When I taught "voice" to 3rd graders in inner city Chicago I
went to a thrift store, bought enough shoes with lots of
wear and "character" (high heels, men's dress, athletic
shoes etc...)so that each student could have a shoe. (Less
than $20 investment) I strung them up on a clothesline (but
a shelf or the floor works too), and stuck adhesive labels
on the sole of each shoe numbered 1-15.
First activity: Modeling. Write three 3-sentence
paragraphs to the prompt: "My favorite place to go" as if
they were written by 3 different people, each wearing an
obviously different pair of shoes. Students work in small
groups match the paragraphs to the shoes--ask why they chose
the way they did. Throughout these exercises, it's the
discussion that matters more than correct guesses. Correct
guesses earn points for the class.
Next level: Assign students numbers that correspond with
the numbers on the soles of the shoes, have them find "their
shoe", take it to their desk or take it home and do a
paragraph character sketch for the person who wears that
shoe. If I wear this shoe: What do I wear? What do I eat?
What do I look like? Am I male/female? How old am I?
Where do I work? Am I happy/sad? What do I do for fun? Do
I live in the past, present, or future? Extension can be to
add a portrait from the waist up. Next day, students find
the person with the mate to their shoe, read each others'
paragraphs, and discuss how to combine the answers to make
the most obvious sense for those shoes (collaborative
revision) Collect the revised character sketches, and have
students put all the shoes back on the line. Teacher picks
a character sketch to read aloud and then guesses (with help
from the gallery) which shoes match that paragraph. Class
gets a point for every correct teacher guess. I did these 3
a day for a week. My students were begging me to read
theirs and see if I could guess. Correct guesses got
photocopied, rolled up and put in each of the matching
shoes, which were put on the floor. Incorrect guesses got
recycled and we always talked about WHY I guessed the way I
did. Eventually all the shoes made it to the floor.
Emergent theme: a unique shoe=a unique person.
Next level: Have students select a shoe from the floor and
take it to their desk. Assign everyone the prompt "My
favorite food." Everyone writes a paragraph as if they are
the person who wears that shoe, and should make their
paragraph as unique and easy as they can for others to
guess. Return their shoe to the line and turn in their
paragraph to teacher. Next day, give each student a
paragraph and have them go stand under the pair of shoes the
person who likes that food best would wear. Discuss and get
it all sorted out so the foods get rolled up into the shoes
they belong in. Emergent theme: unique shoe=unique person
with unique likes/dislikes. For homework, write a
poem, "Ode to ______ (the student's own favorite food)".
You might share your own, or find some fun examples to read
aloud. Tell them lots of people like ice cream, so they
should be as descriptive as possible. I collect those and
read them a few a day and the class guesses whose favorite
food is whose. We talk about "how did you know this
paragraph was written by so-and-so?" Hopefully, on at least
a couple, someone will say, "because it sounds like so-and-
so talks...Bingo! We have unique people with unique voices!
Next level: Give students a number (for a shoe) and
distribute the same generic paragragh describing "A Bad Day"
to every student. Task: With your partner, review your
shoes' character sketch and favorite foods already rolled
inside and revise this paragraph, adding descriptive words
and phrases to make it more unique so that another group can
guess which character wrote it. (I did it triple-spaced and
with a few spelling, punctuation, and capitalization errors
so they could practice use proofreading marks and color-
coding; no final draft required--this was all about revise
and edit). Homework: Distribute another generic
paragraph: "A nice day" and have students embellish it with
their own voice. Emergent theme: adding unique words and
phrases = voice.
As students practiced giving their personal
writing "character", I would occasionally have them use the
shoes to write persuasive essays, like "Why my owner should
keep wearing me", and even narrative, "A day in the life of
the person who wears this shoe" or "Life on the pavement,
any story, written from the POV of a shoe". The guessing
game never got old. We did a lot of acting too—I always
had “performers” with energy to channel. I would give them
a copy of the Gettysburg address (which they had to memorize)
and they’d have to draw a card and read it like a toddler,
rapper, granny, Lincoln himself, their own mom, etc. Those
impressions were “voice”, and the repetition helped
everyone’s memory before their serious recitation for a
public speaking grade.
The class points I mentioned were accumulated for publishing
an elaborate class anthology (which I made 60 copies of--2
for each student, one to keep, one to "sell", and one to
present to the principal). When they hit certain point
milestones, they got one step closer to the "book release
party". They could pick out their colored paper, choose a
binding, design and vote on the cover art, take their
pictures and write their bios, type their final drafts,
assemble the books. With the room decorated with streamers,
some cookies, pizza, and soda, the kids dressed up for
their "book signing". It was a lot of teacher work (and the
photocopying was ridiculous, but parents LOVED it
and "bought" a book with any size donation to the class
(which I used to offset the cost of printing and
materials). Parents were always generous--even in a very
poor community. A few students read excerpts aloud. Some
years we pulled it off before Christmas, and then did it
again. Other years we just barely made it through.
While the original shoe idea came from something I read or a
tip from another teacher, it snowballed into a huge theme.
Those shoes stayed up in our room the rest of the year and
became our models of voice--our class characters. We used
them for all sorts of other things as well--math
(fractions/decimals), science--(forensic evidence, fossil
footprints), social studies (students wore shoes, became
their character, and acted as panelists discussing whatever
we were studying), even character ed (walk a mile in someone
else's shoes day).
At the end of the year we made life size butcher paper dolls
and lined the hallway with the shoes, and put the essays
each "character" had written throughout the year up up as
well. It was an amazing display of art and writing to the
younger kids and I was "that teacher with the shoes"
forevermore.
Please pardon my tense shifting, confusing pronouns and
generally awkward writing. I hope this sparks some creative
ideas for you!
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