Unit Title: The Rhythm of Communication

Standards and Objectives (Evidence Outcomes)

Colorado Department of Education (CDE) Standards in Reading, Writing, and
Communication
a. Writing and Composition: 1. Literary or narrative genres feature a variety of stylistic
devices to engage or entertain an audience

b. Reading for All Purposes: 3. Context, parts of speech, grammar, and word choice
influence the understanding of literary, persuasive, and informational texts

Essential Understandings
Students will be able to closely read and interpret poetry.
Students will recognize the elements of poetry and explain how they affect meaning and
interpretation.
Students can make educated decisions about stylistic devices and explain their reasoning.

Inquiry questions
1. What is music?
2. Where/when does music occur in your daily lives? Other than a playlist?
3. Does music always have to be a song? Does a song always have to be poetry?

Possible Misconceptions
1. Poetry is a superfluous form of literature that is not applicable in students lives and/or
academia.
2. Poetry is too hard to understand to be useful.
3. When students write poetry they are thoughtless and will only do the bare minimum.

Formative Assessment
Dual Meaning Activity:
Explanation: For this activity I will be assessing how well students understand and can
command language. One of the standards for this unit is that, parts of speech, grammar, and
word choice influence the understanding of literarytexts. Therefore, it stands to reason that
they should be able to distinguish and manipulate meaning of texts with their word choice and
grammar. This is especially true for poetry as a genre. To formatively assess students
understanding of this standard I will be doing a Dual Meaning Activity.
Assessment: Students will be given three short excerpts from texts that they have read
previously in the semester. That way they will be familiar with the context and meaning of the
text initially. They will read the text to themselves and jot down what it means next to the
excerpt. They will share and confer with a partner. Next students will be asked individually to
change two elements in each excerpt (either word choice or grammar) that changes the meaning
of the text. Then they will summarize their decision and explain what the new meaning is. This is
will collected to see if additional instruction would be needed.
Elements of Poetry:
For this lesson students will have previously learned many elements of poetry through
jig-saw investigation and mini-lessons. Therefore, I want to be sure that they understand and can
identify the elements in context. This formative assessment will be a station activity. Students
will write what I call speed poems. They will migrate from station to station in groups. They will
be writing their poems down in their notebooks individually, but can (and are encouraged to) talk
to one another. The stations will each have a different genre of poetry, short list of elements, and
an inspiration- in the form of a piece of music. At each station students will have to write in the
genre of poem that the station has listed, and use at least three of the stylistic elements listed.
They will have to do so in ten minutes or less (making it speed poems). Students will underline
the elements, number the station, and then turn in the poems at the end of class. There will be an
opportunity to share the speed poems that they came up with in groups then out to the class.

Elements of this Unit:

Students will be constructing a classic poetry portfolio with a twist. They will create at least three
poems of three different genres that use elements of literature and poetry that we learn in class.
From there, students will create a musical composition to compliment this piece of poetry. The
end result will be a slam poem-type of piece.