dad sang — still ringing now from long ago,
And we found a piece of him – me and my mum.

The melody was more than just a show,
It wove through time, through love, through loss, through fear,
A thread that tied us to the days we know.

My father’s voice would echo, soft and near,
On the stage, in the stillness of a quiet room,
A song, a moment when the world disappeared.

And though the years have swept away the bloom,
Those songs remain, a constant, clear sight,
A warm whispered hug in the darkened gloom.

Now when I sing, it’s not to hold on tight,
But to find that comfort, and face each fight.

~ Vidya Tiru @ LadyInReadWrites

And Now, the End of This Post

Dear reader, hope you liked the windspark and will attempt to write one yourself!

I am linking up to A-Z, Blogchatter, UBC, NaPoWriMo.

And you can find all my A-Z posts (this year and previous years’ as well) here:

A to Z Challenge Posts