Back in April, during National Poetry Month, I had the opportunity to sub in a fourth grade class. I read the book CAN I TOUCH YOUR HAIR?: POEMS of RACE, MISTAKES, and FRIENDSHIP by Irene Latham, Charles Waters. This was a 2018 CYBILS Poetry finalist.
As the students listened, I had them write down words and reactions to the book. Afterward we made a list of phrases. It doesn’t always work to finish the poem when I’m one day in a class and then gone for awhile as was the case with this sub job. But I know when I returned to the class we’d finish what we started.
This past Wednesday was that day. I prepared the strips and shared them. We read them aloud and determined that since we had some one that began, “Each night…” they would serve as the beginning of a new stanza. As I was writing, I noticed this line: “Fists clicked-Chains Cracked” and felt it would be a good repeating line. The first line and the end were givens.
Then each student placed their strip where they thought it might go best. We reread the poem, took away a couple lines, and came up with this response to Irene Latham’s and Charles Waters’ brilliant book:
Each Night
Each night we talked at the table
We didn’t know how
to explain the curse they gave
Some whites ashamed
about how they treated blacks
Fists clicked-Chains Cracked
Each night we plopped chains
classmates crumbled in shame
Classmates black and white
Some kids sat in shame
Fists clicked-Chains Cracked
Each night we gave forgiveness
We didn’t know how
to explain the forgiveness they didn’t give
Black and white forgiveness
Fists clicked-Chains Cracked
Each night we forgave classmates
with an apology
Classmates black and white apologized
Thunder cracked
Chains cracked
We forgave them
Shame hit
We cracked
In the end, we became friends.
© Mrs. Brown’s Fourth Grade Class
Today (as I’m writing this on TH) went into the class and we looked it over. We discussed tightening the poem and removing words. I explained how Stephen Kind reduces his drafts by 10% and Richard Peck tries to fine ten words per page to remove, I gave each student a draft and asked them to select at least five words that could be removed.
After the discussion, our poem looked like this:
This is the final copy:
It was a fun lesson to do with this class. I feel so lucky to be able to work with students on these mini-lessons.
Check It Out 
Thank you for taking us through the process of writing this poem. Your students did a great job! The poem is so poignant.
Wow, Jone, I love that as a sub you are doing this kind of work with students. AWESOME! I also love the editing process here… really powerful. Thank you for having these conversations with kids. xo
This is all sorts of awesome! Thanks for all your hard work on behalf of children’s literature and for highlighting CITYH? with your students.
It’s a wonderful thing you did with the students, Jone. So much learning & wisdom here!
Fabulous job!! Love that line repeat — very powerful.
Wow! That is an amazing poem. Thanks for sharing the process and product.
Wow. What an incredible experience they clearly had. And what an interesting way to teach them, well, really the essence of poetry by cutting. I wrote about cutting too this week.
This class wrote a powerful response to the book. Thank you for sharing their process, too.
Wow. I won’t be underestimating 4th graders anytime soon! I’m so impressed with how you helped these students through the process of creating and polishing a poem, Jone.
Wow. Just…wow. Powerful lesson and powerful poem.
Incredibly powerful poem, and from fourth grade students, what an experience for all of you, thanks for sharing it Jone!