Do any of you lovely people know anything about rhyming schemes in a poem?

[MaureenMLove]

I've got to do a lesson starter on two William Blake poems on Wednesday and I'm a biit stuck! The teacher will explain if I need him to, but I thought I'd try to get my head around it myself first!

The poems are Infant Joy and Infant Sorrow

Any suggestions, most appreciated!

Infant Sorrow is AABB AABB, can't help with Infant Joy.

YTou could talk about the rhythm/metre of the two, compare the looseness of the first with the steady rhythm of the second? What effect does this have? How may times does Joy appear in the first, what is the effect, in what ways is the word joy used?

Hope that helps.

Thankyou, yes that does help. I thought that was the scheme for that one, but I doubted myself! Infant Joy is hard. This is for year 7! At least I can go back to the teacher tomorrow, with some knowledge and not look like a complete numpty!

the second one is in rhyming couplets. v good for emphasis and spoken aloud cos audience is able to predict the endings which makes them listen more. - shakespeare always used rhyming couplets at the end of scenes btw, as a way of summing up for the audience. Also it gives a certain formality to the poem. Hope this helps a bit, other poem I haven't a clue i'm afraid

Oh, I'd jotted down couplets too! Maybe I'm not so bad at this afterall!

The third line of Infant joy rhymes with the 6th

Could that be something like ABCDEC - r is that just daft (could well be tbh)

It could well be Katy! I will have a look around tinternet and see if I can work it out. I'll let you know!

OK, here's how I'd do it.

First - they should be doing the work, not you!

Find some poems with a really obvious rhyme scheme (nursery rhymes?). Explain rhyme scheme (highlight on interactive whiteboard if you have one).

Then give pairs of students the poems, photocopied on A4, & a 5 pack of highlighter pens. Get them to highlight the rhyming lines.

Then ask for feedback - which poem has most regular rhyme scheme? Why? (clue: which poem shows the baby/narrator as more in control?)

Should get you started?

Ok, well 'Infant Joy' comes from Blakes' 'Songs of Innocence' and the babe has been born into an innocent state in this poem - it knows no sin. It expresses an optimistic delight in childhood. Although there is no overt rhyme scheme as such, the repetitive structure could be seen as a way of emphasizing the bliss of the mother who is happy simply to sing over her baby's cradle but it might on the other hand be seen as a way of putting words into the infant's mouth, if he could utter them.

have a look on the bbc bitesize gcse english site. prolly tell you quite a bit. just type in bbc bitesize into google. sorry too rubbish on computer machines to link

Thanks Raven. That's given me a bit more of an idea. Trouble is, I'm only the cover supervisor, but the English dept has claimed me as their own, so I'm tied to what work/poems the teacher wants them to do. I just feel that if I'm in English all the time, I should get to know the stuff. I'm not entirely sure how he wants me to do this starter yet! It was a quick 2 min chat between lessons today. He showed me the two poems and said, 'we'll be doing rhyming schemes'! Hopefully I'll have a better idea of it tomorrow.

I've only been doing this job since April and so haven't actually been let loose on the kids on my own yet! He'll be in the classroom still, so he can step in, if necessary.

year 7 ?? good god!

Infant Sorrow comes from Blakes 'Songs of Experience', hence the change of mood. This one the children could more readily picture, the wriggling energy of the baby tightly swaddled and forced to give up its freedom. If I had to do this with year 7 I'd be looking at Blake's illustrations. But that isn't the lesson focus, but oddly rhyme schemes. The 2nd poem has a rhyming scheme -rhyming couplets. T'is an odd choice given the lack of one in Infant Joy.

I'd go back for some pointers!

Ought to point out, I last taught Blake with year 13!

It does seem rather a tall order for a first time CS and year 7! I'm sure he has good reasons and I shall report back tomorrow.

Fridays lesson starter is something to do with changing adjectives from a given passage to their own. Much more on my level and theirs I think!

Sorry, Maureen - I meant the students should be doing the work!

I've last done Blake with year 9 transitioning to 10 (GCSE coursework). It's quite tough for Year 7, but they might surprise you - I love cherry picking bits of GCSE stuff to spring on year 7 & 8s!

If the focus is on rhyme scheme then I'd go down the route of 'Infant Joy' has quite a free structure (happy baby, not a care in the world, not really interacting with its situation) whereas as Heated says, the baby in 'Infant Sorrow' is thinking about its environment - experiencing frustration - so use of regulated rhyming couplets expresses battle against constraints.

I did my starter! It went really well and I was definately over thinking it!

The teacher got them in their seats and then explained how the lesson was going to go and then wheeled back in his chair and said, 'they're all yours!'

I was clear and concise. Started by saying write the L.O. in your books. Then, since I have noticed over my first few weeks a lack of pens and books, said, 'anyone need a pen? Anyone need paper' So that helped to get the lesson under way muchh quicker.

The kids read through the poems, found the schemes and disected, no problem. I threw in a couple of extra things, like 'what's a verse otherwise known as?' and 'what do you call 2 lines that rhyme together?'

They were really good. When I asked for hands up, they did and when they started to forget and shout out, they were quick to do it, when I reminded them of the rules.

All in all, a very good attemp at first lesson starter, I think! I came out of the classroom, wantiing to skip down the corridor!

well done, its a daunting task. Are you training?

Well, yes, that's was the plan, but the school is in major change. went into special measures at christmas and have had an acting head drafted in. One of the improvements was that they'd stop with all the supply teachers drifting in and out and employ 8 Cover supervisors instead. There are only 2 of us left!

It the first time they've had CS's, so no-one really knows where we fit in! Not trained teachers, but not TA's either. I caught up with my line manager yesterday, who apologised for not seeing us all week, but we've been posted in English and the head there, is looking after us and its going well. We've been told that we can go at our pace and call the shots really. We've decided that it would be a good idea to stay just in english, since we will be able to get to know all the currculum and by helping out on starters, know the kids and know what work they should be doing, in case a teacher is out at short notice.

Had another couple of cover lessons yesterday and today and they were OK again. Almost forgot I had a class this afternoon! They were so quite watching the film Of Mice & Men, they didn't make a sound!