Every time I get a new group of Creative Writing students, I can pretty much divide the room in half: students who can "go with it" and students who are "stuck". It always amazes me that for some of the kids in my room, some of them have never simply written something that wasn't prescribed or "graphic-organized" for them. This lesson is for the kids who feel "stuck", who feel like they don't have words of their own to contribute. Blackout Poetry is a great way to help students get over that road block in their creative process.
I copied random pages from random novels I had sitting around my classroom. I instructed the students to choose an abstract concept (hope, friendship, fear, revenge, etc.), title their poem "Friendship is..." or "Fear is..." and then find their poem within the text provided. The tables were full of markers and extra pages of text. I gave students about 12 minutes to write, we shared, and that was that! This lesson was taught as a small workshop for our Snowball weekend, so we talked a lot about the importance of vulnerability and sharing their stories.
The lesson that I did was pretty informal. If you're interested in seeing another formal lesson plan that I've written, please just comment below and I'll send it to you
Other great resources for Blackout poetry:
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