P I Z ZA Z
People Interested in Zippy and ZAny Zcribbling

PIZZAZ has been an Online Resource since 1995 from Leslie Opp-Beckman
For Scribblers and Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL)

http://www.uoregon.edu/~leslieob/pizzaz.html
Description for Sausage Poems: A string of words which are "linked" with with the same letters/sounds at the endings and beginnings of words.

ESOL student level: These activities scale well to beginner through advanced level proficiency and can be used with all ages.

For more activities: Return to PIZZAZ!

Warm-Up Activities

What are the matching letters or sounds in these 2 example sausage poems (think of them as "mini-poems")?

Example A: Good dogs shouldn't tell lies.
Answer: .............d-d....s-s..............t-t...l-l....

Example B: Seven naughty, yucky yaks sang great tunes so outrageously! Yes!
Answer:..................n-n...........y-y.......y-y.....s-s.....g-g......t-t......ss/o-o...................y-y.....

Instructions

Students work individually, in pairs or in small groups and write their own poems completely "from scratch" or with starter words suggested by the instructor or drawn from a hat. Students can use dictionaries, as necessary, to check spelling.

Variation: Write the poems so that the first and last word of the poem also have matching sound/letter boundaries. In this way, the poem can be written in a complete circle!

Follow-Up Activities (or Assessment)

  1. Students' work can be compiled into a class anthology or wall display.
  2. Students can illustrate poems with hand-drawn or computer-generated images.
© 2010, Leslie Opp-Beckman, Ph.D., Distance Education Coordinator and ESOL Instructor
Email: leslieob@uoregon.edu
URL: http://www.uoregon.edu/~leslieob/
5212 University of Oregon, Linguistics Department, American English Institute Eugene, Oregon 97403-5212 USA
Permission to copy and distribute for educational, non-profit use only.
This page last updated: 24 March 2010		 University of Oregon