American Poets
American Poets
Description
What did Emily Dickinson, Carl Sandburg,
and Ralph Waldo Emerson have in common? All three were poets and they were also
Americans! At the beginning of the 19th century, American poetry was
practically non-existent; most poetry being read was British. But
Join me on a tour to learn more about a
few American poets and develop a taste for poetry. We will be learning about the
following poets during this fieldtrip: Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry Wadsworth
Longfellow, Edgar Allen Poe, Henry David Thoreau, Walt Whitman, Emily
Dickinson, Stephan Crane, Robert Frost, Carl Sandburg, and T. S. Eliot.
Goals
The goals and objectives of this fieldtrip are to: (a) learn about the ten American poets featured in this fieldtrip, (b) understand their style, and (c) read several of the featured poets’ poems.
Research
(Source: the American Poems website, http://www.americanpoems.com/, and the World Book Encyclopedia
website, http://www.aolsvc.worldbook.aol.com/)
According to the American Poems website, “At the beginning
of the 19th century,
But
‘the flowering of
The
World Book Encyclopedia writes, “Poets of the 1900's were also influenced
greatly by the American poets Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson and the English
poet Gerard Manley Hopkins. Although these three poets lived in the 1800's,
their work had elements that became associated with modern poetry. Whitman used
everyday dialect in his poems, many of which were written in free verse. His
collection Leaves of Grass, first
published in 1855, is one of poetry's landmark works.
Lesson Plans:
1)
Go to the American Poets website (http://www.americanpoems.com/). From time to
time, the links on the web site do not work. Either skip the question below or
the page you’ve been directed to and go on. When navigating a site, you may
want to use your forward and back arrows, or click on the icon (link) buttons.
The back arrow is the best way to get from a particular screen back to the main
screen.
2) Welcome to the American Poems site! Click on “Poets” to start the virtual fieldtrip.
3)
Click on Ralph Waldo Emerson, located under the chronological listing, and read
about him.
4)
Scroll down to the poems by Emerson and read “The Snow-Storm.” Use your back
arrows to go back to the Poets page.
5)
Click on Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and read about him.
6) Scroll down to the poems by Longfellow and read the following: “A Psalm of Life” (under Voices of the Night), “The Children’s Hour,” (under Miscellaneous), and Paul Revere’s Ride (Miscellaneous). Use your back arrows to go back to the Poets page.
7)
Click on Edgar Allen Poe and read about him.
8)
Scroll down to the poems by Poe and read the “The Raven.” Use your back arrows
to go back to the Poets page.
9) Click on Henry David Thoreau and read about him.
10)
Read ________________. Use your back arrows to go back to the Poets page.
11) Click on Walt Whitman and read about him.
12) Read ________________. Use your back arrows to go back to the Poets page.
13)
Click on Emily Dickinson and read about her.
14)
Read ________________. Use your back arrows to go back to the Poets page.
15)
Click on Stephan Crane and read about him.
16)
Scroll down to the poems by Crane and read “The wayfarer” (under War is Kind
& Other Lines). Use your back arrows to go back to the Poets page.
17)
Click on Robert Frost and read about him.
18)
Scroll down to the poems by Frost and read the following: “The Road Not Taken”
(located under Mountain Interval - 1916). Use your back arrows to go back to
the Poets page.
19)
Click on Carl Sandburg and read about him.
20)
Scroll down to the poems by Sandburg and read the following: “Soup” (located
under Miscellaneous) and “Fog” (located under Handfuls). Use your back arrows
to go back to the Poets page.
21)
Click on T. S. Eliot and read about him.
21)
Read ________________. Use your back arrows to go back to the Poets page.
22)
Scavenger Hunt
Questions
Grades
K-3
1) What did Longfellow’s father want him to be? And what did he become?
2) What do many scholars consider Henry David Thoreau?
3) True or false: Emily Dickinson was a very outgoing, adventurous person who enjoyed traveling.
4) Who wrote the following poems: “The Song of Haiwatha,” “The Road Not Taken,” and “Fog?”
5) What was Robert Frost’s life ambition?
6) What is Henry David Thoreau’s legal name? When did he change it?
7) How old was Henry Wadsworth Longfellow when he started going to school?
8) How many poems did Emily Dickinson write? How many of them were published during her lifetime?
9) True or false: At the beginning of the 19th century, America had much of her own literature, art, and music.
10) What are two reasons for the popularity and significance of Longfellow's poetry?
Grades
4-8
1) Why do Americans owe a great debt of gratitude to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow?
2)
What was America like in the 19th century? Where did all of the
literature, art, and music come from?
3) What poet was Henry David Thoreau’s friend and mentor?
4) What theories did Emerson’s first book, Nature (1836), express? What did the book help do?
5)
What do some consider The Murders in the
Rue Morgue by Edgar Allen Poe?
6)
True or false: Carl Sandburg was a Pulitzer Prize winning poet.
7) Why did the publication of “Haiwatha” cause great excitement?
8) What did Walt Whitman desire to do?
9) What is the essay “On the Duty of Civil Disobedience” about and what famous people did it influence?
10)
Who are the giants mentioned in the following sentence: “He
(Longfellow) lived when giants walked the New England earth,…”
1)What literary forms did
Edgar Allen Poe favor? Did he master them?
2) Why is Robert Frost’s poetry both traditional and experimental?
3)
Why did Henry David Thoreau go to live at Walden Pond?
4) Edgar Allen Poe
virtually created what and perfect what?
5)
Why can T.S. Eliot be called “one of the most daring innovators of
twentieth-century poetry?”
6) How did Longfellow serve America and the students he taught?
7) What does Carl Sandburg’s poetry express?
8) When did “the flowering of New England” take place?
9) What was one of Walt Whitman’s major sources of inspiration?
10) What is Thoreau’s book, Walden, a response to?
Further Activities
* Now that you’ve read the poems of ten famous American poets, it’s your turn to give it a try! Pick a topic, grab a pencil, and write a poem. Choose how many verses your poem will have, where the commas and periods will go (you are the poet; you may do whatever you want and that even means you can have absolutely no punctuation if you want!), and what the mood of your poem will be.
* Vocabulary time! Define the following words: transcendentalist, unorthodox, philosophy, insular, anecdote, voracious, innovative, and psychology.
* Do you have a favorite poet? Go to the library or research on the Internet to find out more about that person. Then write a one-page paper about him. Include your favorite poem written by the poet at the end of your paper. (For high school students - Write your essay on the following topic: How were the poems your chosen poet wrote influenced by the historical events of the time?)
* Research the following kinds of poems: haiku, limerick, and sonnet. What is your favorite poem form? Why? Try writing one!
* Grab your siblings and/or friends for a game! Write down ten words on small slips of paper for each of the following categories: nouns, verbs, adjectives, and conjunctions (use any words you want – the wackier the better!). Then lay them all on the floor, face down, in their proper categories. Take turns picking a slip of paper to create a wacky, goofy poem that will be sure to produce plenty of laughs!
* T.S. Eliot wrote an entire book of poems about cats! Get the book from your library and read the poems. If you were to write an entire book of poetry about an animal, which one would it be?
*Stretch and bend your brain by memorizing Robert Frost’s poem “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” then recite it to family & friends!