Ekphrastic Poetry in Kindergarten, Oh My! Exploring and Responding to Art through Speech Bubbles, Rebus, Free Verse and more!

Mary Beth Barbro

This unit is designed for use with kindergarten students, but could easily be modified for use with other grades. The goal of the unit is to develop confident, “I can” kindergarten writers who are able to respond to a work of art in the written form of their choosing. I will establish a “tool box” of poetry writing techniques for students to practice and utilize to express themselves. The students will explore and respond to various types of art forms including photographs, music/meditation/mindfulness and paintings. Each of these forms will be paired with an ekphrastic poetry response including speech bubbles, rebus responses and free verse poetry. The students will examine examples of each type of art form and then engage in a collaborative framework in which an example is shared, discussed, a writing response is modeled by the teacher, then the class develops a response together, brainstorming of ideas in a whole class format occurs, students write and illustrate their own responses independently, and finally students share and celebrate each other's work both informally in class and with the school community.