Lesson Plans
Lesson 1. Rhythm
(This lesson illustrates the procedure early in the unit, in week 3, days 5 and 6.)
Objectives
The instructional objectives of this lesson are to familiarize students with four basic rhythmic patterns: iambic, trochaic, anapestic and dactylic feet; to use Shakespeare's Sonnet 73 as a model for illustrating iambic pentameter; and to model an analytic protocol which students will use with all poems studied.
Materials
The materials needed for this lesson include: a handout of Shakespeare's Sonnet 73 (iambic pentameter); the first 8 lines of Byron's The Destruction of Sennacherib (anapestic tetrameter); the first two stanzas of Shelley's To a Skylark (trochaic trimeter); and the first three stanzas of Thomas Hood's The Bridge of Sighs (dactylic dimeter). Also, students will need a handout of the Metrics Matrix (See Appendix A), and their student poetry-writing journals (3 ring binder for unit).
Procedure
The teacher reads Sonnet 73, and conducts a full protocol analysis. This routine first considers sound. The teacher asks students if they can find occurrences of alliteration, onomatopoeia, assonance or consonance. (This is asked because these features have already been taught in the first two weeks.) Next, the rhythm of the poem is considered. The teacher illustrates, by scanning lines, the occurrence of iambic pentameter in this poem. Remarks about the rhythm are limited to the fact that it is iambic—ba-boom—and that there are five such beats in every line. Also, this is the time to draw attention to the fact that this beat is the same beat as the heart, the pulse, breathing, etc. This point and all the others are instructive, because students have not yet dealt with these considerations in detail.
Next, figures of speech are discussed. Attention is drawn to the individual metaphors—the autumn tree, the end of the day, and the fire dying out—and the rhymed couplet at the end, which makes the poet's point. Other figures, like the simile in "That on the ashes of his youth doth lie/ As the deathbed whereon it must expire," can be explained as a comparison of the speaker's spent youth to a bed of ashes on which the time of his youth has passed away, but it is enough to point out one figure at this time.
The latter part of the analysis is cursory, since formal instruction in other traits has not taken place. However, the teacher must model the protocol, so imagery is considered by pointing out the colors, the times of day, the sensations of warmth in the fire image, the dark colors, perhaps the smell of a dying fire, to illustrate that a reader should look for things that stimulate the five senses. In a consideration of form, the teacher points out that there are 14 lines, that each line contains the rhythm mentioned above, and that the rhyme follows an ababcdcdefefgg pattern. In addressing tone, the teacher points to the feelings of the speaker in this poem as gratitude, perhaps resignation and reflection, and gives reasons for sensing this, especially as inspired by the sounds, rhythms and images.
Finally, in an open discussion, the teacher asks students what the poem might mean, in terms of who might be saying it, to whom, for what purpose, and why in this particular form. Any reasonable answer is acceptable, because it is still early in the unit and students are still learning this protocol for analysis. The teacher explains how to use the Metrics Matrix, using Sonnet 73, and has students read the selections aloud, using the ba-boom activity. Rhythms are identified correctly for the students.
As an assignment, students use the Metrics Matrix to identify the names of the rhythms in the other poem fragments. The assessment of this learning will be based on completion of the exercise for the workshop.
Lesson 2. Sonnet
(This lesson illustrates the procedure for teaching the sonnet, near the end of the unit, in week 10, days 19 and 20.)
Objectives
The instructional objectives of this lesson are to illustrate the strict form, rhyme scheme and rhythm of the Shakespearean sonnet; to generate an original stanza and couplet which employs a metaphor from the student's career area; and to model an analytic protocol which students use to approach the poetry they read.
Materials
Students will need a copy of Shakespeare's Sonnet 73, a copy of Maggie Anderson's poem "Sonnet for Her Labor," and their poetry-writing journals.
Procedure
Since Shakespeare's sonnet has already been introduced, there is no need in the
instructional class to undergo the protocol analysis. (The reintroduction of this poem, though, is a good opportunity to show students how their sensitivity to and understanding of poems can change over time.)
The poem, Sonnet for Her Labor (Coles & Oresick, 1995, p.9), by Maggie Anderson, is read, and undergoes the full protocol analysis. First, sound is considered. Students listen, as they have been shown, for alliteration, onomatopoeia, assonance and consonance. They briefly discuss and record their observations. The word "galluses" is defined as suspenders. Next in the procedure comes a consideration of rhythm. Students scan the poem as they have been shown. (It is iambic, but utilizes hexameter. It is a good time to demonstrate that poets can manipulate rhythms to suit their purposes.)
Students then identify symbols and the metaphors of the mountain, and food and cleanliness. They point to instances of imagery. Visual imagery, especially regarding food, water and cleanliness is emphasized.
In terms of form, like Shakespeare's sonnet, this poem develops ideas around the death of the speaker's Aunt Nita. Students look for three discrete ideas and the idea emphasized at the end of the poem in a rhymed couplet: "No one said a word to her. All that food/ and cleanliness. No one ever told her it was good." Students discuss the effect of the last lines on the development of the three ideas, namely how the revelation that this woman has devoted her life to the health and nourishment of the men in her life without recognition appears in a rhymed couplet at the end. Students are then asked to identify, using adjectives, the feeling or tone behind the speaker as she memorializes her aunt, and what words establish that tone.
Finally, the possible meaning of the poem is dealt with in an open discussion. Students are asked what the poem might mean, in terms of who is saying it, to whom, for what purpose, and why in this particular form. I accept any reasonable explanations which relate to the earlier considerations in the analysis.
An exercise in replication is assigned for the workshop session later in the
week (see Appendix C). Students are asked to invent one four-line stanza, which incorporates a person, object, process or idea from their shops. They are then asked to "punctuate" or summarize the developed thought in a rhymed couplet.
As an assignment, students complete the sonnet/quatrain/couplet exercise. Assessment is made based on the successful completion of the quatrain exercise.
Lesson 3. Sample Workshop Lesson
(A typical workshop day near the end of the unit. This lesson describes the operation of a workshop day on Friday, or the last day of the week.)
Objectives
The instructional objectives of the workshop lessons are to engage students with the reading and writing protocols they have been taught to use, and to provide peer and teacher feedback on their original written material.
Materials
Students will need to be equipped with their poetry journals, which now contain completed exercises, lists, models, and class notes from all the previous lessons. They will need a written version of the reading and writing protocol formats, a networked computer with word processing and web access, and a dictionary and a thesaurus.
Procedure
Students are seated in teams composed of classmates in the same career clusters, e.g., trade students include carpentry students, engine technology and electrical trades students. Each group member has a role in the team: discussion leader, recorder, reader, researcher and materials manager. These roles rotate from student-to-student through the course of the unit.
The first order of business is the review of the topic of the week's lesson by the teacher, and the sharing of the homework exercise within the groups. Next, students discuss with each other plans regarding their magnum opus—the culminating career poem. Third is the distribution of career-specific poetry from texts and from the Internet. (The researcher may be asked to find a poem or two in the provided books or from the web.) Students, in their assigned roles, conduct a discussion and analysis of a new poem. Finally, the reader performs the group's chosen poem and the discussion leader reports the highlights of the small group discussion to the whole class, with an emphasis on that particular week's poetic element. The teacher's role in these workshops is either to float from team to team as a monitor and resource person, or as a one-on-one consultant in writing conferences.
Assessment is accomplished in a formal report submitted to the teacher by the recorder. This report details the high points of the discussion of individual students' planning, and a summary of the group's analysis of the new poem.
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