4.3 Writer's Workshop: Poetry

Writing Goal: Poetry

Have you ever watched an artist paint a picture? By using just a few colours, an artist can create a dramatic landscape, a vivid still life, or a beautiful portrait. That's what poets do with words. By choosing exactly the right words, rhythms, and poetic styles, poets write poems filled with imagery and emotion.

Poetry is a special form of communication which touches the heart and the soul!

Workshop Overview:

Read and analyze poems and songs.
Learn about poetic devices.
Write 3 of your own poems and/or song lyrics on the theme of identity.
Create a website to present your poems.
Deliver a dramatic reading of one of your created pieces.

Writing Targets:

By the end of this workshop you will submit 3 poems & an analysis of a poem of your choice:

Your response shows you have a good understanding of meaning in poems
Your poems effectively incorporate three sound devices
Your poems follow the rules of the chosen poetic form
Your poems are expressive and have emotional impact on the theme of identity
Your poems are presented creatively on your website
You deliver a dramatic reading of one of them in a confident, fluent and expressive manner

What do you think when you hear the word poetry? Do you think of something that rhymes and has a certain beat, or rhythm? Do you think of short pieces of writing that are sometimes hard to understand? Not all poems rhyme, but many do. Not all poems are short, but many of them are. Not all poems are hard to understand, though some of them can be.

Let's begin by looking at some videos of spoken poetry.

Take a moment to complete a mini-lesson on adjectives. Go to the Adjectives on the main list and return to this book module when you're done.

"I don't know what to write about! " This is often what teachers hear from students. In the following workshop, you will be asked to write some of your own poetry around the theme of identity, that is all about you. So first brainstorm some ideas!

Open your writer's notebook and complete 4.1 and complete the activity.

You will be creating a website to present your poems.

You will need to have a total of 3 poems on your website
You will have to have a Meet the Poet section on your website
You will need an introduction for each poem

Website Instructions:

Go to weebly.com and create an account if you do not already have one.
Follow the prompts on the website to learn how to develop your website.
Make a page for each of the 3 poems that you will include on your website.
Create an introduction for each poem.
Make your home page a “Meet the Poet” page that you use to introduce yourself.
Add graphics and colors to your website to make it uniquely yours.

You will be assessed on the following:

Website

The student’s website includes 3 poems (20 pts.) ______/20

The student’s website includes a Meet the Poet page (5 pts.) ______/10

The website includes introductions for each of the 3 poems (10 pts.) ______/10

The website includes graphics and an appealing layout (5 pts.) ______/5

The website is easy to navigate (5 pts.) ______/5

Total Points: ______/50

Presentation

The student presents his/her poem in a clear voice ______/5

The student presents his/her poem with expression ______/5

The student has included the theme of identity ______/5

Total Points: ______/15

Let's take a closer look at exactly what poetry is.

Click through the images below.

While you read through the images, open your writer's notebook and complete 4.2 Poetry Vocabulary.

Two important elements of many poems are rhyme and rhythm. To understand these elements think of music. Rhyme is like the lyrics (words of a song) and rhythm is like the beat.

Rhyme Time

Beside the lake, beneath the trees, Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. - William Wordsworth

Did you notice that the last word in each line of this poem (trees and breeze) sounds the same? Like many poems, this one contains words that rhyme. Rhyme is the repetition of the same sound in two or more words.

No doubt you can tell when two words rhyme—for example, bear and care; silly and chili; wheel and feel. The end sound in each word is the same, but the beginning is different.

Rhyme can occur at the end of lines of poetry, like in the Wordsworth example above. Rhyme can also occur in the middle of a line, like in this poem:

In mist or cloud, on mast or shroud.- Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Many poems also have rhymes that follow a pattern. This is called a rhyme scheme. You will learn more about rhyme scheme shortly. It is helpful if you understand rhythm first.

Copyright 2007, Open School BC

Rhythm

We’ve all done it. Our favourite song comes on the radio and we start tapping our foot or drumming the tabletop. We are moved by the rhythm, or beat, of the music.

Poems have rhythm too. And like songs, the rhythm of a poem is often predictable. We can guess what the “beat” of one line of a poem will be after hearing or reading the previous lines. This predictable rhythm is called metre.

Rhyme schemes are always identified with letters of the alphabet:

Many poets use special devices or elements to help the reader understand and enjoy their poems. In this lesson you will learn about three poetic devices that emphasize sounds in poems: alliteration, onomatopoeia, and repetition.

Alliteration

Have you ever tried saying this, five times in a row, and really fast?

Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.

Sentences like this are called tongue twisters. They have lots of letters at the beginning of words that “twist” your tongue when you try to say them.

Poems often have repeating letters, too, but not as many as tongue twisters. They are intended to create a rhythmic and interesting sound pattern in a poem.

The use of repeating letters at the beginning of words in a poem is called alliteration. Here is an example of alliteration from the second line of the well-known children’s rhyme, “Twinkle, twinkle, little star”:

how I wonder what you are. . .

Did you notice the repeating w sound—how, wonder, what? That’s the alliteration.

Alliteration is one of the easiest literary devices to spot because the words usually start with the same letter. Be careful, though, because there are exceptions to this rule: phone and funny, know and news, even silly and cereal! So don’t just read the poem—listen to how the words sound.

Repetition

Have you ever had someone - maybe a little brother or sister - follow you around and repeat everything you say? Isn’t it annoying?

Unlike your little brother or sister, poets can use repetition without driving you crazy. In fact, repetition can make a poem very interesting and give it a nice rhythm. Repetition can also tell us that some words are extra important to the poem and need to be said more than once.

Repetition, then, is the repeating of certain words in a poem for a pleasing effect or to emphasize an important idea.

Here is an example of repetition from "The Highwayman," a famous poem by Albert Noyes.

PART ONE The wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty trees, The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas, The road was a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor, And the highwayman came riding-- Riding--riding-- The highwayman came riding, up to the old inn-door.

In this passage, the word riding is repeated several times. This makes us wonder where the highwayman is riding to. It creates suspense.

Repetition in poetry or songs also can enhance the rhythm. Do you notice a rhythm in the poem with the word riding repeated? You might also feel the rhythm of the galloping horse when you read the repeating word.

Similes and Metaphors

Writers use a number of different techniques to create imagery in their poems. Two of the most common ways are by adding similes and metaphors.

Simile is the easier one to spot. It nearly always includes the word like or as. Many examples of simile have slipped into our everyday language: cool as a cucumber, smart like a fox, and neat as a pin (though, really, what’s so neat about a pin?).

Metaphor does not use like or as. It is more direct. It implies that one thing IS the other, not just like it.

Observe the differences between the following paired examples.

Metaphor: The sea is a plate of glass.

Simile: The sea was smooth as a plate of glass.

Metaphor: She had diamonds for eyes

Simile: Her eyes sparkled like diamonds.

Personification

Another device that poets use to create imagery is personification. Personification gives human qualities to things that aren’t human.

e.g.,

The wind stroked her white curls.

Obviously wind can’t stroke a girl’s hair, but it’s an interesting image for a poem, isn’t it? The poem is much more creative and interesting than it would have been if the poet had just said, The wind blew the girl’s hair around her face.

Personification is easy to spot in a poem. Just look for the non-human thing that is described with human qualities.

In the following poem, the author uses several metaphors and similes to describe himself. How might you compare yourself?

Identity

Let them be as flowers,
always watered, fed, guarded, admired,
but harnessed to a pot of dirt.

I'd rather be a tall, ugly weed,
clinging on cliffs, like an eagle
wind-wavering above high, jagged rocks.

To have broken through the surface of stone,
to live, to feel exposed to the madness
of the vast, eternal sky.
To be swayed by the breezes of an ancient sea,
carrying my soul, my seed, beyond the mountains of time
or into the abyss of the bizarre.

I'd rather be unseen, and if
then shunned by everyone,
than to be a pleasant-smelling flower,
growing in clusters in the fertile valleys,
where they're praised, handled, and plucked
by greedy, human hands.

I'd rather smell of musty, green stench
than of sweet, fragrant lilac.
If I could stand alone, strong and free,
I'd rather be a tall, ugly weed.

-Julio Noboa Polanco

Open your writer's notebook and complete 4.3 Identity Poem

A bio-poem highlights biographical information about a subject, including their experiences, relationships, hopes, and interests.

Here is an example:

Source: https://www.facinghistory.org/resource-library/image/student-bio-poem-example

Open your writer's notebook to write your own bio-poem - Activity 4.4.

In this lesson you will learn about two popular types of structured poems: haiku and diamante. Structured poems are put together in a specific way. They may have a certain shape, like a diamante, or a specific number of syllables, like a haiku.

Have you ever noticed the beauty of a snowflake? The delicacy of a butterfly’s wing? The flight of a kite in the wind? Haiku poems try to capture and express some of these special moments in a few short lines.

Haiku:

originated in Japan centuries ago
are often about nature or the changing of the seasons
are three lines long
have five syllables in the first and third lines
have seven syllables in the second line
do not rhyme

Example

Snow, softly, slowly,

settles at dusk in a dance

Of white butterflies

5 syllables
7 syllables
5 syllables

-Oeharu

Flapping into fog

an angry crow cries hoarsely

for spring to begin.

5 syllables
7 syllables
5 syllables

-Gyodai

Another type of structured poem is the diamante (die-a-mon-tay). Diamante poems are easy to recognize because they are written in the shape of a diamond.

As you can see in this example, each line has to have a certain number of words. These words also have to be of a certain type.

Now that you know two structured types of poems and the rules for writing them, it’s time to create some examples of your own.

Open your writer's notebook and complete 4.5 Haiku and Diamante.

Once you have completed the assignment you are ready to submit your Unit 4 Writer's Notebook to the dropbox.

It is now time to write an introduction for each of the 3 poems you will be publishing on your website. Your introduction for each poem must include:

Hook; a quote, anecdote, statement or rhetorical question that captures the reader's attention
Information about the poem; the type of poem it is, what inspired you to write it, the theme etc.

Create a new document and begin writing your paragraphs. Once you have completed all three paragraphs upload your document to the Poem Introductions dropbox.

It is now time to write your Meet the Poet paragraph for your website. Be sure to follow proper paragraph formatting and include the following:

Your name
Your grade
Where you are from
What you like about writing poetry
What you think people should know about poetry
Which of your poems were your favorite to write.

Create a new document and begin writing your paragraphs. Once you are done, upload your document to the Meet the Poet dropbox.

You've submitted your Writer's Notebook and received feedback. Consider making any necessary changes to your poems prior to publishing them on your website. It is also important to follow the editing & proofreading steps of the writing process with regards to your website.

Editing is where you make sure everything reads smoothly.

Check that you have done each of these things:

Parts of Speech:

Did I use a consistent verb tense (e.g. past or present) throughout my website?

Do my singular subjects have singular verbs and my plural subjects have plural verbs?

Did I use the best words in my writing?

Sentences

Do all my sentences express complete thought?

Have I eliminated run-on sentences from my writing?

Have I eliminated short, choppy sentences from my writing?

Have I eliminated long, rambling sentences from my writing?

Did I use a variety of words and phrases to start my sentences?

Have I eliminated words that don't add meaning to my sentences?

Once you have:

written, revised and uploaded Meet the Poet paragraph on your website
made any necessary revisions to your 3 poems based on feedback from your teacher and uploaded them to your website
written and revised introduction paragraphs for each of the 3 poems
edited your work for COPS
checked the rubric to make sure you have included all necessary elements on your website

.....you are ready to submit the link to your website!

Submit under the dropbox: Poetry Website

Site:	Cowichan Valley School District - Moodle
Course:	ELA7, CSS, Sferrazza
Book:	4.3 Writer's Workshop: Poetry

Printed by:	Guest user
Date:	Sunday, 12 May 2024, 4:36 PM

4.3 Writer's Workshop: Poetry

Table of contents

Rhyme Time

Copyright 2007, Open School BC

Rhythm

Alliteration

Repetition

Similes and Metaphors

Personification

e.g.,

Example

Copyright 2007, Open School BC

Copyright 2007, Open School BC