Poetry about place and home
Downloads can take a few minutes, especially for larger files or slower connections.
Threads
Why this why now
Pupils explored a wide range of poetry in our primary curriculum, with a focus on how poets, including Joseph Coelho and Matt Goodfellow, responded to place in their poems. Pupils now read more complex secondary poets, and start to use analytical skills to explore the methods writers use to respond to place. They also start to emulate those more complex techniques so that their poetry writing and appreciation becomes more accomplished. Later in the curriculum, pupils look at Maya Angelou's poetry in depth to explore how context shapes a writer's voice, and then find their own poetic voice.
Prior knowledge requirements
- Pupils understand that poems have different structures to prose
- Pupils can write a clear topic sentence using the structure: "[Author] presents [character/setting] as..."
- Pupils can use evidence from a text to support their argument
- Pupils can expand explanations to show a clear understanding of a text
- Pupils can identify a range of different word classes
- Pupils can use single paragraph outlines to plan their writing
- Pupils can use a range of different adjectives to describe tone
- Pupils can identify sensory language, onomatopoeia, sibilance, repetition, personification and metaphors
- Pupils can use compound and complex sentences to develop key descriptions
- Pupils are able to use adverbial phrases at the start of a sentence
Threads
Why this why now
Pupils explored a wide range of poetry in our primary curriculum, with a focus on how poets, including Joseph Coelho and Matt Goodfellow, responded to place in their poems. Pupils now read more complex secondary poets, and start to use analytical skills to explore the methods writers use to respond to place. They also start to emulate those more complex techniques so that their poetry writing and appreciation becomes more accomplished. Later in the curriculum, pupils look at Maya Angelou's poetry in depth to explore how context shapes a writer's voice, and then find their own poetic voice.
Prior knowledge requirements
- Pupils understand that poems have different structures to prose
- Pupils can write a clear topic sentence using the structure: "[Author] presents [character/setting] as..."
- Pupils can use evidence from a text to support their argument
- Pupils can expand explanations to show a clear understanding of a text
- Pupils can identify a range of different word classes
- Pupils can use single paragraph outlines to plan their writing
- Pupils can use a range of different adjectives to describe tone
- Pupils can identify sensory language, onomatopoeia, sibilance, repetition, personification and metaphors
- Pupils can use compound and complex sentences to develop key descriptions
- Pupils are able to use adverbial phrases at the start of a sentence
Poetry about place and home
In this unit, pupils read and respond to poems that explore the links between place and identity. They start by exploring a selection of poems including Grace Nichol's 'Island Man' and Lemn Sissay's 'Anthem of the North'. They then write and perform their own poems about place and home.
14 lessons in unit
slide decks, worksheet PDFs, quizzes and lesson overviews. You can select individual lessons from the Poetry about place and home unit and download the resources you need, or download the entire unit now. See every unit listed in our secondary english curriculum and discover more of our teaching resources for secondary english programmes.