Alliteration
Writing Trait/Strategy:
Word choice; poetry tool
Mentor Text Suggestions:
- A Twister of Twists, A Tangler of Tongues and Busy Buzzing Bumblebees and Other Tongue Twisters by Alvin Schwartz
- All About Arthur—An Absolutely Absurd Ape by Eric Carle
- Alligators All Around by Maurice Sendak
- Alphabet Annie Announces an All-American Album by Susan Purviance and Marcia O’shell
- Animalia by Graeme Base
- Dinorella: A Prehistoric Fairy Tale by Pamela Duncan Edwards
- Faint Frogs Feeling Feverish and Other Terrifically Tantalizing Tongue Twisters by L. Obligada
- Four Famished Foxes and Fosdyke by Pamela Edwards Duncan, 1995.
- Six Sick Sheep: One Hundred Tongue Twisters by Beverly Collins and Stephanie Calmenson
- Some Smug Slug by Pamela Duncan Edwards
- The Awful Aardvarks Go to School by Reeve Lindbergh
- The Biggest Tongue Twister Book in the World by Gyles Brandeth
- The Wacky Wedding: A Book of Alphabet Antics by Pamela Duncan Edwards
- The Worrywarts by Pamela Duncan Edwards
- Toad by Ruth Brown
Description:
Alliteration is the occurrence in a phrase of two or more words having the same initial sound (e.g., wailing in the winter wind) It is a tool frequently used by poets to create rhythm and music.
Activities:
- Give each student or pair or students some sticky notes. Ask them to brainstorm as many words as they can that begin with an assigned letter and write one word on each sticky note. Then have them manipulate the sticky notes to compose a sentence/poem/story using as many of the words as they can. Allow them to use extra blank sticky notes for “glue words” such as the, and, or, etc.
- Write an alliteration class alphabet book. Use Animalia by Graeme Base as a model.
Tags: Mentor Texts, Poetry Writing, Six-Trait Writing, Word Choice, Writing Minilessons