Produced for K-12 educators, Teach This Poem features one poem a week from our online poetry collection, accompanied by interdisciplinary resources and activities designed to help teachers quickly and easily bring poetry into the classroom. The series is written by our Educator in Residence, Dr. Madeleine Fuchs Holzer, and is available for free via email.
Featured Poem
Classroom Activities
- Play a short excerpt from the pianist George Winston’s composition “Colors/Dance” for your students. While the excerpt is playing, ask them to stand and move to the music. After one minute and ten seconds, stop the video and ask your students to sit back down. Ask them to write a description of their movements and about how the composition made them feel.
- Play the excerpt again. This time ask your students to stay seated while they listen and to write down what they hear. When the excerpt has ended, ask them to turn and talk with a partner about what they heard and felt during the two different experiences.
- Project William Shakespeare’s sonnet in front of the class. Ask your students to read it silently and write down the words, phrases, and aspects of the poem’s structure that jump out at them. Ask a student to read the poem aloud to the class; the listening students should write down additional words and phrases that seem important. Repeat this process with a second student reading aloud.
- Ask your students to share what they noticed in small groups. About what time of year is Shakespeare writing? What evidence do they find for this in the poem? How do they think this time of year makes the speaker in the poem feel? Again, what evidence in the poem supports this?
- Whole-class discussion: Why is Shakespeare trying to evoke these emotions about the season in his readers? Aside from a particular season, about what do they think he is writing? What do the last two lines of the poem mean to them?
- If your students have also read “October” by Robert Frost, you may want to ask them to compare and contrast these two poems.