Deer Hit - Jon Loomis - Worksheets

Jon Loomis’ poem Deer Hit is perfect for the classroom, and this four-page worksheet will help students not only appreciate the poem for its vivid imagery and powerful narrative, but also understand how it’s constructed.

Alongside some comprehension-style questions, the worksheet focuses on close analysis of the poem, with activities on tone, figurative language and imagery, second-person pronoun, themes, allusion and more, and many of the questions are structured so as to contain both information for students and a prompt for them to answer, as in the below example:
As in the first half of the poem, Loomis deliberately avoids giving every detail about what happens in Part 2 of the poem. Towards the end the father “comes back lugging a concrete block,” and we know its purpose without being told. Why is it more powerful to imagine the killing of the deer for ourselves than to have the event told directly in the poem?

Whether used for students who already have a strong understanding of poetic techniques or to support an in-class analysis of the poem, this worksheet is sure to deepen your students’ appreciation and understanding of the poem.

The worksheet is included in both Word and pdf formats for compatibility.