What is a Poem?

“What is a Poem?” is a free, single-lesson introduction to the concept of poetry suitable for a KS3 and KS4 English classroom. It shares a few iconic and less familiar examples of poetry designed to test and expand pupils’ understanding of what poetry is. It then asks pupils to reflect on and evaluate famous definitions of poetry by authors such as Emily Dickinson and Coleridge. Finally, the lesson asks pupils to revisit and adapt the definition of potery they wrote down at the start of the lesson. By the end of the lesson pupils will have been introduced to a broad and diverse range of poetic styles and should begin to understand that poetry can follow strict rules, but also break them all.

This lesson:

• Promotes group discussion and pair work
• Encourages deep, philosophical discussions in the classroom
• Uses interesting, canonical and less-familiar examples of poetry to stimulate pupil discussion
• Includes clear teaching notes for guidance and delivery
• Includes optional audio-visual material to consolidate class discussion
• Includes starter and plenary activities
• Includes a free, easily-adapted handout
• Can be taught as a stand-alone or as part of a scheme of work on poetry - you may be interested in other lessons in my ‘Introduction to Poetry’ series.