Creating poems about planets

Website address

http://www.sunshine.co.nz/nz/kia/coolstore/v1/msp/space4.html

My Secret Planet

Description

Literacy Hour is part of the Sunshine Online publisher's website for teachers and students. My Secret Planet is one example of the many activities for students that are available at this site. Here, students can generate their own poem by clicking on illustrated vocabulary items.

Technical requirements

The activity is played online and no download is required. You need the Shockwave Flash plug-in which can be downloaded at the site by clicking on Technical Queries. It is also recommended that you use the most recently released version of Netscape Navigator or Microsoft Internet Explorer.

Objectives

1. To revise and extend adjectives for describing nouns. Example
2. To give students an opportunity to experiment with sound and word patterns. Example

Language focus

Vocabulary: Earth and space Example
Food Example
Grammar: Using adjectives to describe objects Example
Text types: Poems

Things to do before the activity

1. Look at the website and try the activity to see if it is appropriate for your students.
2. Make sure that students already know the Earth, space and food nouns in the Vocabulary section above. There will be some new vocabulary in My secret planet (mostly adjectives) which your students can discover when they try the activity. There are illustrations to help students understand the meanings of the adjectives.
3. You might like to prepare the students for the activity by putting the following words on the board and asking them to match the rhyming pairs:

race, mail, star, flew, moon, floor, sea, more, space, blue, car, whale, me, tune

Point out that rhyming words can sometimes have the same sounds but different spelling patterns, such as face and case.
4. Tell students to go to the website and create a rhyming poem. Draw students' attention to the five columns and the column headings. Explain that they need to choose one item from each column. Ask them to print out their poems so that you can use them in the next lesson.

Things to do after the activity

1. Get students to illustrate their poems by drawing pictures of their planets.
2. Encourage students to read their poems aloud to each other and to you.
3. Follow up any vocabulary that students are still not sure about. Explain the meaning of the more difficult adjectives by giving examples of how they are normally used in storybooks and everyday English. Example
4. Give students a gap-fill of the poem and a new list of nouns and adjectives. Example

Ask them to create new poems using the vocabulary and the gap-fill.

Related activities

If you have ideas or suggestions about related activities that would be useful for your students, please let us know by clicking on the Comments button.

Pop-up notes

All the pop-up screens from this PrimeTeach file have been copied here so that you can print them out easily.

Example:
a pinky pumpkin
a patchy purple planet
Example: In my big banana rocket,
around the stars I race,
to a patchy purple planet
that I found in outer space.
Example:
mountains
planet
sea
stars
Example:
banana
carrot
jelly
sausage
Example:
blobby
freckly
patchy
purple

Things to do after the activity

3. Example: vocab1.gif (44526 bytes)

vocab2.gif (41454 bytes)

vocab3.gif (41996 bytes)

Freezy and globby are not commonly used words in everyday English.
4. Example: Choose vocabulary from the list below in order to make up a new poem.
In my ____  ____  rocket,
around the _____ I race,
to a _____  _____ planet
that I found in outer space.

It has ____ _____ mountains,
it has a _____ ____  sea,
and the planet's name is _____,
because I named it after me.

moon, yellowy, huge, green, sandy, turnip, fantastic, shiny, sparkly, cucumber, enormous, yellow, wonderful, gold, silver, orange, watermelon, pumpkin, smelly, lovely, dusty

Grammar notes

For more information on using nouns, look at the following in PrimeGram:

  Grammar: Word classes: Nouns: Overview

For more information on the use of adjectives and their order, look at the following in PrimeGram:

  Grammar: Word classes: Adjectives: Overview

Click to go directly to the website:

http://www.sunshine.co.nz/nz/kia/coolstore/v1/msp/space4.html