English 8: Meet Poet Amanda Gorman
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The Challenge to Make a Difference, Ms. Jarvis and Ms. Petersen English 8: Meet Poet Amanda Gorman Main idea we’re learning about I know I learned this idea if I can... Essential question: How do people ● Define and use terms to analyze a poem. make a difference in the world? What ● Craft a well explained response to demonstrate traits, actions, and knowledge of other the poet’s message. people can I emulate? What can I infer ● Create cohesion between my response and text from the author's message to support with the TLQC format. strengthen my voice? ● Begin a project to explore for the rest of 8th grade about making a difference. Engage Which of these terms do you recognize? Write a definition for each in your notebook or on paper: enjambment stress juxtaposition stanza tone homophone Check your knowledge using the word box at the top of this week’s worksheet, which is on page 3 of this lesson. Read a new text The text for this week is a poem titled “The Miracle of Morning” by Amanda Gorman. She is a poet laureate, which is a poet appointed by a government or institution to serve as the official poet. She is the first to be recognized as a youth laureate of the United States, which is a huge honor! She will write for special events and encourage others. Read the poem on pages 3-4 of this lesson. If you have a phone or other access you can also watch Amanda Gorman speak her poem. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/amanda-gormashares her poem "The Miracle of Morning" on CBS news. Analyze the text, practice terms, and write a response **Assignment: complete worksheet To analyze the poem you will need to read the poem again, answer questions that use the terms from the word box to think about how the author crafted the poem, and write a response to share your inferences about the poet’s message. The poem and worksheet are pages 3-4 of this lesson. 1 1 Apply your thinking with a project Completing a project will help you apply your thinking about our topic, “the challenge to make a difference”. Every week throughout the rest of the year you will continue to work on your project. There is a list of steps in this lesson on page 5 to help guide your work on the project, and there will be mini lessons in the packets that you’ll continue to receive. Please keep notes about your work in your notebook or on paper, and add to those notes every week. Here is the project: Write your own version of the “This I Believe” essays that you read in the first three Home Learning lessons. You will practice the steps of the writing process and improve your writing skills by sharing your beliefs and voice on a subject you feel strongly about in this writing project. Reflect on your progress and next steps for your Apply project to plan for next week After completing the first tasks for your project be sure that you have saved your notes. What will be your next step? You can work on the project as often as you’d like to. Each week there will be a mini lesson to move your work along. You did a lot of work to get this project started this week. Be proud of your efforts. Your work to stay engaged in home learning is important :) Share your learning Tell your family about the poem you read this week, “The Miracle of Morning.” Share with them your ideas about writing your own “This I Believe” essay. Poetry jokes to make you smile :) Question: What did the poet say to Luke Skywalker? Answer: “Metaphors be with you.” Question: Where do poems come from? Answer: Poe-trees. 2 2 The Challenge to Make a Difference, Ms. Jarvis and Ms. Petersen English 8: Meet poet Amanda Gorman Vocabulary, text, and worksheet Pages 3-4 **Check your definitions from the Engage part of the lesson. enjambment: stress: juxtaposition: The continuation of a sentence Emphasis given to a particular Two things being seen or placed without a pause beyond the end of a syllable or word in speech, close together to compare and line, couplet, or stanza. typically through a combination contrast, creating an interesting Example: of relatively greater loudness, effect. Lines 30 & 31 in The Miracle of higher pitch, and longer Examples: someone whispers in a Morning duration. loud crowd stanza: tone: homophone: A group of lines in a poem. The attitude of a writer towards Two or more words that have the Example: a subject or an audience, which same pronunciation, but different Lines 1-4 in The Miracle of Morning can be detected through an meanings, origins, or spellings. author’s word choice and style. Example: new and knew You will be reading the poem and then answering questions to analyze the poem. Preview the questions first to set the purpose for reading. It will also be helpful to mark the poem in some way by underlining, using colors, or making comments as you discover things in the poem related to the terms and to the questions. The Miracle of Morning, By Amanda Gorman I thought I'd awaken to a world in mourning. Heavy clouds crowding, a society storming. But there's something different on this golden morning. Something magical in the sunlight, wide and warming. I see a dad with a stroller taking a jog. Across the street, a bright-eyed girl chases her dog. A grandma on a porch fingers her rosaries. She grins as her young neighbor brings her groceries. While we might feel small, separate, and all alone, Our people have never been more closely tethered. The question isn't if we will weather this unknown, But how we will weather this unknown together. So on this meaningful morn, we mourn and we mend. Like light, we can't be broken, even when we bend. 3 3 As one, we will defeat both despair and disease. We stand with healthcare heroes and all employees; With families, libraries, schools, waiters, artists; Businesses, restaurants, and hospitals hit hardest. We ignite not in the light, but in lack thereof, For it is in loss that we truly learn to love. In this chaos, we will discover clarity. In suffering, we must find solidarity. For it's our grief that gives us our gratitude, Shows us how to find hope, if we ever lose it. So ensure that this ache wasn't endured in vain: Do not ignore the pain. Give it purpose. Use it. Read children's books, dance alone to DJ music. Know that this distance will make our hearts grow fonder. From a wave of woes our world will emerge stronger. We'll observe how the burdens braved by humankind Are also the moments that make us humans kind; Let every dawn find us courageous, brought closer; Heeding the light before the fight is over. When this ends, we'll smile sweetly, finally seeing In testing times, we became the best of beings. Here are questions to answer as you analyze the poem. Please write answers in your notebook or on paper. Skim back through the poem while you work on the answers and explain ideas. 1. Find the set of homophones in stanza 1 and stanza 4. Why do you think the author chose to use those words together? How does it affect your thinking about the poem when you’re listening since the words sound exactly the same? 2. In her poem Amanda Gorman juxtaposes images to create an effect for the audience, for example in that first stanza when she uses images of “heavy clouds, a society storming” contrasted with “something magical in the sunlight, wide and warming”. Read through the poem looking for images she creates that are opposing ideas. Make a list of what you find. 3. Search the poem for evidence of the author’s tone with regard to the situation our world is in right now. Write a paragraph describing that tone. Include text evidence from the poem to show that your thinking can be inferred from the poem. Paragraph format: Begin with a topic sentence, followed by explaining your ideas. Start the text evidence with a transition and then a lead in to provide context from the poem, followed by your quote and citation. After your text evidence add a couple more sentences to conclude your commentary. 4 4 The Challenge to Make a Difference, Ms. Jarvis and Ms. Petersen English 8, Project details (for May 11-June 15) Home Learning Project: Write your own version of the This I Believe essay. You will practice the steps of the writing process, put your writing skills to work, and share your beliefs about a subject you feel strongly about in this project. By sharing your beliefs you will be working on using your own voice to make a difference, which is the theme of our home learning lessons. Keep notes in your notebook or on paper to track your progress. Use these dates and tasks in the chart below to set goals for yourself and to break down the steps of the project. Watch for mini lessons to help you in the next two packets as well. date: task: Week of May 11 Part 1: Brainstorm: Read back through the essays from lessons 1, 2, and 3 for Home Learning: ● Creative Solutions ● Tomorrow Will Be a Better Day ● Greetings Make a list of the things you notice about these essays that celebrate the author’s voice and beliefs.