by Carol Jago

Teaching the sonnet is a ubiquitous (and too often tedious) poetry lesson focusing on accented syllables and rhyme schemes. Most of us begin with Shakespeare. The next time around, consider starting instead with Terrance Hayes’ “American Sonnet for My Once and Future Assassin.”

In this sonnet Hayes reflects upon the structure and purpose of the form (much as Billy Collins does in his poem “Sonnet.”)

Before handing out copies of the poem, have students listen to the audio recording of the poet reading his sonnet.


1. Draw students’ attention to Hayes’ reference to Jim Crow as “gym and crow.”

2. Give students their own copy of the sonnet and ask them to read it and choose a line that struck them for whatever reason.

3. Have students share the line they chose with a partner explaining why it stood out, puzzled, or otherwise interested them.

4. Read the poem once more to the class.

5. Discuss: Where has Terrance Hayes conformed to the “rules” of the sonnet form? Where has he broken those rules for greater artistic expression, calling the form “part prison / Part panic closet”?

6. What do you think the “beautiful catharsis” entails? Who or what is changing?


Now read one of Shakespeare’s sonnets.


Further Reading:


Carol Jago has taught middle and high school in Santa Monica, CA for many years and served as president of the National Council of Teachers of English. Her latest publication, The Book in Question: Why and How Reading Is in Crisis is now available from Heinemann (2019).

by Brett Vogelsinger

by Kelsey Hughes

Gwendolyn Brooks’s poem, “We Real Cool” is a perfect choice for the classroom for many reasons—its brevity (which is, of course, appealing to students at first glance) allows for deep-digging into a small space; the speaker’s voice is palpable and relevant to many teens; and the possibilities for connecting the poem’s themes and tone to a class novel are endless.

This year, I used “We Real Cool” when teaching S.E. Hinton’s The Outsiders. I presented the poem to students at the beginning of class and let Brooks read the poem herself (Listen here). Her introduction provides a good backstory before reading the poem, and by listening to Brooks read aloud, the students are able to benefit from hearing her rhythm and her voice as she reads the poem beautifully. The students then re-read the poem multiple times on their own, marking up the text each time through a new layer--be it through line-by-line extractions of meaning, notes about repetition and figurative language, or even insights into the poem’s progression. After ample time with the text, we “tear apart” and discuss the poem together on the SmartBoard.

After making sense of the poem in isolation, I then ask the students to make a connection between this poem and The Outsiders. I intentionally leave the question, “How does this poem connect to The Outsiders?” open-ended, as the connections range from connections of theme to tone and form. Students surprise me with the amount of meaningful connections they can make with this poem.

After discussing their connections, I then had them look at the definition of “reclaim”* and ask how the speaker here is reclaiming his identity. I then take them to the moment in The Outsiders where the Greasers are almost pronouncing their own “manifesto” before the big rumble; here, we closely read this excerpt and discuss how Greasers are “reclaiming” their identities and why they might need to do this.

A creative writing option would be to have students write a poem in which they reclaim their own identities. This could be a pastiche poem, where students utilize the form and the repetition of “We” or “I” to create their own manifesto. An added challenge would be to require the students to incorporate gradual shift in tone that Brooks creates in “We Real Cool.”

Further Reading:


Kelsey R. Hughes is a writer and English Teacher at Lenape and Holicong Middle Schools in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. Her published and unpublished works can be found at www.kelseyrhughes.weebly.com.


*reclaim: retrieve or recover (something previously lost, given, or paid); obtain the return of.

by Brett Vogelsinger

There is always something special about hearing a poet read his or her own words, and perhaps something extra special about hearing a recorded poet read these words posthumously.  This act reminds us that even the poems that end up commonly anthologized and in the canon are meant to be heard aloud, that they speak from the past most eloquently when we breathe life into them.

Langston Hughes poems frequently surface in student anthologies.  In this video, students have the chance to hear Langston Hughes talk about the experience that led him to write "The Negro Speaks of Rivers" as a young man just out of high school, and then he reads the poem aloud.



Brett Vogelsinger is a ninth-grade English teacher at Holicong Middle School in Bucks County, PA.  He is the faculty adviser for the school literary magazine, Sevenatenine.  Besides his annual blogging adventure on this site, he has published work on Nerdy Book Club, The New York Times Learning Network, and Edutopia and you can follow him on Twitter (@theVogelman).

I wrap the lesson up by asking about the end message -- the final two lines of the poem -- what does Jason Reynolds want us to walk away with?  This poem speaks to many of my kids, not all, but I think it offers a way to show them that poetry might be more raw than they assume.

Pernille Ripp is a seventh-grade language arts teacher from Madison, WI. Follow her work on Twitter: @pernilleripp

by Brett Vogelsinger

I must confess, I am a little partial to the poem "Revenge" by Taha Muhammad Ali because I was present for its English-language debut at the Dodge Poetry Festival in 2006.  To hear a poem spoken first in Arabic, meaningless to a primarily English-speaking audience, reminded me first of the marvels of language; what is without meaning to one person is deeply, profoundly impactful to another.  And when I heard this poem repeated, the second time in English, the power of Ali's words brought the entire audience to our feet, for here was a poem entitled "Revenge," crafted in one of the most conflict-striken regions of the world, that is actually about the power of choosing peace.

If you choose to share this entire video of the poem with your students, it will take a little more time than some of our Go Poem activities, but I think you will find it to be worth it.  I share photocopies of the poem with my students, turned face-down until after the video has finished playing.



Part of what makes this poem so impactful is its structure.  What we may refer to as a "plot twist" in a novel or a movie we refer to as a "turn" in a poem.  Where does this poem take a surprising turn?  What is the nature of that turn?  By surprising us with these unforeseen turns, what do you think the poet wants us to leave the poem thinking about, wondering about, or believing?  (That last question digs at the question of theme, but isn't it so much more interesting than asking "What is the theme of this poem?")


Brett Vogelsinger teaches freshman English students at Holicong Middle School in Doylestown, PA where he starts class with a poem each day. Follow his work on Twitter @theVogelman.

by Brett Vogelsinger

The poem "In Two Seconds" is longer than most poems we use in a poem a day activity, but it is also relevant, provocative, and deep.  Mark Doty wrote this poem in response to the killing of Tamir Rice by a Cleveland police officer.

Try giving the class a copy of the poem turned face down on their desk, requiring them to listen to the poem before they look at it.  You may provide a little context, explaining that this poem is protest poem about an injustice, but let them listen to pick out the other pieces.

After hearing the poem, have them turn over the handout and read it the second time with the goal of answering this question:  What can you tell me about the injustice Mark Doty is writing about?  What happened?  What does the poet condemn about this incident?

Have students share the specific lines that answer these questions.  Be sure to include at the end of your discussion:  Which lines would you most like to discuss with the poet? What new questions does this poem provoke in your mind? This is not a poem for easy answers, so it is important to me to end a discussion of a poem like this in a state of inquiry.

Brett Vogelsinger teaches freshman English students at Holicong Middle School in Doylestown, PA where he starts class with a poem each day. Follow his work on Twitter @theVogelman.