Commenting on
Poems
Prepared by:Ms Sarah Louis
In your copybook:
Doodle something that represents
poetry to you!
What is poetry?
Literary work in which the expression of feelings and ideas is given intensity
by the use of distinctive style and rhythm; poems collectively or as a genre
of literature.
2
Prepared by:Ms Sarah Louis
Prepare 4 different colour
of highlighters…
❖ Poetries are found in Paper 2
❖ Try to always guess the unfamiliar
words when reading the poem and
get the feeling of the whole poem!
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Prepared by:Ms Sarah Louis
❖ 4 steps to follow when analysing poetry
READ
THINK
ANNOTATE
NOTE and COMBINE the key terms
in the question
COMMENTING
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Prepared by:Ms Sarah Louis
READ
❖ Two to three readings before you even
start thinking and make the
connections..
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Prepared by:Ms Sarah Louis
THINK
❖ Is it designed to make you:
❖ Feel something
❖ Think deeply
❖ While reading ask yourself,
“Is this poem targeting my emotions or mind?”
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Prepared by:Ms Sarah Louis
ANNOTATE -
NOTE DOWN
❖ Your initial feelings /thoughts
❖ Figures of speech
❖ Rhyme scheme
❖ Number of line and determine the syllables
❖ Number of stanzas
❖ Tone of the poet
❖ Colours
❖ Word play
❖ Form of the poem ( type: sonnet, haiku, free verse, narrative etc..
❖ Structure (line length, sentence length, structure of stanzas (couplet
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Prepared by:Ms Sarah Louis
Note and combine
the key terms in the
question
❖ Look for keywords in the question and relate it to the
poem you have read.
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Prepared by:Ms Sarah Louis
COMMENTING
❖ Use the PEEAL Technique to comment
❖ Point – Evidence – Explain – Analyse - Link
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Prepared by:Ms Sarah Louis
What’s the initial feeling that you Open Booklet 1
got when you saw the picture?
P. 35
10
In groups of 4s
Annotate the peom
1. Initail feelings that you got when you read…
2. How did the poet describe the house?
3. The words and figures of speech used to describe the people living on the
farm
4. The feeling or the atmosphere the poet is creating
5. His tone throughout the poem
6. Rhyme scheme
7. Number of stanzas
8. Tone of the poet
9. Colours
10. Form of the poem ( type: sonnet, haiku, free verse, narrative etc..
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Prepared by:Ms Sarah Louis
In groups of 4s
Use the PEEAL technique to analyse the poem
He was a big man, says the size of his shoes
on a pile of broken dishes by the house;
a tall man too, says the length of the bed
in an upstairs room; and a good, God-fearing man,
says the Bible with a broken back
on the floor below the window, dusty with sun;
but not a man for farming, say the fields
cluttered with boulders and the leaky barn.
A woman lived with him, says the bedroom wall
papered with lilacs and the kitchen shelves
covered with oilcloth, and they had a child,
says the sandbox made from a tractor tire.
Money was scarce, say the jars of plum preserves
and canned tomatoes sealed in the cellar hole.
And the winters cold, say the rags in the window frames.
It was lonely here, says the narrow country road.
Something went wrong, says the empty house
in the weed-choked yard. Stones in the fields
say he was not a farmer; the still-sealed jars
in the cellar say she left in a nervous haste.
And the child? Its toys are strewn in the yard
like branches after a storm—a rubber cow,
a rusty tractor with a broken plow, 12
a doll in overalls. Something went wrong, they say.
POETRY IS
AMAZING!
RIGHT?
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Prepared by:Ms Sarah Louis
