Students have a 'slamming' time at Panera Bread
Fifth-grade Parsons Elem. class shares poetry during Writers' Brunch
BY JENNIFER AMATO Staff Writer

NORTH BRUNSWICK — Happy face, thinking caps, pencils in hand.

First minute: Think of a topic.

Second minute: Figure out a title.

Minutes three through 10: Write, write, write.

Twenty-four students of Ramona Talbert's fifth-grade class at Parsons Elementary School held their own poetry slam June 10 at Panera Bread on Route 1, taking 10 minutes to write any style of poem they wanted to about the restaurant chain.

As part of the fifth-grade curriculum, the students study a unit of poetry, including haiku, cinquain, free verse, limericks, rhyming poems, list poems, rap, ballads and narrative poems.

The idea for the Writers' Brunch poetry slam came from the 1960s, Talbert said, when poets would go to a café, sit on a stool in the spotlight, and the audience would respond with finger snaps.

She said this helped the students be less reluctant to write and helped them explore "the beautiful language" without too much thinking, putting their thoughts down freely and quickly.

"There is no criticism. There is no right or wrong. It makes them able to take risks," she said.

Throughout the course on the unit, students compiled their own poetry books.

Myles Butler wrote "Mrs. Talbert's Class," including comments about each of his classmates.

"So if I go to school / I have to do a task / But there's no place I'd rather be / Than Mrs. Talbert's class," he read.

Butler enjoys rhyming poems because "they are fun."

"It helps me express what I think," he said.

Walter Pena shared "Crush," about how he likes a girl but "no one knows I like her except for me." He said the poem was based on "inspiration" but would not say if it is a true story.

"I wanted to write about my experiences so people can say, 'If this dude feels that way, maybe I can open up,' " he said. "I write a lot about girls. I like girls."

Madhu Murali wrote "Straight A's" about her struggle to achieve the perfect grade. She said in her family, it is a tradition to uphold grades and do well to have a sense of pride.

She said she figured she would be graded on her poetry slam assignment, so she decided to make that very point the focus of her poem.

"I really need to do well this time of year / Because if I get straight A's my family will cheer," she wrote.

Sandra Lopez read the cinquain "Monarch" about her favorite butterfly.

"Monarch / Blue, black and gray / Flying up in the sky / Waiting for me to pick her up / Lovely."

"Each line changes syllables, and it makes more sense," she said of the unique form of writing.

Brittany Ampomah also did a non-traditional poem, the narrative "An Old Lady in Paris," which spoke of a woman who was hit by a car in France and now will never return, and the list poem "The Yard Sale," which humorously listed "a broken piano that nobody needs" and "500 different candles from last Halloween" that were put up for sale.

"It's like a mini story but more exciting," Ampomah said of the genre. "Stories, you have to use characters. In poetry, it can be one little thing that can be big for yourself."

Through their writings, the children learned about self-expression.

"A poem sometimes will be closed off, and you say, 'What does it mean?'Then you say, 'Oh, it means this' … where in a story, if you write, it has to be specific. In a poem, it doesn't have to be specific," Pena said.

"Someone might think it's a personal thought and you should keep it to yourself, but with a writer's license you can express what you think," Murali said.

The students also had advice on how to write poetry.

"Read poetry so you can write poetry," Pena said. "Read a lot of it. Mrs. Talbert was always reading us poetry for inspiration."

"You have to write in a way that people can understand. Normally when you talk to a person, you don't talk to them as a poem," Murali said.

In addition, the students each wore a hat, or "thinking cap," and had a "writer's license," which is a badge that gave them the freedom to write whatever they wanted whenever they wanted without being subject to any judgments or criticism.

Talbert was especially grateful to her fellow teachers who chaperoned, as well as to Panera Bread manager Vanessa Renta, who accommodated their trip.

Contact Jennifer Amato at

jamato@gmnews.com.