Lesson video

Hi there, it's Mrs. Smart again, welcome back to our English unit, all about John Lyons poetry.

I hope you've got lots of energy for today's lesson because we're going to be reading another poem all about carnival.

Let's get started.

In this lesson you will need an exercise book or some lined paper and a pen or pencil to write with.

If you don't have either of those things with you right now, just pause the recording and go and get them.

In our lessons today, we're going to remind ourselves of some of the contexts that we learned about in our last lesson.

So we're going to learn about carnival.

I'm going to see how much you can remember.

We're then going to read our second poem, all about carnival, called Carnival Dance Lesson.

We're going to respond to it and analyse it and then I will set you your independent task.

In our last lesson, we focused on Carnival Jumbie.

If you want to, you can pause the recording and reread it now.

We learnt a lot in our previous lesson about carnival and calypso music and some of the traditions from Trinidad and Tobago.

Let's see how much you can remember.

Are you ready? First question.

How often does carnival happen in Trinidad? Every two years? Every weekend? Every year? Or never? It never happens.

There's never a carnival in Trinidad.

Make your mind up now I'm going to count down from three and I want you to point to the option that you think is correct.

Three, two, one, point.

Well done.

Every year.

It happens on an annual basis, which means every year.

And remember it's always the Monday and Tuesday before Ash Wednesday.

So around the time of Easter in March or April but the date will vary every year.

What do people wear for carnival? Suits and smart clothes as if they're going to work in an office? A black tie and ball gowns? So that means a black suit and a bow tie and beautiful long ball gowns for women? Option 3, swimming costumes? It's quite hot in Trinidad and Tobago, maybe it's on the beach.

Or option 4, colourful costumes covered in sequins and feathers? Which one do you think? Three, two, one.

Point.

Of course, colourful costumes covered in sequins and feathers.

We looked at some examples of those last lesson.

What is a jumbie? Remember the poem we read was called Carnival Jumbie but what is a jumbie? Is it another word for jumble? A type of ghost? A fairy? Or a type of music? Can you remember? Three, two, one.

Point.

Of course it's a type of ghost.

That mythological creature remember in Trinidad and Tobago, the jumbie or the moko jumbie protects and looked over everyone and protected them.

Whereas in other countries and cultures, the jumbie is sometimes more of an evil devil-like creature.

What is calypso? Is it an instrument? A type of ghost? A type of music from Trinidad and Tobago? Or a traditional food from Trinidad Tobago? Which one do you think? One, two, three.

Ready? Point.

Of course it's a type of music from Trinidad and Tobago.

We listened to some in our last lesson.

Can you remember what instruments play calypso music? Good memory.

Steel pans can play calypso music but also instruments like guitars, trumpets, saxophones, drums, and other sorts of percussion can all create calypso music.

And sometimes calypso music has lyrics, so words that go with it and they can often be quite funny or witty and sort of joking about things that are happening at the time.

Here you can see the poem we're going to be focusing on today called Carnival Dance Lesson.

If you want to, you can pause the recording and read it through to yourself first of all.

We're going to now listen and watch John Lyons reading this poem.

I want you to really listen to how he performs this poem because that's going to be really key to understanding it and will help you with your task at the end of today's lesson.

The inspiration for this next poem comes from carnival and it's following the same idea, the same inclination we all have in Trinidad to have fun, right? And this is called Carnival Dance Lesson.

I wrote the poem and then after writing the poem, I've illustrated it.

And it's a natural thing for me because as an artist, I love illustrating my poems and providing images for youngsters, because in seeing the images, it actually enhances the experience of the poem for youngsters particularly.

And I draw proper images really rather than going into the cartoon part of it, right? And this here is the sketches I did after writing the poem in my sketch pad, sketch book.

And before I transferred it to the illustration.

Okay? The poem Carnival Dance Lesson.

♪ One two three, ♪ ♪ you can dance like me.

♪ ♪ With arms held high ♪ ♪ that's how you start, ♪ ♪ Let deh music touch your heart.

♪ ♪ One two three, ♪ ♪ you can dance like me.

♪ ♪ Just be relaxed ♪ ♪ I insist wine move with the rhythm ♪ ♪ jerk your waist.

♪ ♪ One two three, ♪ ♪ you can dance like me.

♪ ♪ Shake up, jump up.

♪ ♪ BACCHANAL! ♪ ♪ Lehwe celebrate, is carnival.

♪ ♪ One two three, ♪ ♪ you can dance like me.

♪ ♪ Jump in the band ♪ ♪ let us have some fun, ♪ ♪ happy times have just begun.

♪ ♪ One two three, ♪ ♪ you can dance like me.

♪ ♪ Boodum-di-dum-di-dum! ♪ ♪ you can dance like me.

♪ ♪ Boodum-di-dum-di-dum! ♪ ♪ you can dance like me.

♪ Of course.

Every time we listen to a poem and we read a poem, the first thing we have to do is respond.

What did you like about the poem? What did you dislike about the poem? Do you have any questions, anything that's confusing you or puzzling you? What did it remind you of? I'm sure it reminded you of the poem that we read in our previous lesson.

I know it certainly reminded me of that.

Did it remind you of anything else? Maybe it reminded you of going to carnival if you've ever been to a carnival before.

It certainly reminded me of going to Notting Hill Carnival.

Pause the video and write some notes under those four question headings now.

Right.

Time to look at the structure of this poem.

I want you to consider the verses, the rhyme, the repetition and the punctuation.

What could you write about those four different aspects? Pause the recording and write some notes now.

First of all, we can see similarly to the poem we looked at in the previous lesson, Carnival Jumbie, there is a refrain or a chorus that's repeated throughout this poem.

So he, John Lyons has written ♪ one two three, ♪ ♪ you can dance like me.

♪ And it's repeated after each verse, just like a chorus in a song.

Poetry is actually very similar to song lyrics really.

There's lots of similarities between them.

So that's one example of repetition in this poem.

And there's also the part at the end where he goes ♪ Boodum-di-dum di-dum ! ♪ ♪ Boodum-di-dum di-dum ! ♪ So you can see it written out that, those words.

They're not really words, are they? They're more sounds or a kind of rhythm that he wants to create.

So that's repeated as well.

So that's all this is and that's sort of repetition.

Did you notice any rhyme? Well of course, in the chorus or the refrain, he rhymes three and me, but actually in the verses, he's got some rhyme as well, which again, makes it sound quite like a song.

So he's got start and heart, insist and waist.

Not quite a rhyme there but it's sort of half rhyme, they've got similar sounds to them.

Bacchanal and carnival.

Fun and begun.

So lots of different rhymes there and you can see again, the rhyme is often not always, but often at the end of the lines in poems and similarly with songs as well.

Any punctuation you noticed? Well, I noticed in this one interestingly, there were three examples of exclamation marks.

What do you think the exclamation marks might tell me about how to perform or how to read this poem? Yes, exclamation marks often means something is shouted.

Not shouted necessarily in anger.

And this example would be shouted in sort of enthusiasm and energy.

Now you might also have noticed on this poem, we haven't talked about this yet.

It's these beautiful illustrations.

And John Lyons talks a little bit about that in the video at the beginning before he read the poem.

And they really bring the poem to life and illustrates it really, really well.

I really enjoyed looking at those.

Let's think about the language that John Lyons uses and the meaning of this poem.

What do you think the poem is about? If you were telling someone about this poem, could you summarise it in one sentence to tell them what it's about? Pause the recording and write your sentence now.

I summarised this poem like this.

I wrote, people learning a dance in preparation for carnival.

I imagined they were almost in a dance lesson.

Well, the title is dance lessons.

They probably are in a dance lesson and they were learning all together 'cause I can see a group of them.

They were learning a certain dance that they were then going to perform as part of the carnival parade.

I wonder if you had something similar.

Can we now think about the themes and the tone? Remember the themes means the main ideas of this poem.

And the tone is the feeling that the poet creates.

Write some notes under themes and tone now.

I thought the themes were carnival and dancing, probably the main themes, possibly music as well though he doesn't really describe music.

A huge amount where it is just implied, we presume there is music because they're dancing.

What did you have for themes? Now let's think about the tone.

I said, similarly to Carnival Jumbie, I said it had a very positive tone.

It was very energetic because it's all about the movement in their dance lesson.

Had a really fun and happy feeling because generally with carnival, those are the sorts of feelings that we associate it with it.

Everyone has fun, enjoys themselves.

Everyone's really energetic and dances lots to different music.

Did you have anything different? Let's now look at some of the words John Lyons uses in a little bit more detail to make sure we're really clear on his meaning.

I've highlighted here, the phrase music touch your heart.

Now, the music can't actually touch your heart, that's impossible.

What do you think that might mean? I agree.

I think music touching your heart is a way of explaining that music makes you feel a certain emotion.

It's not physically touching your heart but it's touching your emotions and your feelings.

Music can make us feel really happy or it can make us really sad, feel really sad.

Could make us feel really angry maybe or excited.

It can really evoke lots of feelings.

These are the next few verses.

Again we've got this word wine.

Can you remember what that meant? And it wasn't a word for moan.

What did it mean? It was something to do with a movement.

Good.

You remembered.

So wine is a bit like wind.

It's to do with moving your body in a certain way.

Often it's to do moving your hips or your bottom.

And you can see it says wine wid de riddim.

Riddim refers to rhythm.

So that would be talking about the music, the rhythm of the music.

And it also says jerk yuh waist.

So jerk again is another type of movement that your body would do as part of its dance.

And then we've got this word in capital letters, BACCHANAL! And I can see it's got an exclamation mark, which is why I've said it really loudly there.

And this is a word from Trinidad and Tobago and it means to celebrate or to have a party, to have a great time.

Sometimes it's associated with drama as well.

Anything to do with having a great time and celebrating together.

So I can really imagine someone shouting BACCHANAL! during carnival.

That's why it's in capital letters with an exclamation mark.

Then right at the end of the poem, we heard John Lyons sort of saying a beat almost like he was doing vocal percussion.

He said, ♪ boodum-di-dum-di-dum ♪ ♪ boodum-di-dum-di-dum ♪ And that's how he's written it in words there.

So they're not really words, they're more sounds that he wants to create to reflect the beats of a rhythm.

Now that we have listened to and read two poems about carnival, we have read Carnival Jumbie and we've read Carnival Dance Lesson.

I want you to try and compare those two poems. What do you think is similar or the same? And what is different? Think about their structure.

Think about their themes and their tone.

And then think about the language.

You could also think about how did John Lyons perform them that was quite similar and may be different from other poetry performances we've seen him do before.

Pause the recording and write some notes now.

We have come to the end of today's lesson.

I really hope you enjoyed reading and listening to Carnival Dance Lesson.

Today's task is a little bit different.

You are not going to need any paper.

You are not going to need your pen on your pencil.

You can put those away now because today's task is all to do with reading and performing Carnival Dance Lesson.

I want you to practise reading this poem out loud.

Try in adding a beat, to create a clear rhythm and think about how you're saying this poem so it keeps in time with the beat.

You might want to rewind and listen to John Lyons performing this poem because he has a really clear beat.

You can almost see his body moving in time with the poem.

You might want to just hear the beats in your head or you might want to create the beat by clapping or patting your hands on the table or maybe even stamping your feet on the floor so that you can really feel and hear that beat as you're performing it.

So the poem is almost like a song or kind of like a rap almost.

It's not just something to be read out loud.

It's something to be performed.

Practise reading your poem out loud.

And then I want you to have a go at performing it to an audience.

Could be to someone at home or you could even film yourself and watch yourself back.

Congratulations, you have completed your lesson today.

If you would like to, please share your work with your parents or carer.

As I said, it'd be great to perform your poem to someone at home.

And I'm sure they'd really enjoy hearing it.

I will see you in your next lesson.

Goodbye.