Literary Elements in “Stopping By Woods”

Activity Overview

When teaching poems, it is often helpful to refresh or introduce students with technical words. “Metaphor", "alliteration", "personification", "imagery", "apostrophe", and "assonance" are a few important terms.

After you have read the poem, ask your students to do a scavenger hunt using the Storyboard Creator. Give them the list again and have them create a storyboard that depicts and explains the use of each literary element in the poem. They will have an absolute blast and gain mastery of the words.

"Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening" Literary Elements

	DESCRIPTION	EXAMPLE
Personification	Giving human-like characteristics to non-human objects or abstract ideas	“He gives his harness bells a shake To ask if there is some mistake.”
Alliteration	Repetition of consonant sounds at the beginnings of words in a sentence or line	“The only other sound’s the sweep”
End Rhyme	Words at the end of a line that rhyme with words at the end of other lines.	“Whose woods these are I think I know. His house is in the village though;”
Imagery	The use of descriptive or figurative language to create vivid mental imagery that appeals to the senses	“The woods are lovely, dark and deep,”
Assonance	The repetition of a vowel sound	“And miles to go before I sleep.”

Template and Class Instructions

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