Create an Web Site For
Favorite Poems
URL: http://teachersnetwork.org/teachnet-lab/fklane/pmaslow.poem.html
Assignment: After studying how a
poet uses literary devices to portray a certain tone and theme for 8 poems and
writing short essays about them, students will write an essay about which poem
is their favorite to be submited to the highwired.com/fklane/e201
class website.
The poems read and analyzed previously are all from the Adventures
in Appreciation textbook from Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovitch except Hope is a Thing with Feathers, by Emily Dickinson and I am
a Rock-by Paul Simon. The other poems are Recuerdo,
by Edna St. Vincent Millay; Dreams, by Langston Hughes; The Base
Stealer , by Robert Francis; She Sweeps with Many Colored Brooms, by
Emily Dickinson; First Lesson, by Philip Booth; Miss Rosie,
by Lucille Clifton.
Basic literary devices covered are: figurative language-
metaphor, simile, symbol; repetition and refrain.
Answer these questions before you write the first draft of
your essay on why you picked one of the 8 poems we studied as your favorite:Why
did you choose this poem as your favorite? What is it about this poem that
affected you more than the other poems? What particular literary device
that the author used do you find especially appealing? What about the
subject matter appealed to you more than the other poems?
Evaluate A National Web Site For
Favorite Poems
Assignment:
Visit this national poetry site: favoritepoem.org.
1. Students will find the list of poets in the middle of one page and they
should first click on the two we have studied-Emily Dickinson and then Langston
Hughes. They will first read "Hope" and then they should click
at the right hand top and read the four letters from people explaining why they
picked this poem as their favorite. When they click on Langston Hughes
they can then hear the poem read by clicking on the upper right corner.
3. Students should then click on the poets that they recognize from class
to see other poems by this author. They then read the poems and if there
are letters they read those. If the poem is recorded they click on that
symbol and they will hear the poem aloud. There is also a section with a
video presentation of several poems for the students to also look at.
After reading about 12 poems they choose their favorite to
read again and print so they can write an essay at a later date on why it is
their favorite from this group. Here is a checklist provided to help students
chose their favorite poem : Why did you choose this poem as your favorite? What
is it about this poem that affected you more than the other poems? What
particular literary device that the author used do you find especially
appealing? Did you find that either hearing the poems read or
reading people's letters about why the poem was their favorite was helpful in
understanding the poem?
Follow-up Lesson- Students will write an essay on the poem that they they
chose as their favorite. They will discuss contributing literary
elements when explaining why it is their favorite. |
