America SCORES National Poetry SLAM! journal: Three days in New York City

In mid-April, DC SCORES Writing Coordinator Mira Smith accompanied star poet-athlete M'kya, 10, to New York City for the 10th Annual America SCORES Poetry SLAM! and a weekend full of memory-making. During three days, M'kya, a KIPP QUEST Academy fourth-grader, experienced many firsts, made friends with SCORES students from across the country, and inspired a capacity audience on SLAM! night.

Here, in chronological order, is Mira's journal from the trip:

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Previous M'kya posts
Get to know M'kya, Part I
Part II
Part III

Written by Mira Smith
Writing Coordinator

Saturday, April 9
After weeks of preparation and excitement, it was finally time to head to New York City for the America SCORES National Poetry SLAM!. M’kya and her mother Akita arrived at Union Station wearing incredible matching homemade DC SCORES KIPP QUEST T-shirts. We ate lunch together, picked out some snacks for the journey, and boarded the train. I relaxed during the train ride and M’kya spent the majority of the trip sleeping and writing in her journal. After we passed through Philadelphia, M’kya started counting down the stops until we would arrive in NYC.

Once we arrived at Penn Station, we walked a couple of blocks to our hotel to meet the other SCORES staff and poets. M’kya and I headed up to our room (on the 25th floor!) where she met her roommate for the weekend. The first event of the evening was the welcome dinner for all of the poets. Dinner was virtually silent as many poets had been traveling since early morning and looked like they longed for sleep. The poets played a fun ‘human bingo’ icebreaker and then had their first rehearsal with coach Tova where they learned about the rest of the weekend.

Eventually we headed upstairs to our penthouse suite, settled in and went to sleep.

Sunday, April 10
Sunday morning began with an exciting breakfast of New York style bagels — M’kya couldn’t believe how big they are in New York! All of the poets walked together to the SVA Theatre where the SLAM! would be held. They were wide-eyed, in awe of the performance space, and I could sense the excitement building. Coach Tova led the poets in voice warm-ups and taught the complex choreography for the the group poem. Although repetitive and tiresome, after a couple of hours the 13 poets who had just met each other the night before made incredible progress on their performance.

Next we ate lunch at a Barbecue restaurant where the poets had a chance to meet and chat with some professional poets including Charity Blackwell — former DC SCORES staff member and the emcee of the SLAM! — from D.C. Already, the poets had formed friendships with each other and mealtime was much more lively than the night before.

For the next few hours, we had a chance to do some sightseeing. M’kya and her friends decided to start with the Empire State Building. Along the way, we passed the public library and then finally turned a corner and suddenly came upon the impressively tall building. After two long elevator trips, we made it to the observation deck.

M’kya and her friends were astounded with how much it was possible to see from the top. They found the Statue of Liberty, Central Park and even our hotel! Everyone decided on Times Square for the next destination, so we all walked together toward the bright lights and billboards. After taking numerous photos with disney characters and superheroes, we headed to the m&m store. Who knew there could be a three-story building dedicated solely to m&m’s?

We headed back to the hotel for a quick break and then made our way to a fancy dinner joined by SCORES staff from around the country in town for the America SCORES conference. M’kya and her new friends spent most of the dinner playing games including the newly invented rhythm game “SCORES poet,” and a hilarious challenge where a person needs to find a straw using her mouth with her eyes closed. Emcee Charity Blackwell challenged the poets to a boys versus girls dance off the next night after the SLAM!, and so by the end of dinner everyone was secretly planning their dance moves and music selection.

Although tired from the long day, we headed back to the hotel for the annual slam pajama party — a tradition each year of the event. M’kya and her roommates covered the hotel floor in pillows and blankets, ate popcorn and candy and played different games to practice their poetry. Their favorites included a pillow-fight/freeze-dance poetry game and a battle to recite the group chants with as much attitude as possible. That night, the poets had no trouble falling asleep.

Monday, April 11
After eating another huge New York bagel, M’kya and the other poets spent the morning rehearsing group and individual poems with Coach Tova. It was amazing to see how much progress the poets made in just two days!

We ate a quick lunch at the hotel and then rode a bus to Central Park. It was a beautiful sunny day and the group found a perfect grassy spot to play soccer, run around and continue to get to know each other. Everyone had a blast spending time outside and releasing some nervous energy.

Next we headed back to the hotel, gathered our things and took a bus to the SVA Theatre. The poets rehearsed through the entire show complete with microphones, lighting and choreography. They even got a sneak preview of DC SCORES alumnus Xavier Crowell’s slam poetry performance! The group enjoyed a delicious dinner of New York pizza and then headed backstage while the guests arrived.

Each poet received their very own America SCORES National SLAM! jersey with their home city printed on the back. While the poets did some final voice warm-ups with Coach Tova, I grabbed my seat in the audience and waited eagerly for the show to start.

The powerful group poem “It Takes Courage” started off the show and the rest of the poems continued smoothly without a hitch. M’kya rocked her individual poem, "Could Rap Music Be," proving why she was picked to represent D.C at the Slam. Whether serious or silly, each individual poet blew away the audience with his or her thoughtful and poignant words.

After the final group poem, the poets ran off stage to the reception. The group spent the rest of the evening autographing each other’s shirts and the audience members’ programs. In DC SCORES tradition, the evening ended in a dance off where the poets got to show off their sweet moves, be goofy and celebrate with one another. Every participant felt proud of their individual and group accomplishments.

Tuesday, April 12
In the morning, M’kya, Akita and I walked to Penn Station. We stopped along the way to buy a couple of souvenirs and then boarded the train back to D.C. The weekend was memorable for everyone involved, and personally I can’t wait to hear M’kya’s next original poem.

I'm sure there will be many more!

Winter SCORES: Kids learn how to fuel their bodies through nutrition!

Written by Mira Smith
Writing Coordinator

Again this year, one of my new year’s resolutions is to be more conscious of my eating and exercising habits. My main motivations for this apparently quite-popular resolution is to improve my athletic abilities.

Fortunately, I am coordinating DC SCORES' winter nutrition and healthy eating program at seven schools -- so teaching conscious eating will be a part of my job position.

Perfect!

For the next six weeks beginning today, DC SCORES shifts away from the writing program for a nutrition and healthy eating curriculum -- complemented by multi-school soccer clinics. The goal is to introduce to students the importance of combining exercise with nutrition to maintain a healthy lifestyle.

The curriculum covers a wide range of themes and activities each aiming to empower our poet-athletes to make healthier conscious eating choices. Each lesson will address a specific topic such as reading nutrition labels, serving size, food origins and drinks.

One of my favorite lessons focuses on fast food. Poet athletes will begin by playing a fast food taboo card game. Using nutrition terms they have learned, each poet-athlete will have to describe a fast food item for the rest of the team to guess. After discussing why they like fast food -- but how they should avoid eating it constantly -- students will create advertisements for healthy fast food items they invent.

Some of the most exciting parts of winter programming are the cooking sessions. Once a week, teams will use healthy ingredients to make fun and tasty snacks. This first week’s recipe is a breakfast banana split, which uses vanilla yogurt and cereal instead of ice cream and sprinkles. On the last day of the season, teams will get to try new foods including hummus, yogurt covered raisins and rice cakes.

Stay tuned for more blog posts about nutrition lessons, our cooking sessions with partner program Brainfood, and Giant supermarket tours.

Perspectives from Powell, Part V: Countdown to the Slam!

The Powell Panthers will once again take the stage at Columbia Heights Education Campus on Dec. 2. 

This fall, Writing Coordinator Mira Smith is coaching writing at Powell Elementary School in the Petworth neighborhood of Washington, DC. The Powell Panthers love soccer, but are also learning how to express their feelings about the beautiful game -- and much more -- through the poetry aspect of DC SCORES. Follow along as Mira takes us on a journey, through her words and those of her poet-athletes, leading up to the Poetry Slam! December 2.

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Written by Mira Smith
Writing Coordinator

11.20.15
The intensity, excitement and nerves are building for the Powell Power Panthers and in just one week we will add our final touches for the Poetry Slam!.

As their coach, I am unbelievably proud of the team and the amount of progress they have made individually and as a whole. I can only imagine how the poet-athletes feel given the fact that I seem to develop a stomach ache every time I realize just how little time there is before the Slam!.

These weeks, we focus on editing poems, assigning lines, and creating basic group choreography. Our first group poem is a chance for students to share fun and important facts about themselves with the audience. Together, we come up with the title “Now You Know Us” along with a clapping call-and-response rhythm.

During our first session of the week, we give any student who is interested in performing his or her individual poem at the Slam! an opportunity to recite it for the rest of the team. Coach Matt gives the group some quick pointers on stance, eye contact and emotion before their mini-performance.

Franklin recites a poem titled “They Tease Me” about standing up to bullies on the soccer field. Katie, recognizing her connection to her heritage, recites a poem in Spanish titled “Hermanos.” She promises to translate it to English for me soon! In America’s poem titled “Lone Wolf,” she compares her own character traits to those of a wolf. Finally, Rosio’s “Bravery” is a rap about her experiences reading poetry.

The students vote for their favorite piece and I am excited to announce that Rosio will be performing “Bravery” on stage Dec. 2 at Columbia Heights Education Campus.

For the remainder of the sessions, we tirelessly practice the group poems. At this point, about half of the poet-athletes have their lines fully memorized and some poets even create hand motions to go along.

In hopes of encouraging the team to memorize the poems, for Thanksgiving break I task each individual poet athlete to recite their lines to as many people as possible and teach the choruses to at least two people. Some team members even suggest meeting up over break to practice their lines.

While we are not yet performance ready, the Slam! is quickly approaching and we cannot wait to show everyone all of our hard work!

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Previous posts:

• Part I
• Part II
• Part III
• Part IV

Perspectives from Powell, Part IV: When I wear my Powell jersey

This fall, Writing Coordinator Mira Smith is coaching writing at Powell Elementary School in the Petworth neighborhood of Washington, DC. The Powell Panthers love soccer, but are also learning how to express their feelings about the beautiful game -- and much more -- through the poetry aspect of DC SCORES. Follow along as Mira takes us on a journey, through her words and those of her poet-athletes, leading up to the Poetry Slam! December 2.

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Written by Mira Smith
Writing Coordinator

I am -- Written by John
I represent myself
I represent my team

My team is happy
My team is tough

I am strong
I am nervous when I start

Other people are nervous
Other people scared

They hit the ball
They take the ball

We punish them
They punish us

11.6.2015
We have had a fun week at Powell working on group and individual poems. The excitement and anxiety for the Slam! is building and I can see parts of our performance coming together. My goal for the week is to make significant progress in the group poems and task poet-athletes to think about performing their individual poems.

While reading over some of the soccer poem choruses that poets wrote last week, I notice a common theme. Poet-athletes feel particularly connected and excited about the team when they put on their jerseys. We decide that our first group poem will give team members a chance to share how they feel when they wear their Powell jersey. Coach Matt and I hand out worksheets with the group poem prompt.

I explain, “If you could only get one line to share with the audience, what would it be?”

I work with individual poet-athletes to explore how it feels the second they put on their jersey and how that influences their attitude toward the game. Now, all we have to do is compile the lines together, add in our chorus and the poem will be all set to memorize!

During our second session of the week, students have a chance to work on both individual and group poems. This season, coach Matt and I have discovered that the Powell Panthers are extremely passionate about their families and heritage. We decide together that the second group poem will be a chance for students to share facts about themselves and their families. The group comes up with a fun interactive refrain with stomps and claps (which I have learned is a great way to keep the team enthusiastic and excited about the poem).

You will have to wait until the Slam! to hear the amazing group poem the Powell Power Panthers created.

After the group poem, I run a workshop for those who want to work more on their individual poems. Each student writes the words happy, sad, excited, nervous and comfortable in their notebooks.

“Try to recall a specific moment when you felt each of these emotions,” I explain.

Each student spends the next few minutes trying to remember and then write down a time they felt happy and a time they felt sad (etc.). Finally, I challenge them to choose one memory and write a poem about it. Although many poets initially struggle with the task, two team members write their first complete poems of the fall through this exercise. Shoutout to Conner and Franklin for producing your first original poems!

Each day I am thrilled and surprised by how much the Powell Panthers are writing in their notebooks when I’m not looking. We have a lot of work to do before the Slam!, but I am confident it’s going to be our best performance yet!

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Sad -- Written by Franklin I’m at soccer
But they tease me
So i’m sad

They tease me
Because they say
I suck
And don’t know how to play
And they say
“What are those?”

I will be ready
Stand up and say
“Better than yours!”

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Soccer Game -- Written by Conner
When my team scores a goal
I’m hype
And when we don't
I’m like man -- you had that
And when we win
It's the best feeling ever
And when we lose
I’m mad at me and the team

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Sad -- Written by Emelin
When you step in the field
You can feel
That you are in danger or safe
But when you start playing
One time
The worst thing can happen, you might not know
That you fracture your hand
Your life is ruined

Perspectives from Powell, Part III: Group Poems and Teamwork

This fall, Writing Coordinator Mira Smith is coaching writing at Powell Elementary School in the Petworth neighborhood of Washington, DC. The Powell Panthers love soccer, but are also learning how to express their feelings about the beautiful game -- and much more -- through the poetry aspect of DC SCORES. Follow along as Mira takes us on a journey, through her words and those of her poet-athletes, leading up to the Poetry Slam! December 2.

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Written by Mira Smith
Writing Coordinator

My family
My blood
My house floods with love
Love from my mom
We sit in the rug
While watching the movie of hugs
Kisses from my mother
Hugs from my Brother
They love me
I love them back
-- Written by Jennifer

10.30.2015
This week I have the pleasure of staffing Powell’s soccer game against Capital City Public Charter School. Seeing each poet-athlete’s level of determination, sportsmanship and caring toward their teammates reminds me how much progress the team has made since September.

With teamwork month coming to a close, I can see the connection each student feels for the Powell Power Panthers. In hopes of reminding the students that poetry also takes teamwork, I decided to focus on group cooperative work this week.

At the beginning of the session, all of the students step into the hall for a game of ‘cross the line.’ With the students lined up against the wall, I explain to them that I will read out statements and they simply have to follow my instructions.

“Step forward if you get excited before a soccer game.”

“Step forward if you get nervous before soccer games.”

“Step forward if you are excited for the Slam!"

“Step forward if you don’t care about the Slam!”

"Step forward if you love to dance."

As they step forward, I encourage them to look around and see what the rest of their teammates are doing. “Step forward if you want to be a team player,” and every single Panther takes three huge steps.

Next the poets reflect in their notebooks how it felt doing the exercise. Jennifer writes, “It felt good when everybody stepped forward because it shows they want to be a part of the team.” Emelin writes, “It felt normal when they did not step with me because everyone has different opinions of their way of thinking.”

Overall this exercise reminded each student how awesome it feels to be a part of a team but that there are challenges because everyone is different and has a unique experience.

After voting on topics, we decide to write our first group poem about soccer (what a surprise!). In groups, poets write a chorus for the soccer poem. I ask them to think about how soccer makes them feel, how soccer connects the team and to try to use some of the writing tools we have learned over the past two months. One group decides to write a rap titled “Messi is a Beast” and performs it complete with beat-boxing and back-up singers. While I do not want to ruin the surprise and share the group poem before the Poetry Slam! Dec. 2, a couple of team members wrote individual poems in addition to their chorus.

I am a soccer player
I am the world’s best goalie
For my team, no matter what I’ll block those shots and strikes
Light or fast or in the air
I’ll stop them
Running through the sky
I’ll stop them
-- Written by Edwin

When I’m wearing my jersey
I like to eat beef jerky
I defend the game
But at the end of the game
We lose and that's a shame
Midfield runs to the ball
As they were cheetahs running through the mall
When I wear my jersey I get so murky (crazy)
I love to play soccer through the day
But it always ends with our strength and smartness through the day
-- Written by Lea

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Previous Posts
Part I
Part II

Perspectives from Powell, Part II: Pumpkins and personifications

This fall, Writing Coordinator Mira Smith is coaching writing at Powell Elementary School in the Petworth neighborhood of Washington, DC. The Powell Panthers love soccer, but are also learning how to express their feelings about the beautiful game -- and much more -- through the poetry aspect of DC SCORES. Follow along as Mira takes us on a journey, through her words and those of her poet-athletes, leading up to the Poetry Slam! December 2.

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Written by Mira Smith
Writing Coordinator

Christmas we celebrate
For the things people appreciate
We give and get
But giving is better
If your gifts are clever
Santa comes at night and leaves us presents
We love Christmas
How about you?
Jennifer C., Powell Elementary School

Teamwork both on and off the field has been a continuous lesson for the Powell Power Panthers the past two weeks. I am thrilled to see that on the soccer field individual players and the team as a whole have learned to understand what good teamwork entails.

Now, it’s time to focus on teamwork in a less competitive environment -- the poetry classroom. We begin by exploring how to be a good teammate when a fellow team member is reading their poems, going over various ways to show respect to the reader.

“Make eye contact”, says John.

“Don't talk while they talk,” Bryan answers.

The Powell Power Panthers are still learning to implement these in the poetry sessions, but as the Poetry Slam! nears -- five weeks away! -- I am confident the team will begin to understand just how essential respect is to teamwork and success.

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Last week we had the pleasure of inviting Gowri Koneswaran, a poet from the American Poetry Museum, to lead a poetry workshop for our team. She begins by asking anyone who is a poet to raise their hand. At first many team members hesitate, but slowly about three fourths of team members put their hands in the air.

“What makes a poem?”she asks.

“It has lines and stanzas."

“You can express yourself."

“They rhyme!”

Ms. Gowri explains that the class will be learning about personification today. Personification is a figure of speech that gives human qualities to animals, objects or ideas, and Ms.Gowri explains how personification can be a useful tool in poetry.

Each poet-athlete is tasked with writing fall personification sentences. Together, the team comes up with a list of fall words such as leaves, Thanksgiving, pumpkins, wind or apples. Next they compile a list of what Ms. Gowri calls “people words.” These are things that people do or feel such as celebrate, sleep, dance or dream.

To create fall personifications, Ms. Gowri writes, “[Fall word] [people word] when ____________________” on the board to use as a template to make a fall poem. Although the students initially struggle to write seemingly pretend and false sentences, they eventually see how using their imaginations can lead to fantastic poems. A huge thanks to Ms. Gowri for leading an engaging and unique lesson. I am excited to share some of the Powell Power Panthers’ Fall poems below:

Thanksgiving eats when you thank someone
Halloween celebrates when kids go outside and asks for candy
Pumpkins die when it’s October and when it’s rotting
-- Written by Dulce

The pumpkins are sleeping. 
They are sleeping because they don’t move
The leaves dancing when they fall off trees 
and the wind blows them on the sidewalk
The acorn dies because the squirrel eats it
The rake dreams of eating the leaves instead of helping them get together
-- Written by Daysha

Pumpkins eat food when they get carved
Pumpkins get scared when the carving people come
The leaves dance when the wind comes
The leaf blower is scared when there are a lot of leaves
-- Written by Zuri

Pumpkins die when you carve a pumpkin when you make a jack o'lantern
My leaf blower exhales the leafs from my front porch
Thanksgiving teases me when i eat thanksgiving dinner
Squirrels eat acorns so they won't starve to death
-- Written by Lea

Perspectives from Powell, Part I: Building a poetry team

This fall, Writing Coordinator Mira Smith is coaching writing at Powell Elementary School in the Petworth neighborhood of Washington, DC. The Powell Panthers love soccer, but are also learning how to express their feelings about the beautiful game -- and much more -- through the poetry aspect of DC SCORES. Follow along as Mira takes us on a journey, through her words and those of her poet-athletes, leading up to the Poetry Slam! December 2.

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Written by Mira Smith
Writing Coordinator

Untitled
Written by Katie C., grade 5
I like poems
They make me feel like I am someone
Poems are like flowers
They don’t make me feel shallow

The teams are huddled together, focused and ready to play. The clock ticks down and the score is tied. Some students glance to their coaches for support while others check out the other team. Coach Matt counts down and yells “Ball!” Both teams scramble for a piece of paper and begin writing down as many words as they can think of that rhyme with the word ball. The classroom fills with whispers because, of course, this is the final round and no one wants the other team to hear their words.

“Fall, waterfall, call”
“shawl, wall, sawl”
“Sawl isn’t a word!”
“ssshhh!”
“Write it down anyways!”

The back and forth continues until Coach Matt yells “30 seconds left!” With a final push the two teams complete their lists. With a close game of 16 to 14, Team 1 wins the Rhyming Games.

The Powell Panthers perform at the 2014 Poetry Slam!. This October they're beginning the process of
writing original poetry for the 2015 Slam! on December 2. 

The Powell Power Panthers are entering into their second month of the DC SCORES season and with registration complete we are beginning to truly feel like a team. We begin each poetry session with a warm-up writing prompt to help poets feel comfortable writing their thoughts and feelings on paper. Our first soccer game is coming up this week and so it is only fitting to write about the upcoming game. About half of the team write about their excitement, the other half on their nerves.

“Is it possible to play a good game but still lose? What is one thing you will do tomorrow that makes you a good teammate?” asks Coach Matt.

“I will not give up and I always perseverance,” one poet shares.

Although it has been challenging convincing the poets that there is no correct answer to our prompts, every poet seems to write a little more each session.

During the past month we have learned some of the basics of poetry writing. Coach Matt and I have taught about lines and stanzas, descriptive language, similes and now, rhyming. During our descriptive language lesson we asked poets to write about imaginary worlds. Here are some of my personal favorites:

Bad Luck World
This world is bad luck
It tastes horrible
It looks ugly
It smells like horrible food
But hey, at least it’s quiet

Poem of My World
It smells like fresh air
It feels so exciting
Because we could go on every roller-coaster for free
But it tastes like metal
It’s loud of people screaming from roller-coasters

Coaching poetry to a high energy group of students passionate about soccer continues to be a challenge. It is not that the Powell Power Panthers do not enjoy poetry sessions, rather most of them have deep connections to soccer highly influenced by their families, a connection much deeper than to poetry. My students barely go ten minutes without talking about their favorite players or positions to play.

The other day while walking around the classroom during individual writing time I noticed that a group of 5th graders decided to list as many soccer players as they knew instead of completing the writing prompt. On a beautiful sunny day I often find myself feeling bad about keeping the students indoors for longer hours and convincing them that I would rather be inside the classroom than outside. Every session though, I try to give tools to the students to help them express their love for soccer with words.

I look forward to sharing throughout this blog series the new and creative ways I use to engage students less interested in poetry. Soon I hope I can share the story of a team member who starts to look to poetry as a fun and creative outlet for expression rather than “the practice that’s not soccer.”

DC SCORES Podcast, Episode 13: Meet the new staff

This fall, we welcome six new staff members! Get to know Soccer Coordinators Breelle Hunter, Emily Shinogle and Travis Worra (also a goalie for D.C. United); Soccer Program Manager Chris Hudler; Athletic Director Greg James; and Writing Coordinator Mira Smith as they begin their time at DC SCORES.

Listen below on the embedded player or subscribe to the podcast on iTunes to be the first to hear our latest content.

Photo below (from left): Mira Smith, Greg James, Breelle Hunter, Emily Shinogle, Chris Hudler.
Second photo below: Staff member and D.C. United goalkeeper Travis Worra.