Running head: TEACHING POETIC DEVICES IN URBAN SCHOOLS 1

Teaching Poetic Devices in Urban Schools Through Creative Writing

and Analysis of Culturally Relevant Poetry

Todd Cecutti

Capital University

EDUC 352/356

Dr. Cheryl DoBroka

30 November 2016
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Abstract

Through four weeks of instruction on creative writing and the analysis of culturally relevant

poetry, a control group of six urban ninth and tenth grade language arts students with Lexile

scores ranging from below average to far below average showed evidence of growth in their use

and recognition of poetic devices. Based on the results of a thirteen-question diagnostic pre-test,

seven poetic devices that the students showed little to no knowledge of were chosen as focus

content. The unit was then planned in connection to a poetic narrative fulcrum text in order to

establish and expand upon their knowledge of allusion, personification, metaphor, alliteration,

onomatopoeia, hyperbole, and the recognition of stanzas. Texts used for the unit were selected

based upon student interests, cultures, and strengths. Assessment was planned around students

abilities to both apply and recognize poetic devices while creating and analyzing poetry. In

writing poetry, students were asked to reflect upon their own strengths, personalities, and

cultures to drive content while including one to two poetic devices per creation. In analyzing

poetry, students were exposed to texts by Kwame Alexander, Langston Hughes, and Maya

Angelou among others. Analysis occurred often in a group setting in order for students to share

ideas and uncover multiple meanings. Quantitative data from a seven-question post-test and

other qualitative data suggest that students showed appropriate and applicable growth through

the four-week instructional period in their knowledge of the focus poetic devices.
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Teaching Poetic Devices Through Creative Writing

and Analysis of Culturally Responsive Poetry

Purpose

Based on researcher conversations with multiple education professionals during this field

placement, students in this particular urban environment and of their particular academic level

have minimal exposure to poetry, especially with regards to recognizing poetic devices for the

purpose of analyzing poetry. Reading and writing poetry has the ability to open students to an

array of emotions and personal reflections while also improving their ability to interact with

multiple forms of the English Language. According to Kinloch (2005), Poetry, like all genres of

writing, serves a political purpose, particularly for public school students struggling to master the

conventions of Standard American English and academic writing (p. 96). In this way,

instruction aimed to develop students ability to read poetry and analyze it using poetic devices to

defend their assertions, both in a personal, casual environment as well as a formal, academic one.

Baseline Data Collection

Prior to collecting poetry specific baseline data, the researcher was provided with the most

current Lexile scores of five of the six students in Class A (one students Lexile data was

unavailable due to being new to the district). This data showed that all five of the students were

operating at Lexile levels ranging from below average to far below average. This significantly

informed instruction throughout the unit, specifically in selecting a fulcrum text. The fulcrum

text better matched their Lexile abilities than other grade-appropriate texts, but supplemental,

advanced poetry by the likes of Hughes and Angelou was used to justify its use in the classroom.

Students were also assessed by a multiple choice pre-test, which gauged prior student knowledge

of thirteen poetic devices by asking them to recognize the concepts in excerpts of poetry. Of the
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thirteen poetic devices on which students were pre-assessed, seven were chosen based on

students instructional needs: Of the six students in the class, none correctly identified allusion,

hyperbole, metaphor, or onomatopoeia in context; one student correctly identified

personification; one student correctly identified alliteration; two students showed prior

knowledge of the definition of a stanza. This data drove instruction throughout the unit and was

used to create a post-assessment of student learning.

Instructional Data

Learning objectives for this unit typically involved a student demonstrating knowledge of a

poetic device by using it in a created poem or answering questions during group read-aloud of

the fulcrum text. Due to the small class size, verbal discussion questions were an effective way

to gauge individual and group learning. For example, an objective utilizing a creative writing

assessment read, Students will be able to demonstrate knowledge of alliteration by creating a

couplet poem that implements the poetic device. Typically, creative writing based goals

followed this pattern, with similar additional goals that spiraled instruction to address previously

learned poetic devices. An example of a goal assessed through verbal questioning read,

Students will be able to demonstrate knowledge of metaphor by identifying and explaining the

comparison in Langston Hughes Harlem.

Materials used in instruction included the fulcrum text, Crossover, by Kwame Alexander,

as well as individual copies of popular poems by culturally relevant authors such as Maya

Angelou, Langston Hughes, and Tupac Shakur. Students were also provided a poetry definition

master sheet to refer to throughout the unit; when students were unable to recall specific poetic

devices when prompted, the teacher would ask them to consult this master definition sheet rather

than provide them with the answer.

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In order to engage multiple modalities and provide frequent variability in tasks and

formats, a range of methods was used to teach content (Gay, 2002, p. 112). Students were asked

to synthesize or recognize poetic devices on anticipatory sets (bell ringers) and exit slips, as well

as recognize poetic devices during analysis of poems as a group. When reading poems with

deliberate scansion, students would be prompted to create a beat using their hands on the desk

and take turns reading the poems rhythmically, engaging the kinesthetic, auditory, and visual

modalities simultaneously. A primary means of cementing student learning was to have students

write poetry that included the poetic devices that were present in class reading. These creative

writing pursuits also engaged students emotional and reflective modes in order to provide

cultural and personal relevance.

Assessment of learning objectives for student created poems was focused on proper and

complete use of specific poetic devices. For example, students would be required to cut out a

picture from a magazine and create a hyperbolic quotation pertaining to it. Their grade would be

based on their ability to properly use hyperbole in context. As another example, students may be

prompted to search the fulcrum text for allusions and record three of them in their journals,

which are turned in and reviewed by the teacher at the end of every week.

Data Methods/Management

Throughout the unit, poems that the students created were reviewed for the correct use of

specific poetic devices and student comprehension and application of the learned content was

monitored during class read-aloud and analysis of both the fulcrum text and supplementary texts.

At then end of the unit, students were given a post-test that focused on the seven poetic devices

identified as areas for growth by the pre-test. The post-test provided students with passages from

the fulcrum text that exemplified a particular poetic device and students, in multiple-choice
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format, were asked to identify them. This post-test provided valuable quantitative data that

showed significant student growth in the target areas (shown in Graph 1 and Graph 2). Both the

qualitative and quantitative data support the specific research purpose, with additional qualitative

data that shows evidence of student learning of rhythm and rhyme in poetry as well as the

introspective value of reading and creating poetry.

Data Analysis

Qualitative data has been constantly gathered during the unit through teacher evaluation of

students created poetry as well as the class progress in analyzing poetry as a group through

discussion. The created poetry shows progress in students abilities to incorporate specific and

prompted poetic devices for the purpose of evaluation. It also provides evidence students

understanding of more abstract concepts such as the purpose of poetry self-expression,

introspection, etc.

The poetic device post-test was created to provide the researcher with quantitative data to

analyze for the purpose of summating student learning throughout the unit and guide future

instruction. The post-test revealed significant student learning with respect to the seven poetic

devices that were taught explicitly. While the qualitative data provides evidence of students

ability to apply poetic devices to their own poetry, the quantitative evidence provides evidence of

students ability to analyze others poetry.

Successful Instructional Practices

Based on the post-test data as well as the many successful examples of student created poems,

instruction throughout the unit positively impacted students ability to recognize and create

poetic devices. From formative and qualitative assessment of student responses during group

poetry analysis, instruction on all seven of the identified poetic devices was successful. In order
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to teach students how to analyze a poem, the teacher on multiple accounts with focus on specific

poetic devices provided direct instruction and modeled the skill. For example, students were

given the definition of personification and shown multiple examples of it at the beginning of

class, then Tupac Shakurs The Rose that Grew from Concrete was read aloud multiple times

and students were asked to individually mark the multiple instances of personification in the

poem. This particular structure of instruction was repeated for multiple new concepts. Student

success was also due in large part to creative writing activities. Students would be given a

prompt or a form of poetry to mimic and required to include a newly learned poetic device in the

poem as well as one that they had previously learned and understood.

From these methods of instruction and student involvement, the class showed

improvement on all seven of the target content goals based on the quantitative post-test, as

shown in Graphs 1 and 2: alliteration recognition improved from one to two; allusion recognition

improved from zero to four; hyperbole recognition improved from zero to three; metaphor

recognition improved from zero to four; onomatopoeia recognition improved from zero to four;

personification recognition improved from one to three; recognition of stanzas improved from

two to five.

One content area in which student understanding did not improve as expected was

recognition of alliteration. Often, too simple and obvious of examples of alliteration were used

to instruct the class, such as Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers. Not enough

examples from literary poetry were used in order to demonstrate the fact that alliteration is not

always as obvious as the aforementioned phrase. On the post-test, a more literary example of

alliteration was used to assess understanding. This showed on the post-test with only a one-

student increase in learning from the pre-test.

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Future Implications

Based on student learning during the unit, it is clear that creating poetry and academically

analyzing culturally relevant poetry have a positive impact on students learning about poetic

devices. Based on examples of student poems, it also gives students the opportunity to practice

introspection and self-reflection, a skill that all students, specifically those in urban

environments, can benefit from inside and outside the classroom. Poetry instruction for high

school students should include creative writing because it asks student to climb the pyramid of

Blooms taxonomy, from remembering prior learning, to understanding new concepts, to creating

their own works of poetry. It was also essential in the urban environment to provide students

with culturally relevant examples of poetry. Not only did the culturally relevant texts and

instructional methods selected for Class A reach them on personal levels, but they created in the

students a desire to read and create poetry. Based on conversations with other education

professionals in this particular school, student apathy toward poetry typically caused teachers to

avoid it altogether.

The limited success of the instruction on alliteration shows that students learn poetic

devices best when challenged by content rather than presented with simple and somewhat

meaningless examples of it. Learners zones of proximal development were not engaged; rather,

they were presented with examples of alliteration with which they were comfortable. The rest of

the poetic devices with which students showed success were presented to them through

challenging and authentic texts that they were able to access with guidance and modeling from

the instructor.
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Graph 1

Alliteration 1

Allusion

Hyperbole

Metaphor

Onomatopoeia

Personification 1

Recognition of Stanzas 2

0 3 6

Graph 2

Alliteration 2

Allusion 4

Hyperbole 3

Metaphor 4

Onomatopoeia 4

Personification 3

Recognition of Stanzas 5

0 3 6
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References

Gay, G. (2002, March/April). Preparing for culturally responsive teaching. Journal of

Teacher Education, 53(2), 106-116.

Kinloch, V. F. (2005, January). Poetry, literacy, and creativity: Fostering effective learning

strategies in an urban classroom. English Education, 37(2), 96-114. Retrieved November

27, 2016, from JSTOR.