Remember the first time you taught a poem to your high school English class? If you’re like me, it went something like this:
Me: Read poem (30 seconds) followed by an open-ended question, something like “What do you think of this poem?” followed by 30 seconds of silence.
Students fiddle.
Me (in a frustrated tone): Doesn’t anyone have any thing to say about this poem?
Smarta$$ Student (hand raised in the air): No.
End of Lesson.
48 minutes of busy work mixed with chaos.
A few poemless years later, I created poetry lesson plans using popular poems taught in high school. I’ll share a few with you before I get to my list of poems.
- Poetry Analysis and Annotation with Robert Frost’s “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” This forms the foundation for analyzing poetry.
- Speed Poetry Analysis with Any Poem. Best taught after students have a basic understanding on how to analyze and annotate a poem.
- Sound Devices in Poetry (PDF download).
Now, on to my list of popular poems taught in high school.
- "Dreams" and "What Happens to a Dream Deferred?" by Langston Hughes. Two poems. One poet. Great lesson. Check out the Langston Hughes page to achieve your lesson plan dreams.
- "The Road not Taken" by Robert Frost. Check out this Symbolism in the Poems of Robert Frost Lesson Plan. It's part of the Robert Frost unit.
- "Do not go gentle into that good night" by Dylan Thomas. Here's a YouTube clip from Interstellar you might want to share.
- "We Real Cool" by Gwendolyn Brooks. Poetry can be written with slang. Try annotating this and see what happens. You'll be pleasantly surprised. Good examples of alliteration and internal rhyme.
- "How do I Love Thee?" by Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Nothing like a hyperbolic love poem for a group known for hyperbolic declarations of love.
- "My Mistress Eyes Are Nothing Like the Sun" by William Shakespeare. This makes a good study on satire, a good companion piece to other love poems, or a good introduction to sonnets.
- "One Art" by Elizabeth Bishop. This poem talks about loss and makes a good poem for teaching metaphors.
- "Because I could not stop for death" by Emily Dickinson. Check out the Emily Dickinson page for lesson ideas.
- "This is Just to Say" by William Carlos Williams. Sometimes poems deal with everyday occurrences. This makes a good model for getting students to write their own poems.
- "O Captain! My Captain" by Walt Whitman. Whitman's tribute to Abraham Lincoln makes a good study for extended metaphors and symbolism.
- "I Hear America Singing" by Walt Whitman. Just check out the Walt Whitman page for ideas on Whitman's poems.
- "I, Too" by Langston Hughes. Makes a great companion piece to Whitman's classic.
- "The Lamb" and "The Tyger" by William Blake. Check out the William Blake page, but only if you want to.
- "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" by Robert Frost. Here's a lesson plan, analysis, and me singing "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" in my classroom.
- "Fire and Ice" by Robert Frost
- "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" by William Wordsworth. Check out the English Romantics page.
- "Jabberwocky" by Lewis Carrol. Here's an animated YouTube clip (below) as an aide to teaching this popular poem.
- "Eldorado" by Edgar Allan Poe. More on Poe's poetry here.
- "The Eagle" by Alfred Lord Tennyson. Great poem for teaching imagery.
Last Updated on December 5, 2016 by Trenton Lorcher
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