Pens to Pixels: Designing a Digital Magazine

By Jazmin Cruz

During Carol Jago's webinar "Writing Poetry to Read Poetry in Online Spaces", participants were invited to write a poem that reflects the changes in their daily lives during 2020. Using Quincy Troupe's poem, "Flying Kites" as a mentor text, our community of learners wrote their own poems. Pens to Pixels: A Collection of Poetry is a digital magazine we created using the free platform Madmagz.com.

Incorporating This Lesson 

The purpose of this lesson is to help students (and teachers) "pause and take stock of where they have been and where they are now" as we all navigate uncharted waters. This exercise uses poetry to encourage students to express themselves and reflect on changes in their own lives. It may also be used to connect with one another in online spaces, as Carol Jago suggests. The lesson starts by...

...inviting students to create two lists:

1) things students used to do in school or in their daily lives, and

2) things students do now.

​You may use Quincy Troupe's poem "Flying Kites" as a mentor text and this template to help students get started. After students have reviewed and revised their poems, ask them to give it a title. Teacher and peer feedback may help students communicate their thoughts in descriptive ways. Although a digital magazine might be the ideal way of celebrating students' poems, teachers may use a variety of methods for encouraging with their poet-peers. Here, we describe Madmagz as one option for creating a digital poetry magazine. 

Using Madmagz to Create a Digital Magazine

Madmagz.com is a free website that allows users to create and share their digital magazine. The free version features many free page templates with space for images, text, and a page footer. The templates also include a magazine cover, contents page, and preface. One of the best features is that, as a teacher, you can invite each student as a "Collaborator" and they can submit their page to you for review. If you would like them to revise, you can send it back to them! Unlike Google Docs, Madmagz limits the role of the collaborator to submitting pages to the "editor."

Overall, the website is user friendly and great for any level of experience in technology. For students, the fact that the digital magazine can showcase their work publicly beyond their teacher and classmates provides the authentic experience of seeing their published work out in the world. Check with your district's expectations for publishing students' names or faces as you design the digital poetry activity.

​Teachers should note that while some students would enjoy the ability to have their work read by others, some may not. Speak to your students about what they are comfortable sharing first and offer students the option of publishing their work using a pen name/pseudonym.

Pens to Pixels: A Collection of Poetry

Thank you to the 125+ poets who submitted their poem for publication.

​A special thanks to Janie Walburn, an Arkansas educator, whose poem title, "Pens to Pixels" inspired our magazine title! ​

If you missed Carol Jago's webinar, "Writing Poetry to Read Poetry in Online Spaces", you can replay the webinar by clicking here. Carol Jago's handouts and slides are also available. 

We hope you enjoy reading Pens to Pixels: A Collection of Poetry as much as we did! 

Read now

Magazine Correction: On page 63, Jennifer Williams is listed as being from Blaine, TN. She is from Blaine, MN. On page 23, Janine Wehner is listed as being from CA. She is from Anthem, AZ. On page 52, the poem is by Candace Miles and on page 68, the poem is by Candace Cunard. 

Additional poem submissions:

---

References:

https://www.heinemann.com/teachingresources/assets/jago-writing-poems.pdf
​
www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/quincy-troupe

---

Interested in guest blogging for the National WRITE Center? See our guidelines by clicking here. ​