Classroom Activities
For the most part, sonnets are taught on the high school level, not in elementary or middle school, where as figurative language and literary devices are taught at almost all grade levels. For this reason, I thought it would be appropriate to include sample lessons I would use to teach the sonnet. Each strategy listed above will be incorporated into the activities for this lesson. The length of a class period will determine how long each lesson will take to complete. Each of my periods are fifty-five minutes, therefore each lesson may take a couple of days to complete. Someone who teaches a two hour block could do it in one.
Activity One
Lesson-Essential Questions: What is a sonnet? How did sonnets come into existence?
Warm-Up: In order to keep the unit uniform with the Delaware State Standards, I would project Shakespeare's Sonnet 18 and instruct the students to identify the various forms of literary devices and figurative language. The students will be given five minutes to individually write the devices they have noticed in their notebooks. After the five minutes, students will then be called on to walk to the Smart Board and underline their findings.
Instruction: To begin the lesson, I would continue with Shakespeare Sonnet 18 displayed on the Smart board. I would also hand each student a hard copy of the sonnet broken down on a graphic organizer. On the back of the organizer, a blank copy of the outline for a sonnet will be provided. The graphic organizer will label each component of a sonnet. This will assist students who are visual learners and prepare them for writing their own sonnet in a later lesson. The students would be asked a series of questions such as: What type of poem is this? Who is the author? What do you know about William Shakespeare? Based on the students' answers, I would then begin to explain about sonnets and their background. I would inform them that William Shakespeare was born in the sixteenth century and wrote many of his sonnets on misfortune and the power of poetry to immortalize its subjects.
Because sonnets are written in a specific form and rhyme scheme, I would begin teaching the students the vocabulary needed to describe these attributes. The students will be instructed to use the dictionary to find the meanings of quatrain, sestet, volta, octave—and, since we are focusing on Sonnet 18, they would need to learn temperate, lease, eye of heaven, fair from fair, untrimmed, ow'st. The students would not look up these words from Sonnet 18; rather I would place the words on the board and ask them what they think they mean. Once we have brainstormed the meaning of the words, I would have the students read the sonnet to see if they can find the true meaning of the words by using context clues and what they have learned about Shakespeare.
Assessment: Students will be given another example of a sonnet, using the same graphic organizer outline that was previously used, to analyze on their own. They must identify the following information: title, author, rhyme scheme, quatrains, couplet, and volta. Also, they will be expected to list and define any vocabulary that is not familiar to them by using the techniques learned in the lesson, such as context clues and a dictionary.
Activity Two
Lesson-Essential Questions: How do you interpret a sonnet? What is the author saying in the sonnet? Who is the speaker: the author or an invented character?
Warm-Up: This lesson will begin with reviewing all the vocabulary learned in the previous lesson and reviewing the outlined form of Sonnet 18.
Instruction: Once the students have a firm understanding of the previous information that has been taught, they will then learn to interpret the sonnet. Since sonnets are easier to understand in more advanced grades, I feel that my students would gain the biggest benefit from having a hard copy of the sonnet given to them with examples of the metaphors and meanings given in bold next to the first quatrain along with questions to inspire thought. For example:
The rest of the sonnet would not have any side notes. As a class we would brainstorm and work together to decipher what message Shakespeare is relaying.
Assessment: As an assessment, each student will be instructed to write a summary of Shakespeare's sonnet including two metaphors that were used. They will also be expected to identify the volta by describing what the turn of thought is and where it takes place.
Activity Three
Lesson-Essential Question: How do you write a sonnet?
Warm-Up: The students and I would review the previous day's lesson on interpreting a sonnet. We would discuss Shakespeare Sonnet 18 and how his use of metaphors reinforced the theme of the sonnet. We would also re-examine what a quatrain, volta and rhyme scheme are and how they are used in the sonnet.
Instruction: The students and I will create four graffiti walls in the classroom. As a whole class, we would create different metaphors to begin the brainstorming process. For example: I would give them the metaphor, "My son is a raging wave." After discussing what a raging wave may mean to them and brainstorming why I created this metaphor, each student would be given a post it note to write all their thoughts about this metaphor. The next step would be for the students to transfer their thoughts from the post it note to the graffiti wall. We would repeat this process for the next three metaphors. These metaphors would be created as a class, with the intention of developing one overall theme.
After the graffiti walls are complete, the students will be placed into groups of four. Each group will be assigned a metaphor or couplet and required to create a quatrain using ideas from the walls. For example, group one would be assigned, "My son is a raging wave." From that metaphor they will create a quatrain with a rhyme scheme of abab. The second group will create a quatrain with a rhyme scheme of cdcd and the third group will create a quatrain using the rhyme scheme of efef with a volta at the beginning of it, using the remaining metaphors from the graffiti wall. The final group will develop the couplet, using a gg rhyme scheme. Once all groups have finished creating their parts, we will put everything together to develop a class sonnet.
Assessment: The students will be given a blank version of the sonnet graphic organizer. They will need to write their own sonnet using everything that was taught to them in the previous lessons. There will be no teacher help in creating the metaphors. This is an individual assessment.
Culminating Activity: As a reward for the students to celebrate their hard work with this unit, we would turn the classroom into a "Cocoa House." The cocoa house would be similar to the idea of a Coffee House where poets stand on stage and read their poems. The students would each have a turn to read their poems to the class. Cocoa would be provided and soft music would be playing in the background.
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