Understanding Shakespeare: Sonnet 18 Foundation Lesson ......Understanding Shakespeare: “Sonnet 18” Foundation Lesson—High School About This Lesson This lesson models for students

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English

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Understanding Shakespeare: “Sonnet 18” Foundation Lesson—High School

About This Lesson

This lesson models for students how to perform a literary analysis by showing how devices such

as diction, imagery, figures of speech, and sound create thematic meaning. Engagement with

more complex texts such as Shakespearean sonnets will sharpen students’ perception of the way

diction and imagery create theme. Sonnets are short enough to be analyzed in a class period yet

complex enough to require multiple readings to determine meaning, and they allow students

access to elevated themes and rich language in a classroom-friendly setting. Students often enjoy

analyzing poetry and seeing how the form of the poem functions, and the creative writing

activity, which includes a sonnet graph, gives them a concrete tool to identify and understand

iambic pentameter. As part of the lesson’s cumulative assessment, students are encouraged to

create original sonnets which contain elevated, abstract themes.

Passages for LTF®

lessons are selected to challenge students, while lessons and activities make

texts accessible. Guided practice with challenging texts allows students to gain the proficiency

necessary to read independently at or above grade level.

Objectives

Students will

explain how literary elements such as diction and imagery reveal thematic meaning.

analyze how poetic structure creates or impacts meaning.

explain how devices such as figurative language or sound reveal thematic meaning.

produce a style analysis of the poem.

create an original sonnet that conforms to appropriate structure and uses literary elements

to create a theme.

Level

Grades Nine and Ten

Connection to Common Core Standards for English Language Arts

LTF Foundation Lessons are designed to be used across grade levels and therefore are aligned to

the CCSS Anchor Standards. Teachers should consult their own grade-level-specific Standards.

The activities in this lesson allow teachers to address the following Common Core Standards.

Explicitly addressed in this lesson

Code Standard Level of

Thinking

Depth of

Knowledge

R.1 Read closely to determine what the text says

explicitly and to make logical inferences from it.

Cite specific textual evidence when writing or

speaking to support conclusions drawn from the

text.

Understand III

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Teacher Overview—Understanding Shakespeare: “Sonnet 18”


R.2 Determine central ideas or themes of a text and

analyze their development; summarize the key

supporting details and ideas.

Analyze III

R.3 Analyze how and why individuals, events, and ideas

develop and interact over the course of a text.

Analyze III

R.4 Interpret words and phrases as they are used in a

text, including determining technical, connotative,

and figurative meanings, and analyze how specific

word choices shape meaning or tone.

Analyze III

R.5 Analyze the structure of texts, including how

specific sentences, paragraphs, and larger portions

of the text (e.g., a section, chapter, scene or stanza)

relate to each other and the whole.

Analyze III

R.10 Read and comprehend complex literary and

informational texts independently and proficiently.

Understand II

L.3 Apply knowledge of language to understand how

language functions in different contexts, to make

effective choices for meaning or style, and to

comprehend more fully when reading or listening.

Understand II

L.5 Demonstrate understanding of word relationships

and nuances in word meanings.

Understand II

W.2 Write informative/explanatory texts to examine and

convey complex ideas and information clearly and

accurately through the effective selection,

organization, and analysis of content.

Create III

W.4 Produce clear and coherent writing in which the

development, organization, and style are appropriate

to task, purpose, and audience.

Create III

W.5 Develop and strengthen writing as needed by

planning, revising, editing, rewriting, or trying a

new approach

Evaluate III

W.10 Write routinely over extended time frames (time for

research, reflection, and revision) and shorter time

frames (a single sitting or a day or two) for a range

of tasks, purposes, and audiences.

Apply III

SL.1 Prepare for and participate effectively in a range of

conversations and collaborations with diverse

partners, building on others’ ideas and expressing

their own clearly and persuasively.

Understand II

Implicitly addressed in this lesson

Code Standard Level of

Thinking

Depth of

Knowledge

L.1 Demonstrate command of the conventions of

standard English grammar and usage when writing

or speaking.

Understand I

L.2 Demonstrate command of the conventions of

standard English capitalization, punctuation, and

spelling when writing.

Understand I

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L.3 Apply knowledge of language to understand how

language functions in different contexts, to make

effective choices for meaning or style, and to

comprehend more fully when reading or listening.

Understand II

L.6 Acquire and use accurately a range of general

academic and domain-specific words and phrases

sufficient for reading, writing, speaking, and

listening at the college and career readiness level;

demonstrate independence in gathering vocabulary

knowledge when considering a word or phrase

important to comprehension or expression.

Understand II

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LTF Skill Focus

The foundation for LTF English lessons is the Skill Progression Chart that identifies key skills

for each domain, beginning with grade 6 and adding more complex skills at each subsequent

grade level while reinforcing skills introduced at previous grade levels. The Skill Focus for each

individual lesson identifies the skills actually addressed in that lesson.

Levels of Thinking

Understand Apply Analyze Evaluate Create

Close Reading written, spoken, and visual texts

Grammar purposeful use of language for effect

Composition written, spoken, and visual products

Reading Strategies

Determining author’s

purpose

Inference

Paraphrase

Literary Elements

Analogy

Diction

connotation

denotation

vocabulary

Imagery

Rhetorical Shift

Theme

Figures of Speech

(Figurative Language)

Metaphor

Personification

Sound Devices

Meter

Rhyme

Rhythm

Literary Techniques

Allusion

Literary Forms

Verse

Sonnet

Elizabethan

Petrarchan

Types (modes)

Expository

analytical

Multiple Modes

Imaginative

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Connections to AP*

Analysis of diction, imagery, and the literary devices that contribute to thematic meaning is a

skill that students must demonstrate on both the free response and multiple choice sections of AP

English Literature and AP English Language exams. The Literature exam contains a free

response prompt and multiple choice questions on poetry, so it is critical that students develop an

understanding of analysis and language specific to poetry.

*Advanced Placement and AP are registered trademarks of the college Entrance Examination Board. The College

Board was not involved in the production of this material.

Materials and Resources

“Sonnet 18” by William Shakespeare

copies of Student Activity

handout: “Graphing the Sonnet”

Assessments

The following kinds of formative assessments are embedded in this lesson:

guided questions

graphic organizer

frame statements

writing assignment

The following additional assessments are located on the LTF website

LTF Posttest: 2006 Grade 9 Style Analysis on “The Possession” and “Slipping”

LTF Posttest: 2006 Grade 10 Style Analysis on “Wing Road” and “Ex-Basketball Player”

Teaching Suggestions

Students will work through the activities to help them analyze diction, imagery, figures of

speech, sound devices, and structure in “Sonnet 18.” Teachers will find a variety of strategies

embedded in the lesson, ranging from a graphic organizer, to paraphrasing, to frame statements

for an analytical paragraph. Because students often find poetry intimidating, teachers should be

prepared to model the exercises in the initial activities, perhaps in a whole-class setting. As they

become more confident with the poem’s form and language, students may complete the activities

independently.

Answers

Many of the answers for this lesson are subjective and will vary. However, answers to objective

questions are provided below. To obtain the maximum benefit of the lesson, ask students to go

beyond the expected responses.

Quatrain 1:

1. summer

2. The speaker compares a beautiful summer day to his lover

4. temperate: calm; self-restrained, neither too hot or cold

5. darling: very dear or beloved

7. Suggested paraphrase: The speaker asks the question whether he should compare his love to a

summer day. He says that she is lovelier and more constant. Summer has rough winds that

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shake the beautiful and beloved early blooms of May. The time period of summer is too short.

The speaker must view summer as a pleasant time, but considers it too short.

Quatrain 2:

8. The eye is the sun watching from the sky.

9. The antecedent of the pronoun “his” in line 6 is the sun.

12. Suggested paraphrase of line 7: Fair could refer to the weather to mean clear and sunny; it

could refer to his love as attractive and beautiful as well as just and honest.

14. Suggested paraphrase: At times the sun is too hot or the weather gets cloudy. Everything

beautiful, a person or a day, will at some point lose its beauty and change for the worst

whether the change is caused by misfortune, fate, or unbalanced events.

Quatrain 3

15. The word “but” signals a shift in the poem. The focus now shifts from “the summer day” to

his love.

17. Death is described as bragging, like a person.

18. The shade is the shadow of death. The Psalmist refers to walking “through the valley of the

shadow of death.”

19. Lines might refer to age lines in the face. It could also refer to lines of poetry. The poetry

lines are the most relevant because the speaker is declaring his love in the sonnet.

20. Suggested paraphrase: But your youth will not fade away, nor will you lose the beauty that

you possess. Death will not claim you for his own. You and the memory of you will never die

because in my lasting poetry you will live forever.

Couplet

21. Suggested paraphrase: As long as the human race exists, this poem will live on and make you

immortal; you will live on each time a person reads this poem.

24: Suggested answer for frame statement:

In Sonnet 18, William Shakespeare illustrates (title) (author’s name) (reveals, explores, illustrates, etc. marker verbs)

the eternal nature of love and how it can be preserved through a work of art. (key aspect of the theme) (What does the poem show us on a universal level?)

English


Understanding Shakespeare: “Sonnet 18” Foundation Lesson—High School

Prereading Activity 1. Imagine the perfect summer day. It is early summer with just the perfect mix of comfortable

temperature and weather. List the details about that perfect day on the chart that follows. Fill

in the chart with images that appeal to the different senses.

Sight

Touch

Taste

Smell

Hearing

2. Write a general statement about the overall feeling created by this perfect day.

______________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

3. Now think of a person you care about. How are this perfect summer day and this person alike?

How are they different?

______________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

Student Activity—Understanding Shakespeare: “Sonnet 18”


Sonnet 18 Analysis

Read the poem aloud. Work through the questions and activities that follow.

Sonnet 18

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate:

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, 5

And often is his gold complexion dimmed;

And every fair from fair sometime declines,

By chance or nature’s changing course untrimmed.

But thy eternal summer shall not fade,

Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st; 10

Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,

When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,

So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Quatrain 1

line 1 Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

2 Thou art more lovely and more temperate:

3 Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

4 And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;

1. What season of the year is dealt with in this sonnet?

2. The quatrain contains an analogy that compares

to .

3. Based on images from your prereading chart, explain why this is an effective comparison.

4. What is the denotation of temperate in line 2? How is this word appropriate to describe both a

day in summer and a person?

5. What is the denotation of darling (line 3) in this context?

6. Explain the metaphor in line 4, “summer’s lease.”



7. Paraphrase the first quatrain.

Quatrain 2

line 5 Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,

6 And often is his gold complexion dimmed;

7 And every fair from fair sometime declines,

8 By chance or nature’s changing course untrimmed.

8. In line 5, what is “the eye of heaven”?

9. What is the antecedent of the pronoun his in line 6?

10. How could “the eye of heaven” be dimmed?

11. How is the sun further personified in line 6?

12. Explain two possible meanings of the word fair in line 7.

13. For each meaning you identified, explain how something that is fair might “decline.”

14. Paraphrase the second quatrain.



Quatrain 3

line 9 But thy eternal summer shall not fade,

10 Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;

11 Nor shall Death brag thou wander’st in his shade,

12 When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:

15. What word signals a shift in the poem?

What word in line 1 is directly related to the word thy in line 9?

16. The speaker states that “thy eternal summer shall not fade.” Explain this metaphor.

17. How is Death personified in line 11?

18. Explain the Biblical allusion in line 11.

19. What are possible meanings for the word lines in line 12? Which meaning is most relevant?

Explain.

20. Paraphrase the 3rd

quatrain.

Final Couplet

line 13 So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,

14 So long lives this and this gives life to thee.

21. Paraphrase the final couplet.

22. What does the final couplet reveal about the power of a literary work?



The theme of a work, in this case a poem, is its implied view of life and human nature. It is the

generalization about life at large that the piece leads the reader to see.

23. Fill in the following frame statement for theme.

In ,

(title) (author)

(reveals, explores, illustrates, shows, etc. marker verbs) (key aspect of the theme)

and how it .

(What does it show us on a universal level?)

Graphing a Sonnet

Use the sonnet graph on the next page to chart the form of Sonnet 18.

Writing Activities

Review the following definitions:

Rhythm is the varying speed, intensity, elevation, pitch, loudness, and expressiveness of speech.

Meter is the measured, patterned arrangement of syllables, according to stress and length in a

poem. For example, the most common meter in English verse is the iamb, an unstressed

syllable followed by a stressed syllable. An iamb is a two-syllable foot.

A sonnet is a poem of 14 lines following one of several set rhyme schemes. The two basic

classical sonnet types are the Italian (Petrarchan) and the English (Shakespearean). The

Italian (Petrarchan) form is marked by its division into the octave and the sestet. The

rhyme scheme is abbaabba cdecde (or cdcdcd or some other variation of two or three

rhymes). The English (Shakespearean) sonnet is divided into 3 quatrains and a rhymed

couplet. The rhyme scheme is abab cdcd efef gg. The meter is commonly iambic

pentameter (5 iambs, which is ten syllables, per line).

Writing an Analytical Paragraph: Write a paragraph in which you explain how Shakespeare’s use

of imagery suggests his attitude about the enduring power of poetry.

Writing a Sonnet: The theme of a sonnet is usually related to an elevated, abstract idea such as

love, devotion, patriotism, honor, fidelity, etc. Choose such an idea and write an original sonnet,

following one of the patterns identified above (Italian or English). Use the second graph to help

organize the meter and rhyme.



Graphing the Sonnet

Write one syllable in each of the boxes to show the iambic pentameter of each line .In the last

box, place the rhyme scheme letter for each of the lines.

Line # ˇ ∕ ˇ ∕ ˇ ∕ ˇ ∕ ˇ ∕ Rhyme Letter

1

Shall

I

com-

pare

thee

to

a

sum-

mer’s

day?

a

2

Thou

art

more

love-

ly

and

more

tem-

per-

ate:

b

3

Rough

winds

a

4

b

5

c

6

d

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14



Graphing the Sonnet

Write one syllable in each of the boxes to show the iambic pentameter of each line .In the last

box, place the rhyme scheme letter for each of the lines.

Line # ˇ ∕ ˇ ∕ ˇ ∕ ˇ ∕ ˇ ∕ Rhyme Letter

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

Documents

Understanding Shakespeare: Sonnet 18 Foundation Lesson ......Understanding Shakespeare: “Sonnet 18” Foundation Lesson—High School About This Lesson This lesson models for students