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Dr. Park and Liz co-authored a book on teaching Sijo, which sparked this unit dreaming conversation. In this episode, we apply a step-by-step unit planning protocol to dream up a new unit on Sijo!
Unit Planning Step 1: Context/Spark Dr. Park and Liz started working together when Liz’s students kept winning the Sejong Cultural Society’s Sijo competitions. Sijo as a poetry form requires a condensation of ideas. It’s a 3-line poem with 15 syllables in each line. It requires an economy of words. Since poems can be about anything, it’s great for relevance and the ability to share with an authentic audience of peers, community members, and to the wider nation/world through the annual competitions. Unit Planning Step 2: Pursuits (from Dr. Muhammad’s HILL Model) Identity: How will our unit help students to learn something about themselves and/or about others? Students are able to write about anything they want. It’s also a great opportunity to explore Korean culture both historically and in the present through the form. Criticality: How will our unit engage students’ thinking about power and equity and the disruption of oppression? The theme of condensation relevant to the form can lead to conversations about what histories, stories, or even forms of poetry are included or excluded in the curricular condensing process. Joy*: How will my unit enable, amplify, and spread joy? *Joy is: beauty, aesthetics, truth, ease, wonder, wellness, solutions to the problems of the world, personal fulfillment, art, music Students have experienced joy in writing Sijo because its short length seems more accessible to writers who may struggle with essays. We want students to fall in love with writing as expression or writing as connection. Unit Planning Step 3: Project Question What are the most important 3 lines you could share with the world about identity, criticality or joy in this moment? Supporting questions or other ideas to build a PQ around include:
Unit Planning Step 4: Summative Project (Publishing Opportunity and Possible Formats) There many options, including: Students submit to a Sijo competition. (There are several, and many are linked below.) Publish poems in a class publication or school literary magazine. This could be a multimedia publication with recordings of students performing their poems and illustrations to accompany them. Hold a performance or video recording of singing Sijo. (Dr. Park shared there are examples of Sijo set to classical music and hip hop, which you can see on their YouTube channel.) Music teachers can publish students’ Sijo poems in a concert program. Art teachers can have students write poems and draw a picture to go with it. Unit Planning Step 5: Unit Arc Hook: What’s the thing they can't stop thinking about? What’s weighing on students’ hearts? Talk about how poems capture and transfer emotion to the reader. Ask students: How would you do that? What emotions do you want to work with? Build the Base: Teach the form (e.g., 3 lines, syllable groupings). Use existing samples on the Sejong Cultural Society’s website to explore samples. Case Studies: Invite students to explore the Sejong Cultural Society’s website and develop a collection that have commonalities (e.g., in theme or structure). Create gallery walks of these “case” groupings. Work Time/Peer Feedback: Once students have several Sijo poems drafted, invite students to put up on the board all of their poems and invite class feedback as to which one they should submit to the competition. This is a great point to invite students to make revisions afterwards. All the Links! There were so many excellent resources shared during this episode. Here’s a list: Competitions: Sejong Cultural Society
Online sijo course for teachers The electronic book of sijo referenced: Elementary and High School Students Unite through Sijo More articles on teaching sijo:
To help you implement a unit like this, Liz and Dr. Park are sharing free copies of their book, Sijo: Korea's Poetry Form! You can submit a request here. And, if you’re looking for more details on the ideas in this blog post, listen to episode 130 of the Time for Teachership podcast. If you’re unable to listen or you prefer to read the full episode, you can find the transcript below. Quotes:
TRANSCRIPT In this episode, we have another unit dreaming special. We have two guests on here today to talk about a unit that you can run on Zhou, a Korean style of poetry. So let me tell you about the guest that we have on today's show. Dr Lucy Park is one of the founding members of the Sejong Cultural Society, a nonprofit founded in 2004. As the executive director, she oversees all programs including the Seong Music Competition, the Seong Writing Competition and XO education programs. She has been very active in teaching seizure to teachers, students and adults throughout the US. For the past 15 years, she developed and compiled extensive reference material on the basics of English writing, seizure samples and teaching C, which can be found at the Seon Cultural Society's website and youtube channel. She pioneered the society's C and music program, organizing concerts and commissioning composers and songwriters to write c music in a variety of musical genres. Elizabeth Jorgenson is a writer and teacher who hopes her most recent book, Gwen Jorgenson, U A US A's first Olympic gold medal triathlete inspires young people to follow their dreams if you didn't listen to our previous episode where Elizabeth was talking with her mom about that. 00:01:08 You can absolutely go and check that one out that is going to be at Lindsey bets dot com slash blog slash 123. And let me finish Elizabeth bio for you. Here. She also published in Utopia, Teachers and Writers magazine English Journal and elsewhere. Learn more on her website Liz Jorgenson dot weekly dot com. Now let's get to the episode. I'm educational justice coach Lindsay Lyons. And here on the time for teacher podcast, we learn how to inspire educational innovation for racial and gender justice design curricula grounded in student voice and build capacity for shared leadership. I'm a former teacher leader turned instructional coach. I'm striving to live a life full of learning, running, baking, traveling and parenting because we can be rockstar educators and be full human beings if you're a principal, assistant superintendent, curriculum director, instructional coach or teacher who enjoys nerdy out about co creating curriculum with students. I made this show for you. Here we go. Welcome Elizabeth and Doctor Park to the time for your teacher podcast. I'm so happy to have you here today. 00:02:14 Thank you for having us. Thank you for your invitation. Yeah. Uh Do you want to start off either of you want to start off sharing kind of the context, the impetus for the topic of our unit brainstorm conversation today, I can start, I'm a high school English teacher and everything that my students do in class. I try to find an authentic purpose for their work. So we send it off to a writers' market, a publication, a competition, a scholar, some something right for, for our, our work beyond it being for a grade. And I'm always looking for these opportunities for my students. And about a decade ago I came upon the Jiang Cultural Society, they host a variety of competitions. Um They have an essay competition and then they also have a competition and I did not know what Xi was, but just using the resources on their website, taught myself and shared it with myself students. And I've fallen in love with the poetry form. 00:03:17 And I just want as many other educators out there to know um that this exists and to share it with, with them just some ideas of how they might be able to use Shiho in their classroom. Amazing. And Doctor Park, do you want to share a little bit about how you came to either the Shiho or collaborating with Elizabeth or anything that feels helpful for, for listeners? Yeah, Shiz is a very short form uh form uh poetry. So it require uh the syllable count and condensation of the idea in a very short uh three line poem. So it appears to be a very good tool to educate students and adults, to think about uh the economies of words and um you know, uh express their idea in a very condensed form. And uh so it is a very good tool for the education of communication skills. 00:04:25 So, um when we started this uh Xi Zhou competition, uh not many people knew about Xi. Uh and I, I didn't know that the Americans were writing Zhou in English. So I had to educate myself and then we develop uh the education program for the educators uh to teach them how to teach to their students. And uh during the course of our writing competition, we've been doing this since 2000 8. And then I noticed that uh these uh students won a prize year after year. So I thought she must be a good teacher. So I reached out to Liz and then we started collaborating. So it's been about 12 years. So we've been working together and it has been a very uh good collaboration. I learned a lot from Liz how uh she teaches students. 00:05:31 It's not only she do poetry, she is just an excellent teacher. So you, you, you're giving blush, that's very kind. So we, we are having good time together. That's amazing. And I love this idea of the economy's words and, and really condensing ideas into the form, like into the format. I think that's beautiful to just think about beyond even writing poetry. Like that's such a cool skill to be able to develop, there's so much there. So we, we've been offering the, this uh Shiz a workshop for educators and uh there were several teachers uh commented uh on that. Uh and uh one was the English professor at the law school. And then she said these lawyers have to really write their opinion. They are very concise and the writing is the best way to teach them how to do. So, so uh actually, while we are doing workshop, we learn from the teachers a lot. 00:06:37 That is so cool. So I'm, I'm really curious to know like in either live in a unit that you've actually taught or, or Doctor Park and what you've seen in, in, you know, talking to educators in terms of how um you or even how you run the workshops, right? Like thinking about like how participants engage with this kind of idea. I like the idea of thinking of it as a unit that someone could listen to this and, and take and implement what are in terms of Doctor Goldie Mohammed's framework where she talks about how, you know, we're really pursuing identity, like learning about ourselves and learning about other in terms of pursuing criticality. We're really trying to think critically about the world and the dynamics of power and pursuing joy and, and, and the joy that comes in writing and expressing and listening to poetry. Kind of what are those three pieces, identity criticality and joy that you see um coming through kind of the, the shiho poetry or in what ways would you kind of help people pursue those three things in a unit on, on XO poetry? Well, I think for me, like, why, why do I want my students to write? 00:07:42 And it comes back to this enjoyment and not every day are we going to enjoy writing? But I want it to be this lifelong skill that they pick up that they realize. Yeah, I'm writing for school but I can be a writer in all of these other weeks, months, years that I have to live. Um and I, I hope that that comes through that they, they fall in love with writing as expression or writing as connecting. Um And that can really, you know, lead them to be lifelong readers and writers and consumers. Um, you know, in terms of themselves, they can write about anything that they want in their. And so I often start there like asking students what's weighing on their minds or on their hearts. Like, what is that thing that they can't stop thinking about that? That might be a place for us to start. If we can explore why that's gnawing at them, why they're ruminating on whatever it is. Um that then we can use language to explore that or to connect with a person who's had a similar or different experience. 00:08:49 Yeah. So when we first started his own writing competition, we didn't really think about, ok, we want to make everybody a writer or they uh get the prize. But uh we thought that in any profession, uh good writing skill will make them go ahead even if uh you are a doctor engineer or even in business, if you have a good writing skill. So we started with the essay writing and then I came across the and I thought this is really good, not only they can develop this writing skill, uh the good critical thinking process to condense idea uh and with a good communication skill. But also there is a piece of culture, the from across the globe that we can teach uh Americans. So we have a multi purpose in teaching X. And it has been fun in terms of the culture, kids are very familiar with Haiku. 00:09:53 And so that might be a place where educators could start. Like we all know Haiku, here's another poetry form. Um But this one's from Korea and you know, it's just, I think it's an easy way to dive in and then like Dr Park is saying, introducing them to what's out there in the world. There's all of these poetry forms and we only know a real small sliver of them. Let's, let's learn on another one today. Mhm Yeah, I think about that even from the, the perspective of condensation again, like Dr Park, like you were mentioning, like what gets condensed. And so, you know, to, to your point is that like, I think what do we teach as the types of poetry, right? We teach Limerick, we teach Haiku like we and so what is being excluded, right? And what can be re-entered um to change that narrative is almost to me, it seems like the inclusion of um s as like a poetry form itself is kind of an element of criticality of like critically thinking about what we include or exclude or condense um from like all of the things that exist in the world and what we choose to put in front of our students. 00:10:58 It's, it's really interesting to think about that in like through the form. And it's fun too because you could do this in a day or I will take sometimes as long as three weeks to study this poetry form. And so it, it leaves a lot of just wiggle room for educators if they have a day or if they have a whole unit, this, this could work in both settings. I really like all of all, all of the directions of conversation that we could go right now. And so I'm wondering for like a summ assessment, let's say you do a three week unit, right? A full unit on s what would be the project question that you think best kind of encapsulates those pursuits that we were talking about. And ultimately, I think the project would be, I, I mean, maybe not, but I think that ultimately, it might be the poem itself that was written. But what's kind of the question that drives the writing of that poem? What ideas do we have? I don't know. Yeah. Is there anything that, oh, go ahead. Sorry, Doctor Park. No. So you can just, uh, write about something that bothers you and then that can relieve your stress. 00:12:07 So it could be a good psychotherapy. And, um, in the old, uh, the, in old, uh, Korean, uh, the times where the shiz goes back to about 1000 years. Yeah. At least I recently found the Zhou written by somebody 1000 years ago. So um at that time, uh sometimes they use it as a communication skill, they didn't necessarily write it down. So somebody uh wrote it down much later. But then if you look at the birth of voice, it goes back to 1000 years. So um often it was uh done by like a high society while they are drinking in, in, at a party instead of having conversation, they would just uh uh uh as a conversation so they could ask question and then answer to that question or uh the and then it, it's the culture spilled over to commoners and the commoners. 00:13:19 They use um uh the satire to uh mock the upper class or a lot of is about the love poem. You know, of course, they can, it is very commonly used even in western style uh poem, but also they express uh things the political issues. So, uh I think maybe we can teach history by reading all this poem. And then also maybe the student uh at uh at this time can write some political issue, current issues into poems. So maybe 100 years later our descend to read it and they said, oh, that was a problem at that time. So, um I guess it can be used not only in English literature class as a, just a poetry because that gives a lot of like a stress at the beginning. 00:14:21 Like at least, don't you see it like a student say, let's write poem and then they get, I don't know, I am not good at poem. I don't wanna write a poem. But then I say, OK, what's happening around us. So just write it down so uh or send a message to someone else so it can be written on any subject. So this is a fun part of the, the Haiku is so short. So it's uh it's hard to uh convey that kind of message. I think you're right that students are afraid of poetry, but teachers are also afraid of poetry and they don't know where to begin. And so this is a place I think where people can say, OK, there's a form and there's also I always at the beginning when I was teaching Shiho saying to my students, I'm learning alongside you. Like I am not a Shiho expert. Let's learn in this together. They really enjoyed that experience. Um You know, and then I'm thinking the, the emotional part of it is really key. 00:15:24 Um Doctor Park and I were presenting at a library and these women were writing their poems and getting emotional. And the same thing happened, we were at NCTE presenting on Xiu and this teacher was writing about a student who just was still on her mind. And as she was writing and sharing just this release of emotion, you could just tell how powerful the experience was for her. Yeah, she couldn't read her schedule because she, she was just started sobbing. So Lisa had to read for her. So uh but this is a frequently used technique in psychology to write about your stressful uh the event. And uh and that, that really improved uh like a post traumatic uh disorders. So uh they can just write a short essay or just a few sentence. But if they can condense into poem, that is even beautiful thing to do. I am thinking about so many possible like project questions. 00:16:27 So like I wrote a ton as you were speaking. So like there's the kind of what bothers you like in this moment, right? Is, is kind of maybe like an entry point. And then there's like, what like questions do you have? What, what questions do you want answers to like in the world? Almost like kind of like you were saying conversationally, like then I'm thinking about the inclusion of those pursuits that you talked about like identity, criticality and joy. Some of the things like you're talking about love, you're talking about, you know, political issues and satire and, and the joy and the emotion present in poetry. I'm almost wondering if there's like a question that frames it as like and bringing in also that condensation piece of the form where it's like, what is the most important or you know, what are the most important lines that you could tell the world about identity, criticality or joy in this moment or something like, you know, like, I don't know, I love it. I love it. It's so another piece is uh we, we just mentioned that most people are afraid of uh writing poem. But then when uh so many teachers uh who taught told me that when they uh when they say let's let's write poem and they go, oh, but then she said, oh, it's only three lines and 45 syllables. 00:17:44 And then they get, they get very curious, oh, it's like a puzzle or mathematical formula. So they suddenly just jump up and then all popped up and started writing. So they ask what to write one and they bring three. And then uh so one of the teachers said this student has no interest in poetry or literature. But now he just started writing uh and then reading poems and even literature. He said this was a good introduction to literary work. Oh, that's such a beautiful story. And I think so much is, is relevant, right? The the kind of like the fear often I think is the length of essay writing or typical writing that we talk about. And so if it is short, that is a great entry point. But also the potential for what poetry encapsulates like that idea of emotion or what is, what is most bothering you or you need relief from right now. I think most people particularly like adolescents, you know, really want to talk about those things and if there's a really short, like, clear way that they could work on expressing them, I think that feels not only doable but really exciting for studentss. 00:19:01 Super cool. Oh, I love this. I've had that experience, I would echo that it really is true. And of course, there's going to be kids that will say I have nothing to write about or I'm stuck. But, you know, just keep coming back to, we all have things that we're thinking about and being vulnerable as an educator as well and sharing a little bit about, you know, I got into a fight with somebody before I left for work this morning and I can't stop thinking about all the things I said that I shouldn't have said, you know, like, and just kind of opening a door to say it's, it's OK like we're all people, we all have these things going on. And one of the ways that we get through life is the arts, poems, essay. You know, that, that, that's why those things are there. So uh can I uh read the one of the winner of the X writing competition? So the is uh three lines and it's written uh 45 syllables altogether. So the basic structure is uh 15 syllables in each line and grouped in 344434443543 syllable count in each line. 00:20:07 So this is the uh uh winner of 2013 season writing competition. Roberto Santos was 1/12 grader uh who lived in Laredo, Texas, the border town. The title is still American. They say go return to land that I don't know. It makes no sense. Born and raised American. So Mexico is still foreign cultural cap, but this is my home immigrant. No Hispanic. So on his winner's statement, he said it's amazing. I just wrote them, but I've been thinking all my life and then I'm getting the prize. So, so he really condensed his idea and it, it is um beautiful. He, he kept his culture but he's American um and Hispanic but not immigrant. So it, it, it is a very powerful statement. 00:21:12 Thank you so much for reading that. I mean, I just like got goose bumps to just, just hearing that there's so much in there. Thank you. Sorry Lizzie. You're gonna say something, I was just gonna say like even sharing that with your students, like you can write about anything. And here's this one kid's experience who, although we haven't had this exact experience, can we relate to it? Can we learn from it? What do we feel? What do we think in hearing this? And then what ideas are we getting based on this poem? Not to copy it, but just to be inspired by somebody else's art who is our same age. This is a little bit of a deviation from what we're talking about. But I just was listening to this podcast about um racialized emotion and how in history, for example, like we don't often look at the, like we look at like white folks emotions and even in like standards, there's this really interesting, like um this phd researcher was looking at the emotions present in standards and they, they often talked about white folks like fear of like a group of people, people, right? But there's never like, well, what about that groups, fear of the white people in power? 00:22:13 And like, so I just imagine something like this even being part of a history class or something where you take these moments at Dr Park, you kind of alluded to this, right? That it, it has existed for so long, you can kind of look at these as snapshots and, and even take moments of current events like you said, and, and look at that specific winner or the winners from the last decade, right? And, and just look at what are the emotions present and whose voice am I hearing? And whose voice am I not usually hearing? And like, do kind of a criticality analysis of that using the poetry as, as the kind of primary source would be so cool. It would be very cool. And then I was thinking of, you know, I've obviously read all of the winners from the past couple of years and you can see swells in topics that correlate to what was going on at that time. Of course, the pandemic, right? Those years. Well, I don't know if we're over it. Yeah, but during the height of it, a lot of poems were about what people were dealing with those years. I'm wondering too as a type of like publishing opportunity almost like, so you could, one opportunity would be, it sounds like to submit it for a competition. 00:23:16 So whatever your students kind of create, you could submit it to the competition in other like smaller places. Do you foresee this as like a kind of read aloud poetry performance that students could perform? Is this like we would publish this and maybe like a literary journal that the school has. What are your thoughts and like, what would be the best or possible? I've done it all. Um So my students will write several Zhou and they can only submit one to the Zhou competition sponsored by the she Cultural Society. And so every student will project on the board, all of the poems that they're working on or like considering submitting and they read them out loud and then we just talk about each one and I'll do just a vote. I'll say, ok, you are the judges. These are the four poems that you get. Which one are you voting for? And then the kids will all raise their hand and then we'll talk about it. And the poet gets a lot out of this experience like, oh my gosh, I never thought that poem is going to receive the most votes or a kid will ask a question like, well, I was going to vote for that one, but I was confused here and then it will give us this opportunity for revision or dialogue. 00:24:21 Um So that's one way, right, where you could celebrate everyone's work, especially during the revision process. I've also put them together in a class publication and just have done it very simply taken it to the copy room and asked our, we have like a woman who works in the coffee area for us and just said, you know, I wanted this to be together in a book. And so she just stapled it very simply, but the kids really enjoyed it. We've submitted them to our schools literary magazine as you mentioned. Um And then one time I actually partnered with an elementary school class. My kids are juniors and seniors and I worked with 1/4 grade teacher from a different part of the state. Our students never met, but we worked electronically. So these fourth graders would write a poem draft. My high school kids would give them feedback electronically, they would work to polish it. And then we ended up putting together a uh like an electronic book with readings. Like the kids recorded themselves reading their own, they illustrated their poem. And then we had that book available online for parents and community members. Of course, we posted it on social media. 00:25:23 We shared it with our school board. I can send you a copy of it for the show notes if people want to see what we did. Um But yeah, I think that the possibilities are really limitless just as many as you can think of run with it. Yeah, I know some uh adult, she's a poet who uh submitted to, you know, poetry journal and uh was able to publish in print as well as online. And uh we organize X writing competition. The eligibility is people uh in North America USA and Canada. So the submission deadline is at the end of March, but we also have international International XI Competition and everybody in the whole world can participate, including uh citizens of USA and Canada. Uh The submission deadline is at the end of September. And then for those who live in Wisconsin, the University of Wisconsin and X Cultural Society collaborates and we have Wisconsin digital Competition. 00:26:30 So there are three competition and uh there was a competition by Ohio State University. Uh I don't know if they are still continuing. Uh There was a competition by uh Los Angeles Cultural uh Korean Cultural Center. Uh I have to check if they are going to offer the competition again. So there are some competition and uh it's not just the writing the, we wanted to continue our old tradition of singing Zhou. So we have organized uh some uh the song making. So we had uh classical musicians to write music uh with X and as well as hip hop group to write hip hop songs with XI. So if you come to our website, uh we have a X Culture Society, youtube channel. So you will be able to listen to their performance or watch video tape of the hip hop group called Elephant uh Rebellion in Chicago. 00:27:38 They sang Zhong into hip hop songs. So we, we would like to expand this project, but it's uh it's been hard. So, you know, regular, like a poetry loud program. They usually read the long poems so they don't want to read only three lines. But uh the Elephant Rebellion, they uh the, the, it's a group of hip hop musicians. So each one wrote Zhou and then they took to, and then they use the, the, that I just read uh the Still American as a refrain. So they all uh saying uh with the theme of all these immigrant issue. So I, yeah, I'm looking for hip hop musicians who can work with us. I'm just thinking of all the students who are musically talented but may not be traditionally like seeing themselves as writers who would have a beautiful entry point, either for writing their own or to collaborate. You know, like let's do an interdisciplinary project where the music teacher works with the English teacher or something. 00:28:47 You know, there's some sort of collaboration across different classrooms to kind of create something like that. At the end that they create like a full song class wide or something. Super cool. That makes me think of the band teacher at my school was doing some Korean music or music written by Korean composers and he knew that I was into Shiho. And so he asked me to come in and all of his band students sat in the auditorium and I presented to them Shiho and said, OK, now let's try it. And they all wrote their own Shiho poems. And then he published some in the program. So while parents were waiting for the concert to begin, they could learn about this Korean poetry form and then read some of the poems that were written by the performers. And so it's just, you know, another idea of what, like you're saying, cross curriculum um opportunities And then uh in, in Korea, there is a tradition of combining poetry and art. So they write poem and then they draw the picture. 00:29:48 So it is uh in, in one piece, there is a, a poem written at one corner and then just a small drawing that represent the content of the poem. So I can uh Zhou can be combined. So I hope the found that art teacher who is interested in doing the project at her school. Yes, it's so hard. Like you try to find these hours to collaborate across disciplines. But it's like it's, it's very challenging. But yes, I did. I brought some, I, I actually showed the culture society's website to my art teacher and said, here's how you can find all of the previous winning Shiho this could be an inspiration for your art students. And so now that A PS are done, that's I think what they're working on currently. So we'll see what, what ends up happening with that collab. It could be a good project, but some are, yes, that is amazing. Oh, this is so cool. And I'm thinking about all of these pieces too, like the different artistic pieces, both visually auditory and also the the succinctness of the, the the form. 00:30:59 It also I think you had mentioned was that people had put things on social media, like it lends itself very easily to publishing on social media because of the length. And because of all of the artistic dynamics like that, that in and of itself could be a really cool publishing format as all it sounds like. Yeah, you know, we tweet once a week. So so far we've been tweeting uh mostly the winners of the past as cultural society, the writing competition. Amazing. We should link to that in the show notes. That would be really cool to see. Thank you. Yeah. So this has been amazing in terms of just kind of thinking through all of what could be possible in, in teaching a she unit. I think as a hook, it sounds like it would probably be if you were to start this unit off with kind of drawing students in perhaps asking them that question of like what's on your mind, right? Like what are the things that you can't stop thinking about? What bothers you? I is that how you would start them off? And then kind of where would you if so like where do you go from there to kind of like teach the form or to kind of build that base of knowledge before they're kind of getting into? 00:32:08 Um maybe some looking at some different like cases or, or drawing or creating their own pieces. Yeah, I think you might, you know, allow them to talk about those things and then say that, you know, poems like all forms of art they capture and then they transfer that emotion to the reader how will your poem do that? How will you capture and then transfer that emotion and maybe even identifying what emotions do I want to work with. And, you know, they, they can be negative or challenging, but they don't have to, they can be positive and uplifting or it could be a range of emotion. And then I think, you know, you do have to talk about the form. So it's three lines, there's this syllable grouping in each line. Um There's syllable totals that we want and I'll show that and then sometimes kind of get the deer in headlights look like. What is that? But then once you show an example like the Roberto Santos example and that one fits perfectly with the syllable groupings. The kids are they get it. 00:33:09 They're like, oh, II I can do that. And so building up that confidence in showing examples and part of what I love about is that you read them and you just get them. It's not that type of poem that's so removed from studentss or that, you know, there's not like a lot of flowery or vague language. It's really just clear and it captures and then transfers that emotion. And so then, um, I'll often give students a link to the website and say, go explore, read a bunch of different poems that have won in the competition and then come back with something interesting to say, and then that will build our dialogue some kids will have questions like I don't get how this fits the form or I noticed this here or I can't believe this one was an honorable mention. It totally should have won first place. And you know, it just then helps us talk more about what's expected. I love that there is a kind of like a a library already of all of the existing post in the competition to, to be able to, to share that link with students and let them explore. 00:34:12 I'm wondering too, I often think of things like case studies. Like we would do a gallery walk with like a certain theme or a certain topic or way that you would use it or is there any kind of so far? I've heard that there are kind of like topical like immigration would be like a topic that you could kind of look at several that cover that topic. But then I also am hearing that there's kind of these like, like different ways that people would use art. So here is a poem with music and here's a poem with the visual art. And I'm just wondering, are there any other groupings that you might think about sharing the poems with within kind of a category or a group of students to show them like the different case case studies almost? Are you thinking of some Doctor Park? No, I mean, our winners uh wrote on subjects. So a variety of uh subjects. So, white subjects. So, uh, the one of the winner was adoptee. So she wrote about, uh, that, uh, another winner, uh, wrote apparently there's a dating web. So, uh, the dating app. 00:35:14 So if you turn right and that's a good or left, it's bad. So, can I read it swiping left, then left, left to right. Judging faces without a thought, seeking logs that finish the heart. Oh, could you be my Visa? Right. Marriage bells ring left, right, left, right for the fifth time this minute. So, yeah, she won third place in uh 2019. And uh so, I mean, it, it, it, it's just, uh, there are so many things you can write about. So during uh the beginning of Me too movement, there was a about that topic too. Uh and uh some uh student wrote about his uh brother who was a handicapped. Uh So, I mean, there is no limitation of the topic. So at this time, we are just leaving it open. Any topic you, you want you want to use instead of limiting? 00:36:21 Ok. Right. On this topic, it's anything poets write about, you'll see lots of love, lots of um ones about family or relationships. Um I had a student this year who placed as an honorable mention and he wrote about secrets and, and just what secrets do to us and you know, it really anything and that could even be, you could say to kids. Bring to us a case study, you'd say the topic and then you find three or four that fit with that and then bring it to us. What do you notice? What are those poets doing? I love that because then they could, I, I just think about, like, inductive categorization as, like, just an activity. Right. And they could, they could come up with any kind of category. Right. It could be topical. It could be exactly what are they doing within the form? Like how are they structuring this in a unique way or, or you know? Oh, so cool. And then you could make small groups too. Ok. I'm hearing the, you four are talking about love, compare your poems. You three have all talked about structure. Uh What did, what did you notice? 00:37:23 I had um I showed my students first semester, a poem where the title connected to the first line. The title was Absentee Parents. And then the first line of the poem was make excuses when asked why they aren't at your concert. So if you read it all together, absentee parents make their excuses when asked why they aren't at your concert. And then the many students were inspired by that idea. And actually the one that I was talking to you about um the one with Secrets, he did the same thing. He then connected his title, Secrets. Create a bond between friends that transcends all of their bonds. Now, you don't, wouldn't read it again. But he wanted you to think about it. Secrets have power and can test the true character of a person. Secrets can destroy relationships before you even blink an eye. It's like, ah, you know, and so just by gathering those ideas then they'll have others that will spark their own creativity. Hi, everyone. It's Lee just hopping in here quickly to tell you about today's freebie for the episode. Liz and Doctor Park are sharing free copies of their book, Sjo Korea's poetry form and you can submit a request to have them send their book to you to find this link. 00:38:29 Go to Lindsey bets dot com slash blog slash 1 30 back to the episode. I love this so much and because they're so short, you can, you could look at so many in one class period. Like it's not like you're just studying one really lengthy poem for like 45 minutes, right? Like I, I love this idea and I, I think there's so much in here for anyone who is, is unfamiliar. You, you both have just given so many concrete ideas that I think someone who's unfamiliar with. Xuzhou could go and like teach a, a pre coherent unit pretty quickly with the amazing information and ideas that you've provided today. So, thank you so much. Is there anything that we didn't cover that you want to share? Yeah. So Lisa and I edited the book. It's titled Shiho Korea's poetry form. So it has everything about basics of Shiho history and uh the teaching plan for the educators. And many uh the winners, Zhou passed the decision, writing competition winner with commentary by experts. 00:39:36 So this will be the uh the the reference for Xi who wants to learn about Xi. And it is available on Amazon. We also are offering an online course for teachers. Um And so if people wanted to, it's asynchronous, but we have some synchronous opportunities for people. And so if they wanted to take a course um and learn a little bit more. That's also on the Jiang Cultural Society's website. I'll send you all of this, you can put it in the show notes. Um People can also reach out to us. We would love to collaborate with more people, especially if you have an idea about music or art or whatever. Like we're always looking, the more people we can bring in. It's just, it's enriched my life in so many ways. So in July, we have two day uh the virtual workshop. So we'll cover all the topics. Uh It is in uh this year in July 18th and 25th on Tuesday 3.5 hours each. So uh I can send you the information by the way, the book, uh If you are an educator, send us email at culture society at gmail dot com, then we'll send you complimentary copy and one of my favorite part of the books, there's a section called My Favorite Shi. 00:40:55 And so it gives a winning shi talks about the student who wrote it. And then there's an analysis from a Shiho expert. And so I will actually share this book with my students and say this is like the gem, this is, this is the gold read. Why this poem is effective from a Shiho expert and then either counter it or agree with it or bring it back. And the kids, they learn so much in just reading what somebody else thought of the poem, it helps them analyze other poems and just gives them ideas or language. Oh, I never even thought I could talk about how the poem looked or that it used whatever, you know. And so that's, it's a really, it's one of my favorite sections that is brilliant to include that I was just thinking about, there's a book uh about Ruth Bader Ginsburg's Cases. And there's in the back is literally an appendix where someone goes in and actually just like from a lawyer's perspective, analyzes it. And I'm like that taught me so much more than like reading any sort of history text. So that idea of looking into someone else's analysis. 00:41:57 Brilliant. I love that there's a topic on that and also insight into the poet, why they made the choices that they did something that you might not know that then they can illuminate for you Oh, brilliant. And I love that you all included like how to get in touch with you and how to get these resources. That was gonna be my next question. So thank you for answering. You can put everything in the show notes and I was gonna say everything will be in the show notes if you're driving. Don't worry, we have all those links for you in there. Yeah. So youtube channel, just a Google youtube channel, its own cultural society. There are many lectures uh by the professors and Liz Joson as well as some other high school uh teachers and the Xi Zhong music and everything. So uh visit the X Zhong cultural Society website and youtube channel. Beautiful. Thank you so much, Doctor Park and Liz. I just so appreciate your time today. This was so inspiring. Thank you for being on the show. Thank you for having. If you're leaving this episode wanting more, you're going to love my life, coaching intensive curriculum, boot camp. 00:43:06 I help one department or grade team create feminist anti racist curricula that challenges affirms and inspires all students. We weave current events into course content and amplify student voices which skyrockets engagement and academic achievement. It energizes educators feeling burns out and it's just two days. Plus you can reuse the same process any time you create a new unit which saves time and money. If you can't wait to bring this to your staff, I'm inviting you to sign up for a 20 minute call with me. Grab a spot on my calendar at www dot Lindsay beth lions dot com slash contact. Until next time, leaders continue to think big act brave and be your best self. This podcast is a proud member of the Teach Better Podcast Network. 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AuthorLindsay Lyons (she/her) is an educational justice coach who works with teachers and school leaders to inspire educational innovation for racial and gender justice, design curricula grounded in student voice, and build capacity for shared leadership. Lindsay taught in NYC public schools, holds a PhD in Leadership and Change, and is the founder of the educational blog and podcast, Time for Teachership. Archives
March 2025
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