Tuesday, February 3, 2009

Practice, Practice, Practice

Shel Silverstein was one of the greatest poets of the twentieth century, in my humble opinion. He told fantastic stories with great imagination, a marvelous sense of humor, and a creative vocabulary. He did a fantastic job of making gobbeldygook make perfect sense in the context of his writing. Check out shelsilverstein.com for some fun practice writing poems in the "just for kids" section.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

I also think that Shel Silverstein is a great poet. He is creative, makes up his own words, and has a great imagintation. I have a book by Shel that is called "Where the Sidewalk Ends". It has most, if not all of Shel's fantastic poems. Now I can see that it is way harder to write a poem that rhymes than a song that rhymes because in a song, it doesn't have to make as much sence than a poem. I can't wait to listen to more of Shel Silverstein's poems that I haven't heard of.

-Charlie McCray

Anonymous said...

Shel Silverstein is good at making up words that usually make sense. He doesnt use the made up words to rhyme/cheat with other words. Mr. Silverstein is also jt in general a good poet in my opinion. Like Charlie I also hae book called "Where the Sielk Ends" with his poems in ther.

Anonymous said...

I think shel silverstein is a good poet. I thought that how the crocodile went to the dentist was funny. I am glad that it was funny because I don't like hearing or reading boring stories.

Julian Mills

Clemson is AWESOME

Anonymous said...

The video was odd, but I admire Shel's work. I have One of his books, "Where the Sidewalk Ends" it is very good. I think a lot of people think good poetry is easy to write, but it is actually very hard. Shel makes it look easy b/c of all the books of great poems he has.
Jack Bassett

Anonymous said...

I also like Shel Siverstein for his great imagination. I love his poems but I think that some have a more subtle meaning or a lesson behind them. For instance, the Toy Eater sounds like oh, O.K I'll pick up my toys, but it's actually more of teaching a life lesson to all. But, some poems are just plain silly like the Ickle me Pickle me one.
-Logan Ende (soccer is awesome go Gunnars!)

Anonymous said...

I think that Shel Silverstein is a great poet. The video was pretty werid but still. I also think I've read some poems from Where the Sidewalk Ends.

Christopher Gould

Anonymous said...

Shel Silverstein is a great poet. I used to love his books when I was a kid. Also I remember the poem about the crocodile and the animation is really funny.

-Alex O'Connell

Anonymous said...

I think Shel Silverstein is a very good poet. I also think that he is very resourceful to be able to make up all these fake words.But I think most of his poems for children try to convey a much more subtle message than what you first think. An example of this is my favorite poem "The Giving Tree".
-Jack Jiranek

Anonymous said...

I agree with Jack, the movie was very odd. It was a great poem, though. Also, he doesn't ever sacrifice any sense for rhyme. All of it rhymed perfectly, and he kept on subject, never just randomly adding in lines to make the story rhyme.
-Fleet
P.S. Sean Singletary is averaging 2.5 pts per game, 0.8 assists per game, and 0.3 steals per game. Just in case you're wondering.