THE SCHOOL BOY

William Blake

How do you feel about school?

happy

fun

homework

Knowledge

School

To be your true self Group work: Adjectives to describe a school boy

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School boy

Summary

Describe a school boy

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William Blake William Blake was the son of a London hosier. The boy

never went to school. He picked up his education as well as he could. His favorite studies in early days were Shakespeare, Milton and Chatterlon.

At the age of 14, he was apprenticed to James Basier, an engraver. After leaving him, Blake began to earn his living as an engraver of illustrations for various publishers.

At the age of 24, Blake married Catherine Boucher, an illiterate girl. Blake taught her to read and Catherine helped him in engraving. Catharine proved to be an excellent wife, sympathizing with his work and sharing in it.

Blake lived a life of seclusion and poverty. He was often misunderstood by other people, who would regard him as gifted but mad. Blake’s last years found him chiefly concerned with painting and engraving. And he gradually gathered around him a small group of devoted young admirers. However, Blake’s genius in poetry remained unknown in his life time; he was recognized only posthumously.

William Blake was a transitional figure in British literature. He was the one of the first writers of the "Romantic Period." Before this period, most writers, such as Alexander Pope, wrote more for form instead of for content. Blake, on the other hand, turned back to Elizabethan and early seventeenth-century poets, and other eighteenth- century poets outside the tradition of Pope.

William Blake’s Major Works “Songs of Innocence” (1789) and “ Songs of

Experience” ( 1794): The best of Blake's short poems is to be found in

these two little collections of lyrics. “Songs of Innocence” contain poems which were apparently written for children. Using a language which even little babies can learn by heart, Blake succeeded in depicting the happy condition of a child before it knows anything about pains of existence. The poet expresses his delight in the sun, the hills, the streams, the insects and the flowers, in the innocence of the child and of the lamb. Here everything seems to be in harmony.

The School Boy is a poem from Songs of Innocence

In “Songs of Experience”, a much maturer work. entirely different themes are to be found, for in this collection of poems the poet drew pictures of neediness and distress and showed the sufferings of the miserable. The will to freedom must endure, for a time, the limitations of worldly experience, and salvation is said to come through passion; the revolt, through revolution. The poet was conscious of some blind hand crushing the life of man, as man crushes the fly.

The school boy from Songs of Innocence

Listen to the poem and draw a picture with major images.

Be creative and present the major messages from the poem

Create Gallery

Put all the drawings on the wall. Put smile stickers on the drawing you love

best. List all the images from the drawings on the

whiteboard. Invite students to explain why these images

are chosen by them.

Individual work (5 minutes)

Annotate the poem Consult a dictionary for new words. Write down your thoughts evoked by the

poem.

Group work

Each group work together to analyze the ideas and insights of the poem and interpret the poem. Use the TPCASTT Poem analysis handouts and example worksheet.

Find evidence from the lines to support their analysis.

Choose one group member to take notes and write down all the ideas being discussed by group members.

Choose a spokesperson to give a 3 minute presentation to analyze the poem after the discussion.

Presentations

Take notes of the ideas being explored by each group.

Put ideas into ideas map Class discussion

Themes

Group work: Categorize themes explored in the poem and write them on the charter paper.

Create a theme word map Which theme touches you most? Discuss. Homework 1: Write down a theme analysis

paragraph.

Cultural connection

Video: American students’ life

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ofzucjzpao

Debating topic:

Chinese/ American school system is better for students’ future.

Homework 2

Write a journal about how you feel about school life. If you are the principal, what will you change and what will you improve?

EXIT SLIP

What have you learned today? Is there any theme you want to be discussed

more next class? Any questions?