Prepositional Phrase Paper Planes and Poems

This week we began working with prepositional phrases and I wanted to grab the kids attention with something hands-on (because, let's face it, grammar worksheets aren't exactly captivating.)  So I scoured the internet and pieced a few things together that resulted in a memorable lesson the students actually learned prepositional phrases from!

I began by creating an anchor chart with the students defining prepositions, prepositional phrases, and samples of some of the more common prepositions students will be using in their writing.  They copied these into their grammar journals and we were off to the fun part.

I instructed kids to fold a paper airplane out of a piece of colored copy paper.  You would have thought I told them they had won the lottery.  Once the airplanes were created (which, for some, was a lesson in and of itself), the students headed outside to fly them.  Once the plane landed, the student needed to write a prepositional phrase describing where the plane was. 

On the pavement

Under the bench

Near the leaf

Around the tree

In my hands

Below Sally's foot

Next to Carlos' leg

This went on for 10 of the most glorious minutes the students have had to date in my room.

When the time was over, we gathered together to share out some of the prepositional phrases that were written.  I allowed the students to write more on their plane that applied.

We headed back inside and used those phrases to write a prepositional poem describing the journey of our paper airplanes.  Using this template here, the students wrote the poems using different prepositions to begin each line.  We peer edited and then published on a Google Doc.  

All in all, this was a great way to not only introduce prepositional phrases, but internalize them.  Our next step is to take out some of their old Paragraph of the Week paragraphs and add the newly learned material into them.