QCT 10 standards....

Lesson Plan

KLA Lesson Topic Year Level Duration Date

English – Poetry Kath Walker (Oodgeroo Noonuccal) 2/3 40 minutes 6th September 2010

Standard 1 Standard 2 Standard 3 Standard 4 Standard 5 Standard 6 Standard 7 Standard 8 Standard 9 Standard 10
Design and Design and Design and Design and Teachers Teachers Create and Foster Contribute Commit to
implement implement implement implement assess and support maintain a positive and effectively to reflective
engaging learning intellectually learning report individual’s safe and productive professional practice and
and flexible experiences challenging experiences constructively personal supportive relationships groups. ongoing
learning that develop learning that value on student development learning with families Specifically:- professional
experiences language, experiences. diversity. learning. and environment. and the renewal.
for literacy and Specifically:- Specifically:- Specifically:- participation Specifically:- community. Specifically:-
individuals numeracy. in society. Specifically:-
and groups. Specifically:- Task is Indigenous Poetry Specifically:-
Behaviour
Specifically:- intellectually poetry used written by Management
Language challenging students Discussion in the
Engaging – and literacy for students evaluated by about how to classroom
students explored as it extends teacher, express consistently
write their through their abilities students feelings and ensures all
own poem poetry and themselves thoughts students
and get to writing introduces (self through have a safe
express their them to new correction) poetry and
feelings and content and will be supportive
thoughts. (adjectives) posted on the environment
wall for all
students to
reflect on.
Essential Learning Outcomes:- students are able to:

Identify audience, purpose and text type

Identify main ideas and the sequence of events, and make simple inferences

Recognise and select vocabulary to describe subject matter

Interpret how people, characters, places, events and things have been represented

Construct simple literary and non-literary texts by planning and by using prior knowledge and experience to match an audience and purpose

Make judgements and justify opinions about their enjoyment and appreciation of texts using personal knowledge, experiences and direct
references to the texts

Reflect on and identify how language elements in texts represent people, characters, places, events and things in similar and different ways

Reflect on learning to identify new understandings.

Learning Objectives:-

To read, analyse and understand the Indigenous poetry of Kath Walker

Discuss different grammatical uses of verbs, nouns and adjectives in poetry

Students create their own poetry using grammatical terms discussed in lesson

Students evaluate each others poetry by posting their poems on the walls and reading each others work.
Classroom Organisation/Resources:- Behaviour Strategies:-
Different coloured pens for whiteboard Positive praise for students working on task
Copy of poem x 28 Verbal warning for those consistently off task – rubbish dutie
Lesson Introduction:- (Blooms: Knowledge)

Today we’re going to look at a poem and have a go at writing our own poem – what do you know about poems?

Different kinds: some have stanzas, some rhyme, A couplet has rhyming stanzas made up of two lines, Haiku: A Japanese poem composed of three
unrhymed lines of five, seven, and five morae usually containing a season word, sonnet, limerick, ode,… (if no answers just give one or two examples and
move on don’t confuse them)

There are many different kinds of poetry – but I the poem I’m going to show you today, was written by Kath Walker in 1960.

You read another poem recently by Kath Walker recently didn’t you? Can anybody remember what that was called? ‘Corroboree’
Does anybody remember what Kath Walkers Aboriginal name is?… ‘ Oodgeroo Noonuccal’ – write both names on the board.
Activity:- (Blooms: Comprehension)
We’re going to explore another of Kath Walkers poems together - this poem is called Municipal Gumtree write it on the board. Municipal
means – belonging to the community.

Hand out a copy of the poem (one bundle on each end of the row to pass along)

While the poem is being distributed around the class draw a picture of a gum tree...wait for the class to be quiet then ask ‘what kind of tree do you think
this is?’…’it is native to Australia…’ wait for answer: ‘A gum tree?’ – VISUAL AID FOR LEARNERS

Lets read the poem together: read it through for students from start to finish – FOR ESL AND SPECIAL NEEDS STUDENTS

What do you think the poem is about? (Discuss: sorrow, grief, longing to be in the bush, etc..) write some ideas randomly on the board as they are
mentioned.

Who do you think the poem is for? Who is the ‘audience’? (Discuss: other Indigenous people, White Australians?)

Are there some words you don’t understand in the poem? (don’t talk about this unless it comes up in discussion as too many words they probably don’t
know including castration which might be difficult to explain to them).
Dolorous - showing sorrow, grief or pain, sadness (pronounced dul-or-us)
Lets just look at the first part of the poem. Does anybody know what the ‘first part’ of the poem is called? – a stanza. Write on the board. Some poems
have one or two and some have many stanzas.

Write first two lines of the poem up on the board. Lets look at the first two lines of the poem.
Gumtree in the city street,
Hard bitumen around your feet,
‘Remy read what I have written on the board to the class in a big voice’ – after it has been read aloud.
Don’t forget to use the commas to take a breath.

What can you tell me about these two sentences? (They rhyme at the end; it’s about a tree in the city, etc).

‘Callum what is ‘bitumen’?’ (Discuss: hard tarmac used to smooth the road over… to cover the dirt and ground, do you get bitumen in the countryside?)

‘Inge do gumtrees grow in bitumen?’ (Discuss: yes/no, if not why?) – ESL student

‘Adam what do you think this first part of the poem is telling us?’ (Discuss: that the tree is growing in the city, that perhaps it shouldn’t be there?) - ESL
student

Write the next three lines of the poem up on the board

Rather you should be
In the cool world of leafy forest halls
And wild bird calls
‘Bryton, What do you think Kath is telling us here?’ (Discuss: gumtrees belong in the forest where it is wild, that the rainforest is cool and leafy)

‘lets look at the words Kath is using, can you tell me which ones are: (USE DIFFERENT COLOURED PENS TO WRITE THE DIFFERENT WORDS – write table on
the left hand side as you go through each one with the same colours)

Verb Doing word

Noun (Common) A name of a person, place, animal or thing
Proper Nouns Special name for person, place, animal or thing (eg Brisbane City)
Adjective Describing word

Verbs (do you remember what a verb is? It’s a ‘doing’ word): calls
Common Nouns (do you remember what a common noun is? Used to name a person, animal, place or thing): forest, bird, world, gumtree, city,
street, bitumen, feet, world, halls,
 Are any of these words Proper Nouns? (gumtree is not a proper noun because it is not a specific unique name for something, it is a general term
for to a tree, however, it has a capital ‘G’ here because it is at the start of the sentence).

What about describing words – do you know what they are called? Adjectives: hard, cool, leafy, wild, (around is an adverb.. do not discuss in
detail with them if it comes up) – can you think of another word Kath could have used instead of ‘cold’? (chilly) how would this make the poem
sound? What about the word ‘hard’ could she have used another word? How would that have sounded? (tough, strong, firm)

What do you notice about the poem now? (there are a lot of common nouns and adjectives)

‘what else do you notice about these three lines?’ (they rhyme at the end of lines 1, 2, 3 and 4) ‘not all poems have to rhyme’

BLOOMS: APPLICATIONS AND SYTHNISIS

Now we’ve discussed the first stanza, we’ve looked at the different verbs, common nouns and adjectives. We’ve also looked at how parts of the poem
rhyme.

I now want you to come up with your own poem.

Kath wrote this poem about a tree in the city – you could write your poem about anything, just think of a subject you would like to write about: it might
be football, running, swimming, going for a walk, it could be a ‘thing’ or it could be an ‘activity’ but you need to write about how it ‘feels’ remember
you’re going to try to express to other people how these feels and what you think about it.
Write on the board:
SUBJECT: Thing – common nouns or proper nouns OR Activity - verbs
WRITE ABOUT: How it makes you feel - verbs, what you think about this thing/activity- adjectives
I want you to come up with a 5-line poem. Write on the board: 5 Lines
They do not have to rhyme at the end. Write on the board: Does not have to rhyme
You need to make sure you put some common nouns and adjectives in each line. Write on the board: must have common nouns AND
adjectives in each line.
Let me show you – Write example on the board:
I walk in the middle of the day
The sun beats hard and warm on my back
In my example you can see some verbs (walk) and common nouns (sun, back) and some adjectives (beats, hard, warm)

Now I want you to have a go and writing your own – you have 30 minutes. If you need help please raise your hand.

Walk around the class and help students. Once student have finished they can type their poem into the computer.

Adam & Inge (ESL), Dakota (Indigenous) and Sorchell (Special Needs) – give special attention to complete the task.

Praise students working on-task ‘xxx is doing the write thing’ ‘some great working from from xxx’

BLOOMS - EVALUATION

If you have finished writing your poem raise your hand. Once you have finished your poem and it has been shown to either Mrs Spratt or myself then
you can draw a picture to go with the poem or type your poem up on the computer.

If you think you are finished – read over your poem and make sure you have included these things on the board (verbs, nouns, adjectives, 5 lines) and
make sure your poem is saying what you want it to say about the object/thing and how it feels.

A copy of the poem can get stuck to the wall – when you are finished you can read other people’s poems and discuss them.

Conclusion:-
Students can stick a copy of their poem to the wall in the reading corner and a copy into their English books. If students have time they can draw a picture
that goes with the poem.

Early Finishers/Extension Activity: - Can type their answers into the computer, print out and stick a copy in their English books. Draw a picture that goes
with it.
Assessment Opportunities:- English grammar, Writing skills, drawing skills, ability to work independently, ability to stay on-task
My personal reflection:-
Teacher feedback:-