Jeff Wasserman
Subject/Theme: Poetry as a description of a place
Title of Unit: In the Neighborhood
Overview: This unit is designed for use in a public school, though
nothing in it keeps it from being suitable for a private school. It can
be used with any sized class. This unit is planned for an upper-highschool English class, 11th or 12th grade, and is a unit on poetry as a
tool for description of a place. Prerequisite for this unit is a basic
understanding of poetry and how it differs from prose. It is suggested
that you use this unit toward the end of the term or academic year, as
it builds on skills that the students should have acquired by this point
in their schooling, such as close reading and ability to identify and
generate figurative language.
This unit is a more in-depth study of poetry than high school students
might be used to. Rather than a general overview of verse as a form
of literature--a few sonnets, some Dickinson, a Beat or two, maybe
some Romantics--this unit focuses closely on how poets and lyricists
use the conventions of their art to convey a sense of place. Students
will read a wide variety of poems and song lyrics and try to discern the
authors’ relationships to the places described. Along the way they will
work on their own poems about their surroundings--neighborhoods,
houses, etc. When students complete this unit they will not only have
experienced a deep analysis of one of the purposes of writing and its
relationship to one’s environment, they will have written their own
contemporary poems about their environments. Students will be
assessed based on class discussions about their fieldwork and their
analysis of the readings.
Objectives: The unit addresses several of the Language Arts goals of
Connecticut’s Common Core of Learning. Specifically, it will contribute
to students’ ability to:
 Read, write, speak, listen, and view to construct meaning of
written, visual, and oral texts;
 Read with understanding and respond thoughtfully to a variety of
texts;
 Create works using the language arts in visual, oral, and written
texts;
 Understand and appreciate texts from many historical periods and
cultures.
Resources/Materials: Each student will need a copy of the following
texts:
“Composed upon Westminster Bridge, September 3, 1802” by William
Wordsworth
“Chicago” by Carl Sandburg
“In the Neighborhood” by Tom Waits
“Penny Lane” by Paul McCartney
“My Father’s Waltz” by Theodore Roethke
The Canterbury Tales, General Prologue, 445-476 by Geoffrey Chaucer
“Dulce Et Decorum Est” by Wilfred Owen
“Rising Sign” by M. Doughty
Each student will also need a piece of drawing paper.
Your classroom will need a chalkboard--or, if you choose to teach this
lesson outside, you’ll need some big paper and possibly an easel.
Place:
I chose not to set my lessons outside because of what I’d heard from
various other students (in this and my other class) about the
difficulties of taking students outside in the big city. With that in mind,
I instead focussed my lessons on reflection about a particular place,
rather than visiting that place as a class. This puts a lot more
emphasis on students’ ability to gather information independently.
All of the following uses of “place” hold true for each lesson. In the
individual lesson plans, I have pointed out more specific applications
where appropriate. I did not force my lessons to fit in with these five
forms; they just sort of happened that way.
As setting: The lessons in this unit are not geared toward any specific
place, though they require students to always keep a specific place-their neighborhoods--in mind.
As character: Each student’s neighborhood is the source of the overall
unit project. The whole point of this unit is to teach poetry from the
angle that it’s a great way to paint a picture of a specific place.
As chalkboard: Place is definitely the tool through which the goals of
each lesson, and the unit as a whole, are reached. The unit seeks to
teach students about the major tools that poets use when creating a
piece about a place; by using their own neighborhoods as a source,
they learn new techniques in a safe way.
As lens: I deliberately require students to talk not just about the
physical places and people in their neighborhoods but their memories
of important/formative experiences in their neighborhoods.
As book: All of the research students do for their creative pieces comes
from observing their local areas.
Overview of Procedures:
Lesson One: The students will have read “Composed upon
Westminster Bridge” and “Chicago” as homework. The class will
briefly discuss how poetry can celebrate a city’s “spirit.” Then they’ll
brainstorm on perceptions of the USA, both from those who live here
and those who don’t. Individually, they’ll brainstorm on the same
issues about their own city, then their own neighborhoods. The lesson
includes ample opportunity for discussion of stereotyping based on
where a person lives and emphasizes a place’s connections to other
places.
Lesson Two: The students will read or listen to “In the
Neighborhood” and “Penny Lane” in class and discuss what the writers
do with character and place. How do they use realism and
exaggeration to convey an idea? Which technique is more effective?
The students then will draw maps of their neighborhoods with four
levels of detail: the “lay of the land,” labeling buildings and landmarks,
adding sensory details (What does this look like? Smell like? Sound
like? etc.), and locations of important events in the neighborhood’s
existence as well as their own lives. In pairs, the students will “walk
each other through” their maps and add detail as necessary.
Lesson Three: “My Father’s Waltz” is read and discussed. What is
the father like? What does he look like? Students are asked to
identify specific words and phrases that give them the impressions
that they get. The class comes up with a character sketch for the
father in the poem. Then the Chaucer section is read and discussed
similarly. If this is the first time these students have been exposed to
Chaucer, this would be a good opportunity for a mini-lesson on how to
read the language (Middle English).
Next, the students will brainstorm. Each will choose a person from his
or her neighborhood map and write down everything they can think of
about that person’s job, role in the community, personality, etc. They
must come up with sensory clues for each item about that person. A
few students will read their “clues” to the class, while the other
students try to guess from those clues what the person described
therein might be like.
For homework, the students will turn their lists into complete
paragraphs that focus on sensory and emotional description.
Lesson Four: The lesson starts with a discussion of imagery (a vivid
description, figure of speech, or concrete representation that is
evocative of something else). A mini-lesson on figures of speech can
go here. Have the students read “Dulce Et Decorum Est” while it is
read aloud. After it’s been read, have them call out images they found
in the poem as you write them on the board. Then have the students
parse each image and try to determine why Owen uses the images he
uses. The students then do the same with “Rising Sign,” on their own.
Now have the students look at their neighborhood maps. They should
come up with as many image words/phrases as possible for a person
or location on the map.
Explain the poetry assignment for the next day and also have the
students pick a favorite song and do an image analysis of its lyrics for
additional practice with this difficult concept.
Lesson Five: In groups of four or five, the students will read and
critique the poems they wrote. Students will offer feedback orally as
well as on Peer Review sheets (which will count as part of the unit’s
grade). The reader should not tell his or her group what the poem is
describing; the group should be able to figure it out from the poem.
Evaluation/Assessment: Included in this unit is a rubric for
evaluating students’ performance during the course of the unit. It is
vital that they all participate in the class discussions since that is when
the terminology they’ll be using throughout the unit will be introduced
and explained. Also, they will hand in their neighborhood maps,
poems, and Peer Review sheets and will be graded on how effectively
they completed each task.
I suggest using this form of assessment because I know how difficult it
is to give a grade on a creative piece. Rather than grading students
on the content of their poems, their use and understanding of the four
techniques discussed in the unit should be evaluated.
Interdisciplinary Connections: Because of the wide variety of
poems and song lyrics used in this unit, it could be adapted for use in
any class that discusses the Romantics, urban studies, Medieval
history, or World War I. In addition, the mapping portion of the unit
would be an interesting element to use in an art or civics class, or for
an elementary or middle school class.