I am not good at writing poetry. I don’t understand a lot of it yet I want to instill an appreciation and basic knowledge of poetry to my children. That is my goal or the *where*. Knowing the ‘where’ dictates how we do poetry appreciation. Other families are different. Some don’t do it at all and others do it very indepth. Keeping the goal in my mind helps me to maintain a light, enjoyable atmosphere in the home. While we’re doing poetry appreciation though, we may as well multi task.

This very simple, time-efficient, gentle and enjoyable activity teaches us how to use beautiful words and how to use words beautifully. The recitation/speaking aloud part is the very beginnings of public speaking. I encourage the children to speak clearly and enunciate carefully. Copywork provides opportunity for handwriting, spelling, poetry structure, and word usage. Memorisation helps to build strong, healthy mental muscles. Learning research skills whilst completing the Author Bio sheet is another worthwhile activity.

Yesterday I wrote about our enjoyment in reading The Man from Snowy River. Today I’d like to share a little more of how we learn through poetry.

We also look at a map of Australia to see whereabouts this poem is taking place. The Snowy Mountains. We have a look at the Snowy Mountains website. I show them the page about the Snowy Hydro’s hydroelectric power stations and we talk about this, for their grandfather (Hi Pop!) worked there as a cook, while it was being constructed.

We look at an Australian $10 note. If you look very closely you will see a likeness of Banjo Paterson…and using a magnifying glass you can even see, in very fine print, the opening stanza from the poem!
“There was movement at the station for the word had passed around…”

I may also strew some art books or pictures, if I have any that depict the location or similar scenery. It adds to our theme but is not necessary. I used to try and make a full blown mini unit study and connect all the dots for the children: explaining how everything was connected together. Now I don’t. I prefer more natural means like strewing. I now know that the children are more than capable of making their own connections and, in fact, when they do so, are more excited about it than when I attempt to spoon feed them with information.

During one morning tea session we got so carried away with reading Banjo Paterson’s poetry that we also read “Clancy of the Overflow” as Clancy is mentioned in Man from Snowy River. During yet another morning, I ask the children to tell me, in their own words, what the whole poem is about, and what their favourite part or line is. I’m not just looking for sentences like, “oh, I like it. It is good”. I have our Observation Sheet printed out and on the wall so we can refer to it often. I want to know Who, Why, What, Where, When and How of the poem.

For those that don’t know of the poem, you can read it here and you can listen to Jack Thomson reciting a snippet here. (#14) But even better is the free pdf download of a whole Banjo Paterson ebook, courtesy of the University of Sydney.

I might leave a copy of The Silver Brumby by Elyne Mitchell lying around the place. One just never know, it might capture one’s interest! The other thing I do, at first without the childrens knowledge, is to play music from the Man from Snowy River music throughout the day. Jessica’s Theme is a gorgeous piece of music, written by Bruce Rowland. You can listen to snippet of it here #4. I used to play this on the piano when I was a lot younger. John and I love it so much that we had it playing in the background of our wedding video tape.  Just as much as we can strew books, article, artwork, etc I think that we can strew music as well.

This may all sound like a lot, just for one poem. However, it is naturally how I learn and investigate things that I’m interested in…so it is natural that this is how I would present material to my children. It’s not hard or overly indepth. Everything is fairly accessible,, especially in this day and age of the Internet.

Tomorrow, I’ll write how we tie it together using our Activity  and Observation Sheets.

We’re appreciating The Man from Snowy River by A.B. (Banjo) Paterson. This is the second time through this piece of poetry as we went through it with the girls…and now I get to indulge again with the boys.

🙂

Poetry appreciation is a very gentle affair in our household. I thought I’d share what we do and how we do it. I used to try and connect all the dots for my children and we’d almost do a mini unit study on the poem and poet but I simply lack the energy needed to do this anymore.I realise this poem is fairly lengthy but I sensed the boys would be up for it. hey, they’re boys. They love a challenge!

😀

Over a hot chocolate I ask the boys if they remembered reading this poem many years ago. Nope! They’d forgotten. (I nod my head in an effort to hide the sigh) I ask if they remembered watching the movies, of which we own the classic editions because it is such a *family* favourite. Ha! Nope! They didn’t remember that either. Oi voi, what am I doing? While trying not to choke on my cappuccino I gently explain that we are going to look at this piece of work for a few weeks. Hmm, I was met with quizzical looks. A few weeks on one poem?

In between sips of cappuccino I simply read it aloud.

Then I explain that after a few weeks, I’d like each boy to be able to recite the poem aloud. Oh, now they’re showing signs of interest- or do they realise that they will be very embarrassed if they don’t put in some effort?

I read the first stanza aloud again. And then I went through it line by line, explaining a few (not all unknown words though. I want to keep a little bit of mystery and challenge) words and terms that they didn’t know. Ah, now a bit more interest is being shown.

I asked each boy to have a go at reading the first stanza out loud. For the zillionth time I explain how to project one’s voice, which is different to yelling. Hmm, it would be fair to say that they struggle through the first reading. Nevertheless I offer encouragement and tell them that next time they read it will be easier.  And it is.

The next day I read the first two stanza’s aloud. Now, it’s their turn. They breeze through the first stanza and fumbled a little with the second. This is quite typical. By the third day, they read the first two stanza’s beautifully…little by little.

The boys write out one stanza each day (cough cough: when we get around to it) for copywork. They learn about the structure of the poem, spelling, rhythm and new terms.

:coffee: Another day, another hot chocolate. :coffee: (Hmmm, there’s a theme here, revolving around coffee n chocolate) I read the poem out loud again, because we just enjoy it so much! But this time I pause at certain places and expect them to jump in with the rest of it. Sure enough, they do. The words in brackets are the words I’d pause at and the boys would jump in, excitedly.

E.g:

There was [Harrison,] who made his pile when [Pardon won the cup,]
The old man with his [hair as white as snow;]
But [few could ride beside him] when his blood was [fairly up -]
He would go wherever [horse and man] could go.

The next reading this won’t work as well as they will be able to recite the poem from memory. Sometimes I will just read the first word of the line out – that’s enough to jog their memory. It’s fun. The boys get to jump up and down and shout out. What’s not to like if you’re a boy?

Next week sometime, we will nestle down with blankets and chocolate and watch the movie…again. 🙂 Oh, the things a homeschool mama must do eh?

Also, in the near future I will have them do a biographical outline of the author. We’ll use a standard sheet similar to the Author Outline that can be found in my download section. Tomorrow I’ll share on other ways that I multi task using poetry. (Okay, some might call it cross curricula activities but I call it multi tasking- makes me feel efficient). There are so many wonderful ideas and ways to approach poetry, but for me, many of those ideas are simply overwhelming. The way we approach it has evolved over the years: now being gentle and natural…as natural as it can be considering that I’m not overly well educated in this area. However, I can still try to cultivate a love, or at least an appreciation of poetry.

Are you reading or enjoying any poems at the moment? Which ones? I’d love to hear about it.