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Cranston High School East Library: Williams - Poetry

Assignment Information

For this assignment, you will be researching a famous American poet. You will be creating a presentation in Google Slides.  You will need to include the following information: 

Slide 1: Title Slide - Name of Poet, Student's Name, Class Name, Date (MLA Format)

Slide 2: Name of Poet/Photo of Poet/Poet's Birth date and Death date (if your poet is no longer alive)

Slide 3: A poem written by this poet.

Slide 4: What is the main idea of this poem?

Slide 5: Why did you choose this poem?

Slide 6: Descriptive words: Include at least 5 words that create imagery.  These words should be adjectives or adverbs. 

Slide 7: Poet's early life

Slide 8: Poet's adult life

Slide 9: Awards, honors, or contributions

Slide 10: Works Cited (MLA Format)

Slide 11: Your own reflection

Vocabulary

Poet - an author who uses specific words and imagery to tell a story

Poetry - writing that tells ideas in imaginative words

Main Idea - the most important message in the poem

Imagery - words that create pictures in a reader's mind

Adjectives - words that describe/modify nouns and pronouns

Adverbs - words that modify verbs, adjectives, and other adverbs

Famous American Poets

List of Poets:

  •  Maya Angelou 
  •  Stephen Vincent Benet 
  •  Gwendolyn Brooks 
  •  E.E. Cummings 
  •  Emily Dickinson 
  •  Ralph Waldo Emerson
  •  Robert Frost
  •  Langston Hughes
  •  Fenton Johnson
  •  Georgia Douglas Johnson
  •  Helen Keller
  •  Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
  •  Claude McKay
  •  Edna St. Vincent Millay
  •  Duane Niatum
  •  Shin Yu Pai
  •  Carl Sandburg
  •  Anne Spencer
  •  Henry David Thoreau
  •  Margaret Walker
  •  Phyllis Wheatley
  •  Walt Whitman

Google Slides

You will be using Google Slides to present your research. 

  1. Log in to your Cranston East gmail account
  2. Go to Google Slides to create a new presentation 

Great Poetry Sources

World Book - English & Spanish

Google Search

To find a poem by your poet, try typing the poet's name into the box below along with the word "poems"

Google Web Search

Google Translate

Free Online Citation Creators

Use the free online citation creators below to generate and save citations for all types of sources. 

Standards - ELA

American Association of School Librarians Standards for the 21st Century Learner:

1.1.1    Follow an inquiry based process in seeking knowledge in curricular subjects, and make the real world connection for using this process in own life.

1.1.3    Develop and refine a range of questions to frame the search for new understanding.

1.1.4    Find, evaluate, and select appropriate sources to answer questions.  

1.1.5    Evaluate information found in selected sources on the basis of accuracy, validity, appropriateness for needs, importance, and social and cultural context.

Common Core State Standards:

Literacy.W.9-10.W2.a : Introduce a topic; organize complex ideas, concepts, and information to make important connections and distinctions; include formatting (e.g., headings), graphics (e.g., figures, tables), and multimedia when useful to aiding comprehension.

Literacy.W.9-10.6 : Use technology, including the Internet, to produce, publish, and update individual or shared writing products, taking advantage of technology’s capacity to link to other information and to display information flexibly and dynamically.

Literacy.CCRA.L.1 : Demonstrate command of the conventions of standard English grammar and usage when writing or speaking.


Literacy.CCRA.L.2 : Demonstrate command of the conventions of standard English capitalization, punctuation, and spelling when writing.