Discovering Sensory Details in 4th Grade

I saw a dead bee on my step and it was so cool because the patterns look awesome with its tiny little stripes and it felt so fuzzy. And I saw cicada shells. I also heard them. It almost sounds like leaves rusting very loud. Or Styrofoam when you squeeze it. I saw an amazing looking bird. I saw it run away with its tiny little legs. I also saw a wood pecker. It looked like a mix of a cardinal, a robin and a chickadee. It pecked on the tree back and fourth it remind me of chopping a piece of wood in half. I also saw the beautiful trees across the street I noticed they were starting to change colors they were beautiful orange red.

            - Amani, 4^th grade 

Stenographer pads are just another kind of notebook. But within the hands of 4^th graders at Abington Friends School, these stenographer pads become the magical world where the words of  9 and 10 year olds pop. Inspired by Marie Howe’s talk on the popular podcast On Being, 4^th grade decided to complete an exercise in sensory details. Students would document different things they noticed about the world around them. This is to allow students to practice the art of noticing and giving words to what they see, feel, taste, think and hear daily. The results prove to be evidence of the growing skills of our illustrious friends.

We started by reading Jane Yolen’s gorgeous text Owl Moon. We took time to notice the plethora of sensory details that were present in it: from the sounds of owls hooting to feet crushing the snow as a young one goes owling with her/his father.

We then armed ourselves with our stenographer’s pad and went searching for sensory details around the school’s campus. Students quickly learned that if they were still and paid extra notice to their surrounding, the world had much to offer them: beauty.

As homework, students were asked to document what they notice with their senses. Some students told instead of showed. And that was ok. As they practice and receive feedback they will grow. The grammar was off ; the spellings needed some work. But that was okay. Why? Because the main purpose of this exercise was for students to have a space to freely explode their thoughts, without thinking about edits, and give words to their surroundings.

As the year progresses, these descriptions will be nuanced as metaphors, similes and other sensory details are introduced. The hope is also, that as they practice giving words to the world around them that they will put this into their classroom writing. One could consider these notebooks mere stenographer’s pads. But to these 9 and 10 year olds, it is the beginning of discovering and articulating the beauty of the world around them.