Activity Overview
Students select a stanza from The Raven, revise it into a more contemporary English style, and share their revised versions with the class. The teacher and class will determine whether or not the revision properly parallels Poe's original.
Before the Activity
See the attached Activity PDF file for detailed instructions for this activity.
Print the appropriate pages from the Activity for your class.
Install the NoteFolio(tm) App on the students' graphing calculators following the attached instructions.
Assign a stanza from the poem to each student. It does not have to be the stanza that they read aloud in Activity 1.
During the Activity
Distribute the appropriate pages from the Activity to your class
Distribute the NoteFolio(tm) file(s) to your class using TI Connect(tm) and the appropriate TI Connectivity cable
Follow the procedures outlined in the Activity
Students will:
Read and view texts and performances from a wide range of authors, subjects, and genres.
Understand and identify the distinguishing features of the major genres and use them to aid their interpretation and discussion of literature.
Identify significant literary elements (including metaphor, symbolism, foreshadowing, dialect, rhyme, meter, irony, climax) and use those elements to interpret the work.
Recognize different levels of meaning.
Read aloud with expression, conveying the meaning and mood of a work.
Evaluate literary merit based on an understanding of the genre and the literary elements.
Present responses to and interpretations of literature making references to the literary elements found in the text and connections with their personal knowledge and experience.
Produce interpretation of literary works that identify different levels of meaning and comment on their significance and effect.
Write stories, poems, essays, and plays that observe the conventions of the genre and contain interesting and effective language and voice.
After the Activity
For extra credit, students should be encouraged to revise the entire poem as a homework project. This will encourage students to engage in Poe's work more deeply and lead to a better understanding of the classic.
Another possible extra credit assignment would be for the student to take his or her modernized stanza and rewrite it again to retain Poe's original poetic elements and style.