Poetry Activities for Pre-AP Students

I have never really felt comfortable studying poetry with my students, but I knew that I needed to tackle it in my pre-AP classes if I wanted to give my students a fair shot at success when they got to their AP lit class. Below are the lessons & activities that I used with my pre-AP/pre-IB sophomores. .

Analysis

• "Still I Rise" Analysis

• Group Poetry Analysis Presentation

• "Humanity 101" by Denise Duhamel-Analysis Handout

• Analysis Questions for "Humanity 101" by Denise Duhamel

• Poem in a Photo

• Jane Kenyon Analysis (paid product):

• "Poem on Your Own" Analysis

• "How To" Poem Analysis Presentation -"Vietnam Memorial"

• "Vietnam Memorial" Example Annotations

• "Vietnam Memorial" Example Poem Analysis

Assessments

When I was doing boards, I needed to measure growth during my poetry unit, so I have a lot of terms tests that I used that particular year. They are below if you need them, in order of increasing difficulty.

• Literary Terms Matching Pretest (Version 1A)

• Literary Terms Matching Pretest Answer Key (Version 1A)

• Literary Terms Matching Test (Version B)

• Literary Terms Matching Test Answer Key (Version B)

• Match Literary Terms to Examples Practice Quiz

• Match Literary Terms to Examples

• Poetry Terms Learning Style

Timed Writing Prompts Featuring Poem Analysis

• Timed Writing # 1-Poem Analysis-"To The Woman..." by Bianca Lynne Springs

• Timed Writing # 2-Poem Analysis- "Normal" by Reginald Harris

• Timed Writing # 3-Poem Analysis -"Abandoned Farmhouse"

• Timed Writing # 4-Poem Analysis- "Radium Dream" by Sheila Black

• Timed Writing # 5-Poem Analysis- "The Chair That No One Sits In" by Billy Collins

• Timed Writing # 6-Poem Analysis-"The Darklin' Thrush"

• Timed Writing # 7-Poem Analysis-Billy Collins "The Lanyard"

Poetry Writing

• Student poetry assignment sheet

• Imitation Poems Introduction & Practice featuring Thomas Lux's "A Poem in Thanks"

• Imitation Poems

• "The Lady or The Tiger" Found Poem

Other Materials

• Introduction to types of poetry

• Limerick PowerPoint

If you have any pre-AP poetry materials that you would like to share, please leave them in the comments below.