I have been teaching my KPTP lesson
for the past two weeks now. During my lesson, I have been teaching my students
sonnets. To start off, we learned about the different types of sonnets and
practicing analyzing them. We focused more on Shakespearean sonnets to ease our
way into more of Shakespeare’s works. Students normally struggle with
Shakespearean language. This is typical, especially for freshmen, to not
understand what the sonnet is saying because of the language. In a previous
class, we studied the language and even took a test over it. Due to studying
issues students did not do so well. They are learning the power of studying now
after that test. They also are finding out that asking “why do we need this in
life?” gives them the answer of “You will need it in the next week when we
start reading Shakespeare.” So this then leads to the question of “Why are we
reading Shakespeare? We won’t need that.” Well, the answer to that is that they
are correct; they may not use it as much in the future. This will help them
analyze things that they do not understand. They will be almost bilingual
because the language is so different from ours. Our students are learning that
Shakespearean words are used more frequently than they think. They can figure
things out because of the help of Shakespeare. Another part of the answer to the
same question from students is that Shakespeare wrote about themes that are
timeless. The same themes are used today, they are learning from where the
themes were put into practice that far back. There is so much more that they
are learning from reading and understanding Shakespeare; students just do not
realize it at the time of learning.
To
get back to the breakthrough of my classes; I had my students review what they
learned about sonnets (what makes up a sonnet, what the key components are,
etc.) and apply their knowledge into writing their own sonnet. Of course, I did
NOT have them write in iambic pentameter. They recognize that this is part of
the sonnet process, but that would have been too difficult for my students in a
short period of time. I also had my students present their sonnet to the class
and explain the accompanying visual that they chose to compliment their sonnet.
Out of the two classes I had do this assignment, all but four students completed
and presented their sonnet on time. I am not sure about those four students if
they will complete the assignment. This is a proud moment for me because I was
able to give them a difficult task and have the majority of my students
complete and enjoy the assignment. I asked my students to write me a paragraph
over their inspiration for the sonnet and then tell me how they thought they
did. The majority of them said they were proud of their sonnet and enjoyed
sharing their work to the class. Being able to get this reaction from my
students made my week! The creativity that was given through their work was
outstanding. All of my students were engaged and enjoyed sharing their creative
side.
The
website I have chosen to incorporate in this post is a list of 30 ways to use
creativity in the classroom. As teachers, we cannot be afraid to use creativity
to an advantage in our classroom. My students now understand sonnets and were
able to do so in a creative way. They all enjoyed the assignment. The link:
