Poets generally choose each word carefully, and Robinson Jeffers is no exception to this rule. Look closely at Jeffers' word choice in "Inscription for a Gravestone" and "The Deer Lay Down Their Bones" through discussion and writing....

Good grief? Elizabeth Barrett Browning's "Grief" and Emily Dickinson's "After great pain, a formal feeling comes" are the focus of a series of close reading activities that ask groups to compare the point of view and tone of these two...

Gentle sleep eludes poor King Henry IV. Uneasy under the weight of his responsibilities, Henry contemplates the darkness of the night and in his soul. To develop their skill reading difficult text, class members engage in a close reading...

Focus on the musicality of poetry by reading out loud or playing a recording of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Bells" and "The City and the Sea." Discuss the tone, rhythm, and sounds of the poems before launching into a written analysis of the...

Break an article down with a SOAPSTone chart. Class members determine the speaker, occasion, audience, purpose, subject, and tone. The chart includes a question for each of these elements, provides some clarifying text for each, and...

No color, no images, no sound. Just words on paper. How then, do writers convey the tone of a piece? By carefully selecting the words they use to create an impression in the minds of readers. After all, "Don't come back, Jack" expresses...

Read a poem, any poem, and use this graphic organizer for analysis. The resource consists of a questions about the poem's literal meaning, a grid for noting down and analyzing poetic devices, specific questions about tone and theme, and...

How do events, characters, setting, and tone work together to create an engaging short story? Would the impact or theme of a story be different if one of these elements were changed? After reading Mark Twain's slightly screwy "A Ghost...

Find out how much your class knows about literary elements with a quick pre-assessment. Pupils work first individually to identify the instances of personification, metaphor, simile, and more, and then with group members to determine the...

Present your class with an overview of poetry-related information. The slides are clearly organized by topic, starting with reading poetry, ending with myths, and touching on everything from the five senses to open and closed forms of...

The second lesson of a pair about Paul Laurence Dunbar, this plan focuses in particular on his poem, "We Wear the Masks." After a short historical introduction, class members conduct a series or readings, marking up the text and...

Frustration, sarcasm, panic. Young writers are presented with a series of prompts and asked to craft a line of dialogue that reveals something about the speaker. Extend the activity by having pairs trade papers and asking partners...

College-level writers learn the importance of using academic language in their papers and essays. Assessing the audience is an important aspect of choosing the language with which one writes. Review these 10 slides to make sure each...

Explore literary devices and figurative language using higher level examples. The 33 slides here define common types of figurative language (like simile, metaphor, personification, etc.), and then focus on specific examples in...

How are mood and tone similar? Different? Help your readers understand the difference between the two with this helpful guide. On the first page, they read the definition for both tone and mood and identify words that are describe each....

What is a paragraph? This question drives the PowerPoint. Viewers discuss important elements of a solid paragraph, transitions between paragraphs, and strategies for editing. Show this presentation and then look at an example paragraph...

After teaching your class how to analyze poetry, provide them with this summative assessment. They read the poem "El Olivido" by Judith Ortiz Cofer, identifying unknown words in context, identifying the author's tone, and making...

Before diving into their first literary analysis, review this presentation with your class. They study sentence patterns, figurative and literal language, tone, mood, and diction as they relate to literature.

How does the setting affect the mood of a story? First, describe what imagery is. Better yet, show them examples of powerful imagery (which this presentation does not do). Then, discuss the effects the setting has on creating a mood. 

It's important that readers can identify the author's purpose in a piece of writing. Give them different examples and this graphic organizer to help them keep track of how the tone and word choice can give hints to the purpose. Complete...

Sympathetic, sarcastic, insensitive. Clarify for your learners the ways that writers use language to reveal their purpose in writing and their attitude toward their subject. Expand upon the presentation by including additional specific...

Who is Drake and why is he hiding under a car? The flashback technique used to open Drake Bennett’s short story, “Coward,” is sure to hook readers into a tale about a four year old who fears getting a shot at the doctor’s office. Class...

Dark humor, anyone? Kerry Mitchell’s “Unhappy Hour,” compels readers to laugh at his very chilling tale. Explore with your class how the author combines tone and mood to create a sci-fi story with a very unhappy ending. Pre-reading...

Introducing or need to review literary devices and terms for a study of poetry? Though text heavy, the explanations and examples of key poetic devices will provide learners with the vocabulary they need to discuss and craft poems.