on·o·mat·o·poe·ia
ˌänəˌmatəˈpēə,-ˌmätə-/
noun
the formation of a word from a sound associated with what is named (e.g., cuckoo, sizzle ).
I love this lesson. I love it because it reminds me how creative and fun my students can be at the ripe age of 12 and 13. It reminds me that, despite all that media and peer pressure that seems to force them to grow up faster than we did at this age, they are still kids; and I love it.
I stood at the front of the room, making sure I had plenty of space, in order to ask the kids if they knew about such cartoons as "DUNNA NUNNA NUNNA NUNNA DUNNA NUNNA NUNNA NUNNA, BATMAAAAN! POW! BANG! BOOM! (insert air punches here)!" I got a lot of "what the heck?" looks from the kids, but I was not phased by this as I get it on a daily basis because I frequently make a fool of myself...for their benefit. Ask any child in my classroom if they know how to spell the word onomatopoeia. Guaranteed you'll get a "yes!" because of my teaching strategies. You're welcome, kids. You're welcome, world.
I gave them a list of nouns such as bacon, rattlesnake, rain, and a baby crying; they had to come up with an onomatopoeia for each sound. When we reached the word rain, we talked about how there are different types of rain, so obviously there are different sounds we could record on paper. One of the choices was shhhhhh. Here is the student "conversation" that followed that response:
S1: Shhhh, ooh... it's like a mountain.
S2: How is it like a mountain???
S1: (attempting to explain)
S2: No, it's not! (whole class agrees by adding their own comments)
S1: Whatever, y'all don't understand LIFE!
These are the types of things being debated in 7th grade classrooms today.
