I smell spring. It's coming through the open window in my office. There's no doubt about it...I smell freshly mowed grass, crocuses, and the first charcoal grill of the season. Yep...spring is here! Let's write about it.
Usually I say, "Write as fast as you can!" but that's how we'll end this writing exercise, not how we'll start it...okay?
Writers: Today (or the next weather permitting day this week) go outside. You can lounge in a chair or lay flat on your backs and look at the sky. Breathe the air. Taste the wind. Take of your shoes and feel new dirt and grass. Inspect...really inspect delecate buds. Pick up a bug. Watch an ant. Feel the bark of a tree. Listen to the flutter of bird wings.
Your senses should be on overload. Creative overload!
Go inside or stay outside. Write the word SPRING at the top of your paper. As fast as you can, without lifting your pencil for spaces, write every thought, word, or idea that falls out of your mind and makes you think of spring. This is braindropping at its finest! Time yourselves for one minute.
When you're ready, use your list and your imagination to write a paragraph, poem, or memory of a spring past or present.
Teachers and parents: Do the same activity. The only change is this: Take a piece of posterboard outside with you. Braindrop your list of spring sounds, sights, smells, and tastes (after you've had five minutes of silence). I know getting kids to be quiet and just soak in the gifts of the new season seems like it might be hard, but it's not. Why? Because first you're going to share your memories of spring when you were a child. Nothing gets a child engaged faster than letting them into your lives. It makes their writing relavant to what you both know.