MENSA Education & Research Foundation
Magical Musical Tour: Using Lyrics to Teach Literary Elements
Language arts learners don't need a lecture about poetry; they listen to poetry every day on the radio! Apply skills from literary analysis to famous songs and beautiful lyrics with a instructional activity about literary devices. As...
Columbus City Schools
Poetry Speaking and Listening Standards
Celebrate April's National Poetry Month or enrich a poetry unit with a wealth of language arts material. Class members develop an oral interpretation of a poem and/or develop a podcast interview with a poet.
National Park Service
The Poet's Toolbox
If you need a lesson for your poetry unit, use two poems by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow ("Rain in Summer" and "The Slave in the Dismal Swamp") and a resource on Elements of Poetry. The lesson plan guides you through activities on...
Curated OER
Extreme Poetry Vocabulary
Challenge your class with this comprehensive list of literary vocabulary words. Learners take a pre-test, look up definitions, come up with an example, and then take a post-test. You might use this prior to a unit about poetic devices in...
Curated OER
Japanese Poetry: Tanka? You're Welcome!
Students explore tanka, a form of Japanese poetry. They read and analyze tankas to determine the structure and intent, and compose a traditional and a non-traditional tanka.
Curated OER
Poetry Introduction: Reading Strategy and Response
Fifth graders analyze a poem. In this poetry analysis lesson students read a poem, analyze it, and write a response. They write about their own thoughts on the poem's meaning and any feelings they have about the poem.
Curated OER
Reading Poetry in the Middle Grades
Bring the beauty of "Nothing Gold Can Stay" by Robert Frost to middle school language arts. After learners read a copy of the poem, they follow an instructional sequence that focuses on sound, figurative language, and theme.
EngageNY
Introduction: Writing a Narrative of Adversity
A little adversity is good for writing. Scholars review narrative-based monologues and concrete poems and choose which genre to use to express their own theme of adversity. Pupils also consider how to structure their narratives by...
Curated OER
Everyone Can Write Poetry
Embark on a journey of writing several different types of poetry. Fifth graders read several examples, and use the examples to model their own writing. Each poem is to be accompanied by a different art visual representation. In the end,...
Curated OER
Seven Poems, Seven Paintings: A Teacher's Guide to Selected Holocaust Poetry
Seven poems paired with seven original works of art provide learners an opportunity to draw connections between literary and artistic interpretations. Designed to augment a study of the Holocaust, each pair is accompanied by discussion...
Alabama Department of Archives and History
Strange Fruit: Lynching in America
To continue their study of the Civil War, Reconstruction, and the beginning of the civil rights movement, class members watch the YouTube video of Billie Holiday singing "Strange Fruit" as an introduction to an examination of lynching in...
Curated OER
1900 America: Primary Sources and Epic Poetry
Using Walt Whitman's Song of Myself and Hart Crane's The Bridge as models, class groups first craft their own epic poems for 1900 and, using primary sources, create a multi-media presentation that captures the sights and sounds of life...
Curated OER
Discovering Angel Island: The Story Behind the Poems
Poems carved into the wooden walls of the Asian immigrant prisons on Angel Island provide upper elementary graders an opportunity to study not only the story behind the poems but to also focus on the figurative language employed by the...
National Endowment for the Humanities
Emulating Emily Dickinson: Poetry Writing
High schoolers analyze mood and voice in Emily Dickinson's poem, "There's a Certain Slant of Light." After the analysis, students write a poem of their own emulating the Dickinson poem, and then write a one-page essay describing what...
National Endowment for the Humanities
In Emily Dickinson's Own Words: Letters and Poems
Analyze the depth and beauty of American Literature by reading Emily Dickinson's letters and poems. The class analyzes Dickinson's poetic style and discusses Thomas Wentworth Higginson's editorial relationship with Dickinson. They pay...
Curated OER
So Much Depends Upon...Sixteen-Word Imagery Poems Inspired by Love that Dog by Sharon Creech
After reading Love That Dog by Sharon Creech (and possibly shedding a few tears), middle schoolers work on their own sixteen-word poems with a Six Trait writing activity. They focus on word choice in this activity to capture an...
Curated OER
Introduction to the Poetry Unit
Students explore, analyze and interpret one form of poetry writing called Poetry Slam. They hear several examples of unexpected poetry and view a video of "Slam Nation." The books, "Hey You! C'mere: A Poetry Slam," by Elizabeth Swados...
Teaching English
In Flanders Fields
War is one of the most profound human experiences in history, and is often best depicted in works of art and literature. Introduce class members to the poetry of World War I with this resource that uses John McCrae's "In Flanders Fields"...
Curated OER
Reading Pictures, Seeing Poetry
Learners examine the painting, The Combat of the Giaour and Hassan based on a poem by Lord Byron. They compare how Romantic artists and writers made choices about visual elements and language to depict their subjects.
Curated OER
An Introduction to Poetry Using Color
Middle schoolers complete a variety of poems that focus on many different literary techniques and styles. As part of this experience, students share their portfolios with adults in the school and at home.
Curated OER
"you Can't Order a Poem Like You Order a Taco": an Introduction To Poetry
Students explore what poetry is and certain aspects within it. They write their own knowledge and perceptions of poetry and the expand that knowledge and experience through listening to, reading, and writing poetry and exploring poetic...
Curated OER
1900 America: Historical Voices, Poetic Visions
Students examine the United States at the turn of the century. Using primary source documents, they interpret them within a specific historical context. Using this information, they write a poem with metaphors and a specific meter They...
Curated OER
The Presidents Song
Remember learning to spell “encyclopedia” by singing along with Jiminy Cricket? How about using a singing exercise to learn the names of the presidents? “The Presidents Song,” includes the names, in order, from Washington to Coolidge....
Curated OER
Japanese Poetry: Tanka? You're Welcome!
Students explore the structure and content of the Tanka form and to arrive at a definition of the structure in English. They analyze a tanka to determine its structure and intent and compose two Tanka; one in traditional form and one...