LESSON PLAN: “Seven Ages of 

Man”
Then the whining schoolboy, with his satchel              And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school.

1. Begin by asking students to freewrite for a few minutes on what it means to be a

“student/schoolboy/schoolgirl.” Share and discuss. Look for commonalities.
Highlight occasions that will overlap with Shakespeare’s description (above).
Share Shakespeare’s description and discuss.
2. Play a recording of the speech “All the World’s a Stage.” Here is a nice recitation
by Morgan Freeman. Here is another recitation by Benedict Cumberbatch.
3. Introduce the concepts of simile (an explicit comparison, often (but not
necessarily) employing “like” or “as”) and metaphor (a comparison made by
referring to one thing as another). (Forrest Gump’s “life is like a box of chocolates”
may be a good introduction to this).
4. Have students now go and rewrite their thoughts on what it means to be a student,
using a simile or metaphor. (If a student gets stuck, he or she can fill in the
comparison: “A student is like ___________.” Share again.
5. Discuss how a  conceit  (extended metaphor) works.
6. Break students up into seven groups and give them each one of the ages (see
below). (Terms may need to be glossed on the sheets.) Reread the first lines to help
orient students.
7. Have students embody  their given age of man to create a tableau vivant. (30
seconds to organize and freeze.)
8. Have each group freeze, discuss their decisions, challenges, areas of confusion,
and highlight moments of success and creativity.
9. Show images of “The Seven Ages of Man.” Compare pictorial depictions and
Shakespeare’s literary and theatric representations.
10. Have students return to their student-inspired similes and metaphors. Have them
build up, expand upon, or complicate their previous similies until they create an
extended metaphor.

All the world’s a stage,

And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages.

Group 1:

At first, the infant,

Mewling and puking in the nurse’s arms.
Group 2:

Then the whining schoolboy, with his satchel

And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school.

Group 3:

And then the lover,

Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress’ eyebrow.

Group 4:

Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honor, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon’s mouth.

Group 5:

And then the justice,

In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part.

Group 6:

The sixth age shifts

Into the lean and slippered pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank, and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound.

Group 7:

Last scene of all,

That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.