A Character Trait BioPoem for Famous Americans

We've been working on expanding vocabulary all year long. Recently we've been working on character trait words. This fit in nicely with our unit on Famous Americans and Biographies. I gave all my students two pages of character trait words. (See below..found on Pinterest) We've been through this list several times so far. Each time we highlight a few more words and write a "KID FRIENDLY" definition or

synonym beside it. These are staying in our writing folders. We use this bank of words to write reading responses, character descriptions, or more recently for our BioPoems.

The BioPoem is a patterned, nonrhyming poem that is based on a person's life. Having students write a poem versus a full page paper focuses their attention on the person's most important points.  Here is the frame I created for my students to use for their writing. 
Through this lesson I got in: vocabulary expansion, parts of speech , social studies content, editing practice, research skills, main idea....the list could go on and on. 

Students applied the meanings of the character description words as they created these poems.
George Washington looks like he means business! 

This project was also a great review of all the people they need to know before leaving third grade.
Can you guess from the pictures who these two are?

Students created illustrations of the person they wrote about to accompany their writing.
Explorer Christopher Newport looks like he's been at sea too long! (:

It's always a good thing when I can tie language arts in with my content studies. A great way to maximize my time.

 Here they are:  Our parade of Famous Americans.

Let me know if you are interested in the BioPoem Frame and I'll send it your way!