The Sound of Words: An Introduction to Poetry

Lesson One: Understanding What Is Poetry

The first day of the unit will be devoted to having students define poetry and decide which of two written excerpts is poetry. I will ask the questions: What is a poem? How do you know that a piece of writing is a poem and not prose? Students will be given ten minutes to think about their responses and write them down. They will read their responses and, as they do, the teacher will ask thought provoking questions. For instance, if a student says, "Poems rhyme." I will retort, "Aren't there poems that do not rhyme?" When we have discussed the topic, each student will write a revised definition. I will next give students the following two excerpts written in lines for them to decide which one is prose and which poetry.

Excerpt A

    I was in high school
    Before I discovered
    James Weldon Johnson's
    Collection of African American Negro Poetry
    It had never been checked
    Out of the library. 14
  

Excerpt B

    Nothing is as beautiful as spring
    When weeds in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush
    Thrush's eggs look like little low heavens and thrush
    Through the echoing timber does so rinse and ring
    The ear, it strikes like lightning to hear him sing; 15
  

Students will study the two excerpts for five minutes; then I will read both excerpts aloud. Using my model, students will recite the excerpts to their partners. I will read the excerpts aloud a second time. They will then make their choices. They will be divided into two groups, A and B. The two groups will debate each other. Each side will support its answer by using data from its selection to justify its answer.

As students justify their choices, I will begin writing poetic devices on the board: end rhyme, alliteration and so on. I will ask the whole group to vote on its choice, and will verify that B is the poem. I will read B for the third time and ask students to write down any words they recognize. Whole group will discuss the words they copied down and the meanings of such words.

After reading the poem together, the students and I will paraphrase the stanza of the poem and discuss the author's tone and meaning. Three student volunteers will read B while class listens. At the end of the readings, class will pinpoint differences in sound and meaning they heard in the renditions of the stanza.

I will play an audio recording of "Harlem" as students listen. At the end of the recording, two student volunteers will read the poem as their peers listen. I will encourage students to share any information they have about the poem and about the author. I expect that some students will have prior knowledge of the poem and its author. For home work, students will research background material on Hughes in order to better understand the context in which the poem was written.