Poetry Network for English Teachers Language Learning Support Section, EMB

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Poetry Network for English TeachersLanguage
Learning Support Section, EMB
Invitation for enrollment
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The Poetry Network

• The Poetry Network aims to help you
• Pool resources for poetry teaching
• Optimise teaching effectiveness
• Enrich understanding and appreciation      
• Try out different teaching strategies
• Respond positively to curriculum changes
• Yield fruits through collaboration

If you want to benefit from this professional
network, please complete the registration form
and return it to us as soon as possible!
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Workshop onPerforming Poetryat Secondary Level
Language Learning Support Section 21st October
2006
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A Diamond Poem

• Speech Festival
• solo choral
• articulating rehearsing performing
• competition verse-speaking celebration
  curriculum
• understanding appreciating learning
• integrated creative
• English Teaching

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Getting Ready to Teach the Poem for Performance
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Understanding the Poem
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Activity 1Matching

• You have been given a copy of the poem The
  Listeners by Walter de la Mare
• In the envelope on your table is a modernized
  version of the poem, cut up into sections
• Match the sections of the modernized version
  with the original version

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Activity 1Matching

1. C
2. H
3. F
4. A
5. D

1. J
2. G
3. B
4. I
5. E

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The Listeners by Walter de la Mare.

• 1. Now, listen to a reading of the poem.
• After listening, share the following with a
  partner
• Did you find the poem challenging? If so, in what
  ways?
• What problems do you anticipate in
• teaching the poem?
• performing it?

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Challenges

• Poems can be difficult to understand because of
• 1. The language
• Grammatical omission or contraction
• Inversion
• Old-fashioned vocabulary and structures
• 2. The poetic features
• 3. The compressed way of expression
• 4. The readers lack of some background knowledge

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Challenging language from The Listeners
And (he could hear) his horse champing the
grasses in the silence
And his horse in the silence champed the grasses
Never the least stir made the listeners.
Inversion
The listeners never made the least stir.
And he smote upon the door again a second time
And he knocked on the door again a second time
Hearkening in an air stirred and shaken
Listening in an air stirred and shaken
Old English
Though every word he spake
Though every word he spoke
Contraction
Neath the starred and leafy sky
Beneath the starred and leafy sky
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Activity 2 Work in pairs to study the poem
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Analysing the poem - meaning

1. A horsemans strange encounter in the woods
2. A narrative poem
3. Quiet, but tense and eerie
4. Narrator, traveller
5. The traveller is perplexed, nervous and scared
6. Moonlight, empty house with foliage, shadows in
   the hallway
7. Mainly senses of hearing and sight
8. Living creatures vs. ghostly listeners
9. One long stanza

• Subject matter what is the poem about?
• What type of poem is it?
• What is the mood? Is it serious or lighthearted?
• How many speakers are there?
• What feelings do they express?
• What visual images are created with the words?
• Does the poet play on the senses?
• Is there any contrast within the poem?
• What is the structure of the poem?

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Analysing the poem - sound

• 1. Yes, alternate lines rhyme in pairs
• 2. Sound soft and quiet. Rhythm smooth
• Pace generally slow, but moving fast when
  tension intensifies
• 3. Yes, the quiet and mysterious atmosphere is
  emphasized.
• 4. Alliteration forests ferny floor, silence
  surged softly backward

1. Does the poem rhyme?
2. How are the sound, rhythm and pace?
3. Does the sound system help to emphasize the mood?
4. Are there any special sound features (e.g.
   alliteration, onomatopoeia)

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Analysing the poem -structure

• For each section, discuss the following
• Is it narrative or descriptive?
• What is happening? (narrative)
• What is being described? (descriptive)

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Narrative traveller speaks
Descriptive sets the scene
Narrative traveller speaks
Descriptive scene outside house
Descriptive the atmosphere inside the house
Descriptive travellers feelings
Descriptive scene outside
Narrative travellers response
Descriptive the atmosphere inside the house
The traveller leaves and silence returns
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Teaching the Poem
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Consider the following

• How can you help your students to
• understand and visualise the poem?
• respond to the poem?
• (What kind of response will you aim for? What
  prompting questions to use?)
• learn and appreciate the significant poetic
  devices in it?
• express the poem with imagination and feeling?

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Teaching strategies

• Use pictures, realia, music, context, etc to set
  the mood and help students understand the meaning
  and visualise the poem.
• Employ different strategies and activities at
  different stages of the lesson to
• encourage students to respond to the poem
• commenting on the ideas, themes and events
• relating these to their own experience
• discussing or writing something related to the
  poem
• extend their experience in using the language
• teach poetic features
• Read aloud the poem for students to focus on the
  sound imagery.

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Visualising and understanding

• Show students pictures which convey some aspects
  of the scene described in the poem. Ask questions
  about the pictures.
• Some music or soundscape could also be used.
• Read through the poem and let them listen.
  (Possibly with scary background music) Ask very
  general questions to make sure they have grasped
  the gist of what the poem is about.
• Who are the Listeners of the title?
• How does the traveller feel?
• Why does he go to that house?
• What does he do in the end?

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Studying the language

• Sequencing a modern English version of the
  story in the poem.
• Matching Old English and other difficult
  vocabulary items with modern or more common
  equivalents.
• Ask students to underline those parts of the poem
  where there are sounds (champing, sound of iron
  on stone etc.)

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Working on meaning and images

• Give students a list of things which are inside
  and things which are outside the house. They
  have to put them in the correct columns or boxes.
• Use this to show how the author makes a contrast
  between the living creatures outside and the
  ghosts behind the door in the haunted house.
  Sounds and movement outside and ghosts inside etc.

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Responding to the poem

• Ask students to
• Draw the inside of the house (use the picture to
  represent the outside)
• Make a tableau of the scene in the poem, with
  ghosts inside and traveller outside
• Identify sounds in the poem and perform the poem
  with recorded or home made sound effects
• The background (why the traveller came to the
  house, what promise he had made) is not
  explained. Ask students to make it up.
• Alternatively, write about what the ghosts did
  next.

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Performing the Poem(Solo verse-speaking)
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Have a Go!

• Read the poem aloud with your partner
• The first person reads lines 1-16
• The second person reads lines 17-32

• Make a mental note
• What difficulties do you face in actually
  performing the poem?
• How would you help students to overcome them?

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Teachers preparation
Meaning

• Analyse the structure of the poem for a good
  understanding --- this determines how it should
  be read.
• Note
• How many voices are speaking
• Any sound that may be problematic to the students
• Long and short vowels
• Problem sounds for Chinese speakers (th, l, r)
• Final consonants --- (e.g.ed sound after voiced
  consonants -- champed, leaf-fringed)
• Consonant clusters (e.g. cropping, thronging)
• Check the pronunciation of any words in doubt

Sound
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Teachers preparation (2)

• Mark the following
• Rhyming words
• Pauses --- with end-on lines
• Stresses
• Syllable stress --- work out the basic rhythmic
  pattern
• Words stress
• key words in every line
• words / phrases that carry special meaning
• words that convey the mood
• Work out the general mood of the whole poem and
  note any changes in it.

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Teachers preparation (3)
Sound it out

• Read aloud the poem to yourself and listen
• Is the rhythmic pattern regular or irregular?
• What is the effect of the sound pattern?
• Does the pattern match the mood of the poem? Do
  you want to introduce some variations to break
  the pattern?
• Experiment with different ways to say the poem.
• Does your expression match the meaning you want
  to put across?
• Is the student able to say it as you wish?

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Performing Techniques

• Use contrast to enliven the reading

• fast slow lines/stanzas
• loud soft lines
• heavy light voices
• staccato smooth rhythms
• high and low pitches

A P E
lternate ause mphasize
Wait for a specific silent beats before
continuing

• Saying it louder, slower and dramatically

• key words, sense words, onomatopoeia
• climax / punch line

• Make suitable use of facial expression and gesture

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Activity 3 Listen and Note
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Rehearsingthe Poem
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Rehearsing with the students

• Help students to visualise the poem and project
  themselves into the alternate roles/ voices.
• Model read the poem --- Use a tape to tune them
  in if necessary.
• Instruct students to mark the phrasing, stress,
  intonation and inflection patterns on the poem
  sheet.
• Listen to the students and work on any speech
  defects, if any.
• Ensure that students have mastered the
  pronunciation before working on the feeling,
  rhythm, intonation, etc.
• Encourage students to experiment with the reading
  and practise with one another.

Peer support/learning
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• -- -- / -- -- -- / --
  -- / (--) --
• Is there anybody there? said the Traveller,
• / -- -- -- / -- /
• Knocking on the moonlit door

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Choral Speaking
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What is Choral Speaking?

• A group of people reciting in unison?

• A group of speakers expressing their
  interpretation of a poem imaginatively from
  memory
• Unity
• Presentation controlled, unified and harmonized
• The outcome of concerted efforts and repeated
  rehearsals

variations
Clip art licensed from the Clip Art Gallery on
DiscoverySchool.com
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Techniques for Choral Speaking
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Techniques (1)

• Orchestration Use different voices for special
  effects.
• Listen to students voices and group them
  accordingly
• Light or dark
• High or low
• Rough or smooth
• Melodious or monotonous
• Divide poem into
• chorus
• small groups
• solo lines or phrases
• character lines
• Use conducting to synchronize the speech

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Techniques (2)

• Achieve extra effects with judicious use of
• Gestures
• All speakers using simultaneous gestures
• Individuals / small groups gesticulating on
  certain words / lines
• Postures (and hand position)
• Train learners to show their concentration and
  enjoyment through synchronized speech, eye
  contact, posture and facial expressions.
• Sound effects
• Percussion
• Vocal effects
• Music
• Costumes or props

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Techniques (3)

• Make pleasant grouping for better vocal and
  visual effects
• Position the students according to voice quality
  to
• create a stereo effect
• form shapes to highlight the theme
• Shapes or grouping can be changed to show a
  change of mood or meaning
• Scatter solo speakers among the group, but place
  character speakers together in the front row
• All speakers must be seen --- arrange them
  according to height on risers
• Practise entering and exiting the stage ---
• The performance begins as soon as their names
  are called and finishes only when they sit down.

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Show Time !

• You are going to watch the performance of choral
  group
• Haunted (by Shel Silverstein)

• While you watch, take a mental note of the
  strengths and weaknesses of the performance

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From analysis to orchestrating

• Study the poem and analyse its structure ---
  focus on the gist and special features of each
  stanza
• Plan how it can be read to best convey the
  meaning
• Design the orchestration

Step 1
Step 2
Step 3
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Haunted -- Analysis
challenge
make-believe spooky descriptions
showing courage
backing down back to reality
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Haunted Reading style
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Haunted - orchestration
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Practical Work
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Your Turn Now!

• Suppose you are to prepare your class for
  performing a poem at a school function and you
  have the following poems for consideration
• Cat Began
• Hong Kong is Full of People

Please refer to the yellow poem analysis sheets
for the text

• Listen to the poems and comment on their
  suitability for solo or choral work.

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Before making your decision

• Study the poem and analyse
• its structure (gist and purpose of each stanza)
• how it can be read
• how to orchestrate it for choral work
• Experiment how to read it out
• according to your interpretation

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Working Together

• Get into pairs or groups.
• Work on one of the poems.

Make notes on the poem analysis sheet
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Practical Tips
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On choice of poems

• Poems that are relevant to students interest and
  experience
• Poems that match students gender, age, voice
  quality and personality.
• Different occasions and purposes call for
  different poems

• For choral work
• Poems with variety, contrasts and repetition
  (refrain)
• Narrative poems are good as a start
• Avoid static and abstract poems
• Not poems with I as the subject (but
  modification could be done sometimes).

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• Traditional and contemporary poems with
  significant poetic features and meaning

• Poems that
• you can manage
• suit your students

NSS elective module
The HK Schools Speech Festival
School Performance
Integrating with curriculum

• Poems that
• motivate
• relate thematically to the modules

Poems that are fun, dramatic and allow room for
exploitation
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On solo verse-speaking

• Do not give explanation and instruction only ---
  Students must visualise and appreciate the poem
  before they can speak it meaningfully.
• Dont teach verse by verse ---This causes a lack
  of continuity. Students cant get a feeling of
  the poem as a whole.
• Rehearse section by section --- Focus on one
  thing at a time. Allow students time to
  internalize, experiment and improve on their own.
• Never allow premature memorization --- Memorizing
  the words without proper interpretation and
  feeling is disastrous and its difficult to undo
  any mistakes.

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On choral speaking

• Orchestration must be the product of analysis and
  interpretation.
• Introduce orchestration only at the final stage
  of rehearsal --- Every speaker must know the
  whole poem to maintain harmony in the speech.
• Work on a harmonious blend of voices and
  synchronized movements to show good
  co-ordination.
• The speakers should look involved, confident and
  relaxed.
• Maintain good discipline at all times.

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Key to Success
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SUCCESS !

• Clear speech and accurate pronunciation are of
  paramount importance.
• A touch of drama is essential. Never overdo any
  extra effects --- they should add to and not
  distract from the poem.
• It is important that students enjoy the choral
  work --- Know when to stop.
• Aim not at perfection, but spontaneity and
  flexibility --- Adapt your expectation and
  treatment to bring out the best in the students.

But for school functions, extra effects help to
deliver the meaning clearly and may be more
appealing!
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Selected Anthologies of Poems

1. Mike Murphy (1979) Rhythm and Rhyme. Hong Kong
   Institute of Education, HK.
2. Paul Cookson (ed.)(2005) The Poetry Store.
   London, Hodder Childrens Books
3. Michael Rosen (ed.) (2003) A World of Poetry.
   London, Kingfisher
4. Brian Pattern (ed.) (1998) The Puffin Book of
   Utterly Brilliant Poetry. London, Puffin Books
5. Michael Harrison Christopher Stuart-Clark
   (eds.)(1999) The New Oxford Treasury of
   Childrens Poems. Oxford, Oxford University Press
6. Sadler, Hayllar, Powell (1981) Enjoying Poetry.
   South Yarra, Macmillan Education Australia Pty
   Ltd
7. Michael Rosen (ed.) (1985) The Kingfisher Book of
   Childrens Poetry. London, Kingfisher
   Publications Plc

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