Curated OER
Langston Hughes Was a Dreamer Too
Encourage your pupils to imagine their own dreams for the future. After studying three poems by Langston Hughes and listening to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s I Have a Dream speech, young poets craft their own dream stanza.
Curated OER
Sonnets
Explore the concept of rhyme scheme within a Shakespearean sonnet. After writing out their favorite (appropriate!) rap song and explaining why they like it, middle schoolers define a rhyme scheme. Afterward, they examine a Shakespearean...
Curated OER
Annotating Poetry
Use text marking and highlighting to explore the structure of a poem. After listening to Allan Ahlberg read "Please Mrs. Butler," learners locate stanzas and patterns on their copy of the poem using the text marking technique. Class...
Curated OER
Poetry Beyond Words: Creating Poetry with Linguistically Diverse Students
Models of and directions for how to write 20 different types of poems are featured in an NCTE resource. The introduction to each form highlights the embedded concepts. For example, tongue twisters encourage poets to use alliteration and...
Curated OER
There Was an Old Woman Who Swallowed a Fly
Here is an entertaining way to introduce your language learners to several significant grammatical structures. The children’s rhyme, There Was an Old Woman Who Swallowed a Fly, contains examples of noun and relative clauses for the class...
Curated OER
Animal Noises
The Spanish song, Vengan a Ver Mi Granja, provides young language learners an opportunity to expand their vocabulary. After listening to the sounds, class members name the animals and their habitats, construct puppets of the animals, and...
Curated OER
Arkansas State Anthem
Does your state have an anthem? Consider using it to launch a study of poetic imagery. Class members research the poet, the history of the song, the images presented, the format, and the tone. Conclude with a class sing-along.
Curated OER
Using Creative Dramatics With the Teaching of Poetry
Launch your poetry unit in a very dramatic way. Divide your class into groups, and give each group a different poem. After discussing the poem, each group member selects a stanza to study. The group then develops a skit that represents...
Curated OER
Poetry - Stanzas - I Am Poem
Reinforce the concept that many poems are organized into stanzas, each of which has the same number of lines. The provided worksheet template asks young poets to craft three stanzas that all begin with the same line and have the same...
National Endowment for the Humanities
The Impact of a Poem's Line Breaks: Enjambment and Gwendolyn Brooks' "We Real Cool"
Young scholars analyze the Gwendolyn Brooks use of enjambment in her poem "We Real Cool." In this poetry analysis activity, students define common poetic devices and the examples of enjambment in the poem. Young scholars discuss the poem...
Curated OER
Seven Jumps
Your young poets will jump at the chance to demonstrate their understanding of stanzas. Cue up “Seven Jumps,” a track on Michael Herman’s CD, International Folk Dances. Class members move to the music of each stanza and freeze when a...
Curated OER
Picturing Shakespeare: Creating Illuminated Texts
Learners experiment with illuminating important text. In this fictional literature lesson plan, students research Shakespearean sonnets. Learners identify key elements of the sonnets, and examine the relationship between illuminated...
Department of Defense
Do Dea: Music From the Ashes
This is a self-guided learning unit on the topic of poetry. Included are lessons, self-assessments, background information, learning activities, and related literature. Learn how to analyze poetry, appreciate figurative language, and...
ReadWriteThink
Read Write Think: Poetic Form and Structure
This online lesson makes use of concrete poems to teach the structure and form of poetry. Uses a "Columbus Day," theme for the lesson, but can be used any time of the year.