The Sound of Words: An Introduction to Poetry

Strategies

Recognizing Rhythm

At the most basic, rhythm is a pattern of sound. In poetry, we want to make note that we also include the accents of stress in the text because that is what carries the movement of the pattern. From hymns to Anglo-Saxon poetry, nursery rhymes to popular music, most poetry we use in our classroom is written in accentual-syllabic meter. Accentual-syllabic meter is difficult in that it combines two separate kinds of patterns: accents and syllables into rhythmical units we call feet. At first, students need to get into the practice of dividing lines of poetry into syllables using authentic literature (fig 1.). I have provided you with a syllabic breakdown showing the meter, of the lines in fig. 2. Once students have a good feel for the meter, they need to take the next step and add accents to the syllables. For purposes of this exercise, I have put an (x) to symbolize a stressed syllables and a (-) to symbolize an unstressed syllable. To view the metrical meter breakdown, refer to fig. 3.

For purpose of this strategy, I have used several examples from Robert Frost's "Mending Wall"

Original Text (fig. 1):

The work of hunters is another thing (ln. 5)

No one has seen them made or hear them made (ln. 10)

We keep the wall between us as we go (ln. 15)

Syllable Breakdown (fig. 2):

The | work | of | hun | ters | is | a | noth | er | thing

No | one | has | seen | them | made | or | hear | them | made

We | keep | the | wall | be | tween | us | as | we | go

Accentual-Syllabic Breakdown:

The figures above use the tradition iamb pattern of meter - stressed, unstressed. Typically, it is only necessary to teach the four main kinds of accent patterns: iamb, trochee, dactyl, anapest. See fig. 5 for examples regarding the four main kinds of accentual patterns.

Fig. 5

To be perfectly honest, meter is difficult. Pinsky notes in his book The Sound of Poetry that "the stress on syllable in English is not inherent in the sound, but relative."⁹ Simply stated, students need to practice, practice, practice this technique in order to hear the beat associated with sound. Marking of the meter of a text is called scansion. By taking the time to divide the lines into feet and marking the locations of stressed and unstressed syllables, students learn to hear the rhythm.

Recognizing Meter

In the above section Recognizing Rhythm I simply explained the syllabic background is the meter, but there are various kinds of meter that students should be familiar with for the AP English Literature and Composition exam. Please reference Figure 6 with the various kinds of meter that can be (but, not limited to) presented in a text.¹⁰

Fig. 6

Recognizing Rhyme

There are many different strategies in recognizing rhyme schemes in a text. Start by explaining the basics of rhyme. Next, have a pre-chosen word for students to list as many rhyming words as they can. I would give a word that is connected to this section of the unit like scheme. Give the students a few minutes to write down as many words they can think of that rhyme with scheme. Students should come up with a variety of answers including, but not limited to: beam, deem, dream, gleam, scream, steam, team, theme, etc. If you feel it is necessary to go through a more through definition of rhyme I would suggest practicing this a few times to get the student's thinking about rhyming words. Once students feel comfortable with basic rhyming, give them definitions of more specific kinds of rhymes (exact, slant, masculine/feminine, etc.) and have them categorize their rhyme list when they are completed.

Although this seems like a basic exercise, it is necessary for development in language. In an evaluation of Project CALL (Contextualized Approach to Language and Literacy), an educational psychologist argues that children that come from minority and/or low socioeconomic backgrounds, in addition to those children who already have speech and language difficulties, tend to perform below mainstream and are at severe risk for developing literacy problems later in life. As a way to battle this phenomenon, they suggest that teachers need to provide students with a strong foundation of literacy skills. The two they choose to evaluate are the strategies of rhyming and letter knowledge.¹¹ For purposes of this unit, I am going to focus primarily on rhyme, but many of the strategies and lessons can be adapted to include letter knowledge for English Language Learners/English as a Second Language. Of many of the studies cited in the article they make a certainly a significant link between the knowledge of nursery rhymes and literacy successes of reading, spelling, and most important the acquisition of knowledge in children.

Another way to break it down is by looking at a variety of nursery rhymes, as well as, books by Dr. Seuss. Taking the time to look at these texts can be fun, but also will rely heavily on the teacher to require students in acts of critical inquiry. An additional or other way to look at rhyme is to focus on poets like W. C. Handy whose lyrical poems feature rhyme prominently. Many of Handy's poems, "St. Louis Blues" and "Beale Street Blues," are poems that are readily available on a variety of free/low-cost music services. Instead of having students read the poems aloud, students will not only listen to the performance of the pieces, but many times can hear them sung.

Another unique way of doing this is choosing rap songs in languages that are alternative to the languages spoken at your school. While students are not aware of the meaning, it is inevitable for them not to; they can hear the unique sound of rhyme. I would suggest using the artist MC Solaar from France. His beats are similar to the American conventional of rap music and therefore will allow students to hear the same conventions use in foreign text.

Combining Rhythm, Meter and Rhyme

To assist in teaching these sound devices, I would use rap music as a foundation. For instance, it can be difficult for students to see the strong stresses in meter in Anglo-Saxon poetry, but as Adam Bradley states in Book of Rhymes, "the beat in rap is rendered audible."¹² To familiarize the unfamiliar students should be given the opportunity to apply rhythm, meter, and rhyme to rap. This is key for students in understanding the lyric poetry of the Anglo-Saxons are all but distant relatives' of spoken word and rap.

Choosing the right spoken word or rap texts can be very difficult. I suggest picking texts or artists that connect directly with your students. We need to remember as educators that at its very essence, popular culture is a reflection of our fears, desires, needs, and dreams. Knowing this educators must take students and their likes/dislikes very seriously. For a unit like this I would chose someone like Chicago-based artist, Lupe Fiasco. He embodies many of my students' experiences because he knows the urban realities of being a Chicago teenager. His music is also very relevant to the kind of social injustices and societal issues of urban youth. In past years, poets turned rappers like Common, or bling, strapped, rollers like Lil' Wayne have received more notoriety, but I find that many of Fiasco's lyrics are ore sculpted and socially relevant to the classroom. Depending on the age and background of your students you may choose to use other artists for the strategies I included above that rely heavily on rhythm, meter, and rhyme. As a disclaimer, I strongly suggest reading lyrics and listening to the texts before using them in a classroom setting.

Tone - "The Sound of Sense"

Robert Frost introduced the concept as "The Sound of Sense," in a letter in 1913 to his dear friend John T. Bartlett. Frost there refers to the "imagining ear." At the time when Frost wrote this letter he distanced himself from other poets claiming to Bartlett that he was "possibly the only person going who works on any but a worn out theory (principle I had better say) of versification. You see the great success in recent poetry have been made on the assumption that the music of words was a matter of harmonized vowels and consonants." Frost did not see himself as a writer who followed the then formal patterns (orthodox) of poetry. It was not the specific words, but the abstract sound of the words, that he believed created content and meaning. To explain this more clearly, Frost suggested that "the best place to get the abstract sound of sense is from the voices behind a door that cuts off the words."¹³ In essence, that is a prime example of what he meant by the "sound of sense."

In Frost's lecture "The Last Refinement of Subject Matter: Vocal Imagination," he asks the reader to imagine asking him if poetry, for him, is a matter of basic poetic devices, such as rhyme, alliteration, consonation, and he responds with a resounding "no". He then asks us to imagine the different ways he might say "no":

• No, I should hardly be inclined to say that poetry was a matter of vowel and consonant sounds; or
• No, I will tell you NO! Let's hear no more of that: or
• No, I can't hear it, no; or
• No, you wait a moment and I'll tell you¹⁴

He goes on to explain that, while we normally look at the word "no" in a negative way, we use it in a variety of different ways: pessimistically, compassionately, disapprovingly, etc. Frost is asking us to evaluate tone, a term that is often hard to teach to students.

Teaching AP English Literature and Composition I find that I often use Ogden Morse's article "SOAPStone: A Strategy for Reading and Writing" in my classroom. SOAPStone is a strategy I have seen used in English, Social Studies, and even Studio Art AP level classes. A simple acronym, SOAPStone can help a student lead towards understanding the underlying rhetorical analysis of tone. Each step leads towards a better understanding of tone: S, who is the speaker; O, what is the occasion; A, who is the audience; P, what is the purpose; S, what is the subject; and last, but certainly not least Tone.¹⁵ Using this acronym is a great way for students to support their thoughts and feelings, by organizing their notes and using adequate examples from the text to support their findings about an author's tone.

Another way to have students think about SOAPStone and have them analyze a poem or rap is by adopting the RAFT strategy. The RAFT acronym asks students to recognize: R, role of the writer; A, audience of the text; F, format of the message; T, topic of the text. A way to extend this lesson is to give students the option to write using the RAFT strategy by providing a role, audience, format, and topic from them. This is a nice strategy to use in class because it offers a variety of different kinds of assignments for students to complete. Some options are listed below:

Tying it Together Through Socratic Seminar

One of the ways I would like to have my students present their own critical analysis as well as take individual stances on variety of topics is through the strategy of Socratic seminar. While students on the AP English Literature and Composition exam do not have the opportunity to prove themselves through the spoken work, Socratic Seminar is a good way for students to start thinking and defending their own arguments.

With the given background students will be given a variety of texts websites senate hearing logs, YouTube clips, and interviews. They will have two days, in and out of class, to review the evidence and decide on the following topic: Is GirlTalk's music a new creation? Using Socratic Seminar, I would also like to urge students to take a stance on the complexity of rhyme patterns in music they listen to versus the works of Hughes and Handy. What are the similarities they see? The differences? Can they say one form is more complex than the other? Does that result in them feeling strongly about the value of a text