1. Elements of Poetry
“Poems are pattern in motion, like music but gifted with human speech.”
-Leonard Nathan, Contemporary Poet

2. What is Poetry The art of expressing one’s thoughts in verse.
Uses few words to convey its message
Meant to be read aloud
Arouses our emotions
Uses imagery or figurative language to explain feelings and create mental pictures
Suggest action or moods

3. How do we recognize Poetry?
Can have established formal structures
Pattern of Rhymes
Can take the shape of irregular lines on a page.
Free Verse—not written in rhyme and meter.
Can vary in tone
Attitude expressed by subject

4. Sound Devices add a musical quality to poetry
Sound Devices add a musical quality to poetry. Enhances a poem’s mood and meaning
Rhyme: the repetition of sounds at the ends of words (pool, rule, fool)
Rhythm: the beat caused by the pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables (The cat sat on the mat)
Repetition: the use of any element of language—sound, word, phrase, clause, or sentence—more than once.
Onomatopoeia: the use of words that imitate sounds---crash, bang, hiss, splat
Alliteration: is the repetition of consonant sounds in beinning of words---lovely lonely lights
Taken from Pearson 6th grade Textbook

5. Identify the Rhyme Scheme
“Ten Minutes Till The Bus”
By David L. Harrison
Ten whole minutes
Till the bus,
Scads of time,
What’s the fuss?
Two to dress,
One to flush,
Two to eat,
One to brush,
That leaves four
To catch the bus,
“Ten Minutes Till The Bus”
By David L. Harrison
Ten whole minutes
Till the bus,
Scads of time,
What’s the fuss?
Two to dress,
One to flush,
Two to eat,
One to brush,
That leaves four
To catch the bus, A B

6. Figurative Language writing or speech that is not meant to be taken literally.
Metaphors: describe one thing as if it were something else. They often point out a similarity between two unlike things ---The snow was a white blanket over the town.
Similes: use Like or as to compare two apparently unlike things and show similarities between the two—She is as slow as a turtle.
Personification: gives human qualities to something that is non human---The ocean crashed angrily during the storm.
Hyperbole: is an exaggeration or overstatement used for comic effect or to increase emotion---A million bees had stung him.
Taken from Pearson 6th grade Textbook

7. Figurative Language Activity
Give students a topic (fruit, colors places, etc). Have students come up with a metaphor on that topic, then continue have them create similes, personification and hyperbole.
Green

8. Sensory Language
Writing that appeals to one or more of the five senses—sight, sounds, smell, taste, and touch.
Creates word pictures, or images
Poets often use these words and pictures to help the reader experience the poem.
Taken from Pearson 6th grade Textbook

9. Sensory Language Activity
Write a paragraph about a certain topic including sensory details.
Could also put a BaDaBing in right here for writing.

10. Quick Check In use what we have talked about to fill in the chart below
Example
Poetic Element
The honeybee buzzed by and landed on a flower
Moonlight crept slowly into the boy’s room at night.
The baby’s cry was a siren alerting all that it was time for dinner.
The silver stars swirled in the summer sky.
He was hungry as a bear after school.
Answers:
Onomatopoeia
Personification
Metaphor
Alliteration
simile