Teaching poetry is challenging due to students’ lack of understanding and intimidation. Engage students by starting with simple concepts, literary devices, and relatable poems before moving on to more difficult works.
Teaching poetry can be challenging because many students are intimidated by this form of writing and may not have a solid understanding of why poetry is important. It is important to find ways to engage students in the material when teaching poetry by not only choosing the right poems to teach, but also by understanding the personalities and interests of the students to teach. Starting with very simple concepts and giving students some leeway with the topic can help them engage before moving on to more difficult topics and poems.
One reason teaching poetry can be difficult is because students tend to have difficulty understanding figurative language. This is a word or phrase that has an implied meaning; examples include similes, metaphors, metonymy, synecdoche, and so on. Before teaching poetry to a class of students, try teaching one or two of these literary devices. Similarity is perhaps the easiest concept for students to understand, so this is a good place to start. Provide students with many examples of similarities; mix famous similes of poems and literary works with invented similes; challenges students to come up with the most creative similes they can think of.
Once students have gained a basic understanding of some types of figurative language, present students with simpler, shorter poems that express an emotion throughout. Indicate the literary devices that the students learned. At first it may be helpful to choose a poem without any rhyme scheme to allow students to focus on the figurative language instead. This will make teaching poetry a little easier in the beginning. Once students are able to recognize and use imagery, it may be a good idea to move on to rhyme schemes and common types of poems. While the sonnet is perhaps the best known form of poetry, it may not be the best place to start. Start with a simple rhyme scheme, like ABABA and so on.
The more students are involved with the materials, the easier the teaching of poetry will be for the teacher. Instead of starting a lesson with Shakespearean sonnets, the teacher should perhaps start with a modern poet who uses a modern language that students can connect with. Moving on to Shakespeare later is certainly important, but it is more important that students get the gist of the poem before delving into exceptionally challenging works.
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