YEAR 5
POETRY UNIT
WEEK ONE
During today’s lesson
We will:
 Review our previous learning – by showing we
recognise the features of this style of poetry (T6)
 Continue to read a range of narrative poetry (T4)
 Distinguish between homophones (W6)
During independent work, you will:
 Use the structure of a poem to write an extension
based on this (T12)
So what have we learnt so far?
Narrative poems are …
poems that tell a
story
Features of narrative
poetry can be:
introductory verse
 characters
 storyline
 chronological series of
events
 often have an easily
identifiable rhythm
 sometimes rhyming
couplets
 punctuation to aid
expression when reading
aloud

How the Bumble-Bee
Got His Stripes
By Nick Toczek
How the Bumble-Bee got His Stripes
On the day that the world began,
Each of the creatures was shown
All the colours of the universe;
And all were told to choose
Which of these they wanted for
themselves.
How the Bumble-Bee got His Stripes
Well, that day the elephant
Thought carefully and chose to be grey,
But the bumble-bee
Just bumbled around and buzzed around
And couldn’t make up his mind
And the yellow sun shone so brightly
That the bumble-bee’s bum became
yellow
How the Bumble-Bee got His Stripes
And that night the goldfish
Thought carefully and chose to be golden,
But the bumble-bee
Just bumbled around and buzzed around
And couldn’t make up his mind
And the black night grew so dark
That the bumble-bee’s hips became black.
How the Bumble-Bee got His Stripes
And the next day the cricket
Thought carefully and chose to be green,
But the bumble-bee
Just bumbled around and buzzed around
And couldn’t make up his mind,
And the yellow sun shone so brightly
That the bumble-bee’s waist became yellow
What have you noticed?
Think about our previous
lessons on narrative
poetry
Share your ideas with a
partner
So what have we noticed ?
On the day that the world
began,
Each of the creatures was
shown
All the colours of the
universe;
And all were told to choose
Which of these they wanted
for themselves
Like a narrative
story opening .. this
verse tells the
reader who, where,
what, when, why
So what have we noticed ?

In the first line of each verse a new animal is
introduced
Well, that day the elephant
And that night the goldfish
And the next day the cricket

The passing of time is also shown in the first
line, just as you would when you start a new
paragraph in a story.
So what have we noticed ?

To emphasise the bumble-bee’s behaviour,
the poet uses repetition in each verse.
‘But the bumble-bee
Just bumbled around and buzzed around
And couldn’t make up his mind’

This also makes the reader question what
might happen next. Just like in a build up
section of a story.
So what have we noticed ?

The passing of time is also shown in each verse with
the alternate use of day and night
The sun makes part of the bumble-bee’s body yellow
where as the dark sky makes it black
In your independent work,
You will write the next verses of How the
Bumble-Bee Got His Stripes with a partner
But first….
Lets take a closer look at some
of the words within the poem
Each of these words can be spelt at
least one other way and still sound
exactly the same.
Can you think of the other spellings
and explain their meaning?
for
sun
so
waist
night
Words like these are called
HOMOPHONES
How about……
Can you think of any
others?
there & their
hear & here
threw & through
Now it’s over to you!
Write the next verses of
How the Bumble-Bee
Got His Stripes with a
partner.
Use the writing frame to
help you.
You have approximately
20 minutes
To finish our lesson …
Let’s share an example or two of our narrative poetry
extensions.
And recap what the term homophone means
Homophones are words with common pronunciation
but different spelling
In tomorrow’s Literacy lesson, we will read
the real ending of the poem and focus
more upon homophones, this time within
sentences.
Well done
everyone!