Poetry

English Year 4 Autumn Poetic Forms

Syllabic Poems

Use Studio Ghibli films and contemporary Japanese popular culture, including Pokémon, to frame the study of haikus & syllabic poems. Use descriptive language & adverbials.

We recommend that you start with the core unit, the heart of this English block of study. This introduces key textual material and sets the tone for any further units you wish to teach. These can be selected on the basis of the needs of your class – look at the green icons to identify the unit’s particular focus: SPAG, Composition or Comprehension. Whichever units you choose, we suggest teaching them in order, as there is a built-in progression indicated by the numbering.

‘UNIT PLAN’ gives you a text version of all parts of the unit to use in your school planning documentation. ‘DOWNLOAD ALL FILES’ gives you that unit plan plus all of the associated documents.

Core
Unit 1 Core: Read and write haiku in the context of contemporary Japanese culture (suggested as 4 days)

Unit plan Download all files

Objectives

Spoken language
-- Articulate and justify answers, arguments and opinions.
-- Give well-structured descriptions.
-- Use spoken language to develop understanding through imaging and exploring ideas.
-- Participate in discussions.
-- Consider different viewpoints, attending to and building on the contributions of others.

Word Reading
None for this unit

Comprehension
-- Listen to and discuss a wide range of poetry.
-- Recognise different forms of poetry.
-- Identify themes and conventions; drawing inferences.
-- Retrieve and record information from non-fiction.
-- Ask questions to improve their understanding of a text.

 

Transcription
Increase the legibility, consistency and quality of their handwriting.

Composition
-- Compose/rehearse sentences orally (including dialogue), progressively building a varied and rich vocabulary and an increasing range of sentence structures.
-- Discuss writing similar to that which they are planning to write in order to understand and learn from its structure, vocabulary and grammar.
-- Assess the effectiveness of their own and others’ writing and suggest improvements.

Grammar
None for this unit

Teaching and Activities

Day 1 Teaching
Introduce Howl’s Moving Castle. Discuss a still image in depth, watch a video clip and read a synopsis. Talk about the style of anime, justifying opinions.
Activity
Look at four images from other Studio Ghibli films and match them to synopses. Identify the film they would choose to watch. Read an extract from the original book by Diana Wynne Jones and find out about her opinion of the film.

Day 2 Teaching
Look carefully at three scenes from Howl’s Moving Castle: the castle itself, flying and an escape scene. Describe these, using careful imagery and description and trying to imagine what the characters are feeling.
Activity
Write descriptive phrases about these scenes and then re-work these to make them more precise and focussed.

Day 3 Teaching
Revise syllables, encouraging children to clap out their names in syllables. Look together at four haiku, letting children respond to these and express their reactions. Discuss the features of the form and what makes an effective haiku.
Activity
Draft a haiku based on descriptive phrases about the castle, flying or escape. Think about the form, but also – more importantly – about the way a haiku encapsulates something.

Day 4 Teaching
Look carefully at three translated Japanese haiku. Talk about the fact that the numbers of syllables are not correct as these are translated. The haiku form was exactly preserved in the original Japanese. Discuss the impact that these amazing haiku have.
Activity
Children complete their writing, assessing what they have drafted and making improvements. They present a final version of their own haiku.

SPAG
Unit 2 SPAG: Revise adjectives, prepositions and use expanded noun phrases (suggested as 3 days)

Unit plan Download all files

Objectives

Spoken language
-- Listen and respond appropriately to peers
-- Ask relevant questions to improve understanding.

Word Reading
None for this unit

Comprehension
 -- Listen to and discuss a wide range of non-fiction.
-- Retrieve and record information from non-fiction.
-- Check that the text made sense, discuss their understanding and explain the meaning of words in context.
-- Identify main ideas drawn from more than one paragraph.

 


-- Participate in discussion about non-fiction texts.

Transcription
None for this unit

Composition
None for this unit

Grammar
 -- Noun phrases expanded by the addition of modifying adjectives, nouns and prepositional phrases;
-- Use and understand grammatical terminology as outlined in Appendix 2.

Teaching and Activities

Day 1 Teaching
Revise haiku and introduce Pokémon, finding out what children know already. Generate research questions to find out about the creator of Pokémon.
Activity
Use a non-fiction text to research Satoshi Tajiri (the creator of Pokémon). Evaluate a haiku about Satoshi and try writing a different one together.

Day 2 Teaching
Look at some ‘riddle’ haiku about Pokémon characters. Introduce noun phrases and revise nouns, adjectives and determiners using a Pokémon based Powerpoint.
Activity
Use descriptions of Pokémon creatures to identify nouns and noun phrases. Write a haiku about a Pokémon character.

Day 3 Teaching
Look at some more ‘riddle’ haiku about Pokemon. Use Pokémon themed Powerpoint to introduce prepositional phrases.
Activity
Write expanded noun phrases using prepositional phrases, about Pokémon characters. Write a different haiku about a Pokémon character. Discuss the benefits and costs of playing video games.

SPAG: Grammar and Punctuation

Noun phrases PowerPoint
Children are reminded of terminology: nouns, adjectives, prepositions and phrases. They then construct expanded noun phrases and understand how these are formed.

Comprehension
Unit 3 Comprehension: Understanding syllabic poems: Haiku, tanka, cinquain (suggested as 4 days)

Unit plan Download all files

Objectives

Spoken Language
-- Listen and respond appropriately to their peers.
-- Articulate and justify answers.
-- Use spoken language to develop understanding.
-- Gain and maintain the attention of the listener.
-- Select and use appropriate registers for effective communications.

Word Reading
None for this unit

Comprehension
-- Listen to and discuss a range of poetry.
-- Recognise some different forms of poetry.
-- Ask questions to improve their understanding of a text.
-- Identify how language, structure, and presentation contribute to meaning.
-- Prepare poems to read aloud, showing understanding through intonation, tone and volume.

 


-- Participate in discussion about poems.

Transcription
Increase the legibility, consistency and quality of their handwriting

Composition
-- Discuss and record ideas.
-- Write notes using simple organisational devices.
-- Compose and rehearse sentences orally, progressively building vocabulary and a range of sentence structures.
-- Organise paragraphs around a theme.
-- Assess the effectiveness of their own and others’ writing and suggest improvements.

Grammar
None for this unit

Teaching and Activities

Day 1 Teaching
Share a book of Haiku ‘Guess Who’. Use this to revise haiku and to talk about the other decisions and choices that the poet has made. Model how to add two extra seven syllable lines to one of these haiku.
Activity
Text mark three haiku to show understanding of their features. Write two extra seven syllable lines for one of these poems. Use these new poems to introduce the tanka form, reading an old, challenging and beautiful Japanese tanka.

Day 2 Teaching
Look at two five-line poems use these to revise tanka and introduce cinquain form. Read a cinquain written by the originator of the form. Look at a summary of the three poetic forms and see what is in common between them all.
Activity
Explore a collection of fifteen syllabic poems. Decide which is which form and choose favourites. Read a joke form poem together – a Lowku!

Day 3 Teaching
Explore a metaphor and simile in depth using sound and video clips.
Activity
Choose a favourite poem and carefully make a handwritten version. Learn a poem by heart.

Day 4 Teaching
Look at three more syllabic poems. Read an appreciation written about one and work together to write an appreciation of another.
Activity
Use a prompt sheet to write appreciations of chosen poems. Come back to ‘Guess Who’ and talk about ideas for further books.

SPAG
Unit 4 SPAG: Identifying and using adverbials in Haiku (suggested as 3 days)

Unit plan Download all files

Objectives

Spoken Language
None for this unit

Word Reading
None for this unit

Comprehension
-- Identify how language, structure, and presentation contribute to meaning.

Transcription
None for this unit

 

Composition
-- Compose and rehearse sentences orally, progressively building a rich vocabulary.
-- Assess the effectiveness of their own and others’ writing and suggest improvements.

Grammar
-- Fronted adverbials.
-- Use commas with fronted adverbials.
-- Also revise conjunctions (Grammar terms used in Appx 2).

You Will Need

Essential Resources
All images and poems in resources

Presentations
SPAG PowerPoint: Adverbials

Teaching and Activities

Day 1 Teaching
Explore a still image from Howl’s Moving Castle, enjoying its detail and seeing how it communicates information about when, where and how things are happening. Introduce Adverbials using a Powerpoint with examples related to this image.
Activity
Use five more images from Howl’s Moving Castle. Expand verb phrases by adding adverbials. Talk about the effect that this has.

Day 2 Teaching
Look at an evocative mountain scene from Howl’s Moving Castle. Read a haiku about mountains and find the adverbials it uses.
Activity
Read and think about a collection of beautiful haiku about Mountains. Find the adverbials in these haiku. Make some changes to the adverbials in one of the haiku, noticing the difference it makes. Look together and enjoy an ancient haiku about mountains.

Day 3 Teaching
Read another haiku written about an image from Howl’s Moving Castle. Learn how it was created using knowledge of adverbials.
Activity
Choose a different image from Howl’s Moving Castle and write a haiku using adverbials and following a set pattern. Finally, enjoy looking at the preparatory art-work for Howl’s Moving Castle and see how this relates to our study of grammar!

SPAG: Grammar and Punctuation

Adverbials PowerPoint
Children learn how adverbials modify verbs and then decide where to place adverbials, punctuating correctly.

Composition
Unit 5 Understand syllabic poems: Haiku, tanka, cinquain, and write own poem (suggested as 5 days)

Unit plan Download all files

Objectives

Spoken Language
None for this unit

Word Reading
None for this unit

Comprehension
-- Discuss words and phrases that capture the reader’s imaginations.
-- Recognise some different forms of poetry.
-- Discuss their understanding of a text and explain the meaning of words in context.
-- Identify how language, structure, and presentation contribute to meaning.

Composition
-- Plan writing by discussing and recording ideas.
-- Plan writing by discussing and recording ideas.
-- Discuss writing similar to that which they are planning to write in order to understand and learn from its structure, vocabulary and grammar.

 


-- Compose and rehearse sentences orally, progressively building a varied and rich vocabulary and an increasing range of sentence structures.
-- Assess the effectiveness of their own and others’ writing and suggest improvements.
-- Propose changes to vocabulary.
-- Proof read for spelling errors.
-- Read aloud their writing to a group or the whole class.

Transcription
-- Increase legibility, consistency and quality of their handwriting.

Grammar
-- Revise Noun Phrases (using grammatical terminology from Appx 2).
-- Use fronted adverbials.
-- Use commas after fronted adverbials.

Teaching and Activities

Day 1 Teaching
Revisit ‘Howl’s Moving Castle’ and identify themes and subjects from the film. Revise the features of haiku, tanka and cinquain. Read a new example of each.
Activity
Look closely at a haiku, tanka and cinquain written on a one of the themes of ‘Howl’s Moving Castle’. Explore the language used in these and discuss how the form of the poem influences the content.

Day 2 Teaching
Look again at the themes from ‘Howl’s Moving Castle’ and choose one of these for a poem. Use a summary Powerpoint to revisit learning on adverbials, noun phrases and metaphors and similes. Model how to start to capture these and other pieces of descriptive language about a chosen theme.
Activity
Start to write descriptive language in preparation for poetry writing.

Day 3 Teaching
Look at a copy of the writer’s notes for one of this week’s poems. See the process of change, improvement, revision and decision. Revise syllable counting.
Activity
Draft a syllabic poem based on yesterday’s descriptive language. Make changes and experiment with their impact.

Day 4 Teaching
Discuss how to finalise their poems and how these could be presented. Revisit tips for learning poems by heart.
Activity
Finalise, present and learn poems. Celebrate these and make a plan together about how they could be shared with a wider audience.

SPAG: Grammar and Punctuation

Grammar Revision PowerPoint
Revise noun phrases, adverbials, including fronted adverbials, and consider similes and metaphors.

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