Poetry writing and appreciation in action

How to help struggling and reluctant pupils to find success and acceptance in writing and speaking is Points to ponder
always a teacher’s great concern. Using activities that offer for pleasurable learning and the
development of language awareness can be an entry point. Poetry writing and appreciation serves this ÕHow does poetry writing and
purpose well for two main reasons: (1) reading poems help pupils learn to appreciate the sound, words appreciation help pupils learn English?
and patterns of the English Language; and (2) writing simple poems using words that they know or like It increases the pupils’ awareness of the
do help struggling pupils write with increased confidence. The activities also encouraged able pupils to language, e.g. linking words to sounds,
experiment with language, thus enhancing their creativity. taking notice of rhymes and rhythm,
creating certain patterns in their writing. It
Integrating poetry writing and appreciation into the learning modules was tried out at P4 level. In the also offers the pupils opportunities to use
first stage, pupils were introduced some shape poems about animals for appreciation and recitation. The the language creatively.
teacher added movements and varied the tone or pace of her reading for the pupils to enjoy. She then
invited the pupils to join in reading aloud and talk about their initial responses—which one did they
like, which words/phrases interested them. The pupils were guided to observe the use of adjectives for Õ Is it difficult for young pupils to write
an accurate description, e.g. a ‘fierce’ lion, a ‘naughty’ monkey, a ‘tiny’ mouse, etc... They learned to poems?
clap the rhythm and do the actions while reciting the poems. Then the reading texts in the textbook and Every child is curious about things around
small readers were used to provide pupils with the necessary language knowledge such as nouns, them and wants to share their feelings,
adjectives and verbs for describing different animals. Scaffold materials and activities were provided to ideas and experiences with other people.
help pupils create a three-lined poem in the structure of : Once small children get a limited number
Noun of words, they can be guided to express
Adjective (and) adjective their thoughts in meaningful chunks of
Action word. With some simple patterns of poems
Basing on the information about animals in the small reader and the textbook units, the pupils wrote such as shape poems, two-line poems
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about the animals they liked with the teacher’s guidance. e.g. provided as models in the start, small
Tigers, children can write their first draft and make
Huge and scary, improvement with adult support. Teachers’
Growling in the jungle. praises and recognition of their work will
The pupils learned to discriminate these three necessary elements in a shape poem of animal. Then the be encouraging.
teachers introduced another shape poem in the structure of:
Adjective, adjective, noun
Action
Following this structure, pupils learned how details were built up with the use of appropriate adjectives
and verbs to add power. Pupils’ work indicated that they managed to describe the characteristics of
animals as in: ÕWhich is more important for pupils, the
form or the content, when creating their
poems?
Teacher may discuss the form of the poem
with the pupils—does it rhyme, is there a
pattern? But over-emphasizing on form
will discourage young pupils to express
their ideas and enjoy creating their own
poems. Therefore, don’t get too hung up on
the form of the poem. When pupils
Big, yellow goose Beautiful, fast horse Strong, powerful elephant gradually get familiar with certain patterns,
Running on the grass Flying in the sky Playing with water in the river they can be encouraged to create their own
variations on them, e.g. expand a shape
poem. Also, some proficient pupils can
easily be identified from their creative
products in course of poetry writing. Their
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The pattern was simple enough for the pupils to manage writing. What they had to be aware of was the keen observation on people/things around
word order when there were more than two adjectives. In the goose poem, the pupil was aware of the them and good choice of words to express
order of ‘size—colour’ to describe the goose. In the elephant poem, the adjectives ‘strong’ and their ideas and feelings should be
‘powerful’ showed the appropriate choice of words to describe the characteristics of an elephant. Instead appreciated.
of merely writing ‘playing in the river’, a required pattern for the poem, this pupil tried to add more
interesting information making it read as ‘playing with water in the river’. The description then became
more lively and vivid. The horse poem and the accompanied illustration showed the good imagination
of the pupil—a horse with two big wings standing on a piece of cloud.

In previous lessons, the pupils had also been introduced rhyming words in other poems. For further
practice, the teacher encouraged the able pupils to give pairs of rhyming words in creating their shape ÕCan pupils attempt poetry writing if they
poems. Some of them did apply their knowledge about rhymes in writing their own poems which read have difficulty in using rhyming words?
more like a couplet as in the following: Not all poems require the use of rhyming
words. A cinquain does not rhyme. Neither
do Haiku and diamond-shape poem. In
these poems, pupils only need to express
their feelings and ideas on word level or
phrase level. If pupils are familiar with
rhyming words through studying the word
families—groups of words that have the
Naughty fat cat Tiny white mouse same combinations of letters and a similar
Scratching Dad’ mat Eating cheese in my house sound, they can attempt writing a couplet (a
two-line poem that rhymes) first. As
The pupils then recited their poems in class. It was found that most of the pupils could read, spell and experience grows, pupils can create lengthy
use words like ‘enormous’, ‘powerful’, ‘terrible’, ‘wonderful’, ‘fantastic’ etc. accurately. Their work stanzas with different rhyming words.
was posted up for sharing.
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In the next stage, the teachers decided to add more details and depth to their poetry teaching. They
encouraged the pupils to move from word-level to sentence level poem writing. The application of
language forms, phonics and writing skills was attempted. With teacher guidance, the pupils were
provided input of a target language structure and a list of rhyming words. In groups, the pupils
attempted to create their simple poems on the basis of a structured framework that allowed them to
express their feelings, ideas and experiences with greater confidence:

Amy, the picky eater Peter, the picky eater

I like green melons, I like sweet melons,
But I don’t like yellow lemons. I love water-melons,
I love cold jelly, Buy fruit in the Habin,
But I don’t like hot coffee. Hope it is on sale.

When reciting their own poems, the pupils were highly aware of the sound and rhythm in each line.
They were able to beat the rhythm correctly by clapping hands or hitting on some percussion
instruments. They also voiced out the rhyming words when reading aloud their poems. Poems
composed by individual pupils were then compiled into poem books (e.g. Animal Poems, Food Poems,
Beautiful Places) for sharing in class. Some able pupils were very creative and wrote more than one
poem for each topic.

On the whole, the pupils enjoyed writing poems and showed great interests in one another’s work. The
activities stimulated them to express and share their feelings and ideas. The able pupils’ writing tasks
throughout the rest of the school term reflected their capability to use varied sentence structures and
vivid descriptions to talk about people and things. The struggling pupils also made much improvement
in both writing and reading aloud.