Day 2= Is Poetry Important?Day 3= What makes it “good?”Day 4= The Effects of Poetry

Day 5= “What will your verse be?”

Getting to know you. . .

• Journal: If you had to choose 5 adjectives that describe you, what would they be?

• Invictus

• Journal: If you had to choose 5 more adjectives that describe you, what would they be?

• 9 minutes

“Food” for thought. . .

• How did the poem affect the way that you described yourself? (How did the video affect the adjectives that you chose?)

• What affect does poetry have on our identity?

• 6 minutes

Activity 1 (more getting to know

you!) :D• We will watch the Invictus clip a

second time, this time, record a list of words that describe the narrator.

• In your own words, who is this man as a person? What evidence is there from the poem that you’re right?

• 6 minutes

What is Identity?

• http://dictionary.reference.com/help/luna/Spell_pron_key.html 

• 1.the condition of being oneself or itself, and not another: He doubted his own identity.

• 2.condition or character as to who a person or what a thing is: a case of mistaken identity.

• 3.the state or fact of being the same one as described.

• 4.the sense of self, providing sameness and continuity in personality over time and sometimes disturbed in mental illnesses

Who was Nelson Mandela (and why does it matter?)

• Nelson Mandela, Biography

• While reading, what are some events that, you feel, add to Nelson Mandela’s identity?

• Discuss: “Invictus” was written on Mandela’s prison wall for the first 18 years that he was imprisoned. . . How did poetry affect Nelson Mandela’s identity?

• 7 minutes

I Am Poems

• Using William Henley’s poem and your list of adjectives that describe you, create an “I Am” poem about yourself.

• How does your identity affect this poem? (How does identity affect art?)

• Write and share

What IS Poetry?

• Take a look at the different articles about poetry and underline the words that you think DEFINE poetry.

• Think of what we discussed about William Henley's poem and your own “I Am” poems.

• During this process, CREATE A LIST OF (at least 20) WORDS THAT HELP TO DETERMINE WHAT IS POETRY.

What IS Poetry?

• Look at the list of words in front of you. Create AT LEAST 5 groups with at least 4 items per group!

• Why do these words belong together? How would you label these groups? Why would you label them this way?

What IS Poetry?

• Re-group your groups. You MAY use duplicate groups, but you MUST have at least 3 groups with at least 4 items per group.

• Could some of these belong to more than one group? Why did you label them this way? Explain.

What IS Poetry?

• Based on what you’ve seen, who would like to try to summarize for us, “What IS Poetry?”

• What can we agree upon as a working definition of poetry?

What would happen if. . . .

• What would happen to our definition if we were to add this video?

• "Fix You”

• How do the music and the dance combine to portray a message?

• What is particularly “poetic” about this dance?

• Based on our definition, could this be considered Poetry?

• How are identity and art co-dependent in this dance?

What would happen if. . .

• What would happen to our definition if we include this image?

• What does the painting symbolize?

• How do the colors and images combine to portray a message?

What would happen if. . .

• What is particularly “poetic” about this painting?

• Based on our definition, could this be considered “poetry?”

Wrap up. . .

• Compare and contrast the themes and effectiveness of the dance and the painting. . .

• Based on what we’ve done today, what is your “final” definition of poetry?

• How does poetry affect identity?

• How does identity affect poetry?