FAMILY DYNAMICS IN POETRY: Poems on Parent-Child Relationships | 3-Day Lesson
This 45-page EDITABLE poetry curriculum promises to elicit dynamic engagement from all students without compromising on intellectual rigor. The 12 poems in this mini-unit all focus on the complex nature of family dynamics and parent-child relationships.
Because teenagers are caught up in complex relationships with their parents, these poems will set the stage for your class to have authentic discussions that inspire a whole new depth of reflection. The literary devices quizzes, discussion prompts, and analytical writing assignment will challenge your students to dig beneath the surface of the text and generate profound interpretive insights!
Here are some highlights from this 45-page curriculum:
• Homework Packets with Poems about Parent-Child Relationships: The two homework packets contain a total of 12 poems by a diverse range of award-winning poets such as Sylvia Plath, Theodore Roethke, Sharon Olds, Audre Lorde, Li-Young Lee, Galway Kinnell, Tony Hoagland, Ada Limón, and others. Every poem focuses on a different kind of parent-child dynamic. Because teenagers have a lot to say about relationships with parents, these poems will set the stage for your class to have fascinating and profoundly productive discussions!! (12 pages)
• Literary Devices Glossary: A glossary with definitions and examples of the various types of figurative language, imagery, stanzas, and syntactic devices. Many teachers already have a glossary of literary devices, but I'm providing this in case you need one. (2 pages)
• Literary Devices Quizzes: Open each class with a quiz of 10 questions to assess whether your students can accurately identify the literary devices used in the poems from the homework packets: metaphor, personification, symbolism, imagery, alliteration, etc. The digital versions of the quizzes on Google Forms will grade every student's work and automatically generate a list of their scores. Answer keys included. (4 pages).
• Discussion Questions: This bundle features a list of discussion questions for the first poem in each of the homework packets. The discussion questions will ensure that every class discussion starts on a productive foot. Every discussion question is grounded in concrete textual details and challenges students to arrive at lucid interpretive insights! The questions lend themselves to a range of different pedagogical uses: 1) to focus students’ thinking prior to beginning a discussion, 2) to prompt in-class writing, 3) to assign written reflections for homework, etc. Guaranteed to elicit student engagement and foster deep thinking! Answer keys included. (10 pages)
• Quick Writes: The quick writes give students an opportunity to capture and refine the best ideas generated in the discussion. Quick writes can also help reticent students to gather their thoughts so they'll feel ready and eager to contribute. (4 pages)
• Analytical Writing Assignment: Challenge students to take their interpretations one step further by writing an analytical paper on a poem of their choice. The assignment sheet contains detailed instructions for how to generate a formalist analysis of a poem (analyzing how the poem's formal features contribute to its meaning). This kind of formalist analysis is exactly what students are asked to generate on the AP Literature exam! Sample paper included. (3 pages)
This entire 44-page unit will come to you in two separate formats: Word *and* PDF. Because the Word doc is fully editable, you'll be able to customize the materials to suit the skill levels of your students — year after year! If you don't have Microsoft Word, you'll still be able to access all of the materials as a PDF — which is easy to navigate and quick to print! Finally, as a free bonus, I'm including links to digital copies of every document in user-friendly platforms like Google Docs and Google Forms.
My store is called “Rigorous Resources” because all of the resources contain rigorous content that will motivate students to engage in thought-provoking and productive discussions. Thank you for choosing “Rigorous Resources”!!
Happy teaching!
Adam Jernigan, Ph.D.
Links to all of the poetry units in this collection:
Poetry Unit #1: Sensory Imagery in Poetry
Poetry Unit #2: Figurative Language in Poetry
Poetry Unit #3: Love Poems
Poetry Unit #4: Ethical Dilemmas in Poetry
Poetry Unit #5: Family Dynamics in Poetry