Text: The Echoing Green

Close Reading Strategy with: The Echoing Green

Lexile Level: 1090

1st Reading: Independent

Hand out text. This poem was published in 1789. Explain close reading strategy and why we are learning to use it. Introduce the term “complex text”.

Ask students what type of text this is.

Tell students that as they read, they should underline things that confuse them and circle words or phrases that they think are important. They may also write their thoughts in the margins of the text if they choose to.

Encourage them to re-read the text several times, to really think about each line.

Quickwrite: How do you think Old John and the other old folk are feeling as the watch the girls and boys play? What evidence is there in the text to support your thinking?

(Teacher: Observe students. Are they writing much? What are they writing? What are they circling and underlining? Make notes on a sticky note as you observe. You will use these notes to adjust you think aloud if necessary)

10 minutes.

1st Discussion: Partner talk

Partner talk. Have students share their quick writes with each other. Instruct them to use words from the text to explain their thinking to their partner. Also have them share what they underlined and circled in the text and why.

(Teacher: Walk around and listen in. On task? Misconceptions? Using text evidence? Make notes on a stick note as you listen. You will use these notes to adjust you think aloud if necessary.)

5 minutes

2nd Discussion: Share out

Have partners share out their quickwrites and then what they underlined and circled with the whole group. Observe level of engagement, judge level of students’ understanding of the text. Are there misconceptions that need to be dealt with during the teacher think aloud?

5 minutes.

2nd Reading:Teacher Modeling

Teacher will read the text and conduct a think aloud. Think aloud about arise, thrush, weary, merry, descend, echoing green, bells.

10 minutes

3rd Discussion: Text Dependent Questions

(These are answered orally, all students search for the answers or evidence in the text)

  1. General Understandings
  2. What is this poem trying to describe?
  3. Key Details
  4. How is this poem structured?
  5. Vocabulary and Text
  6. When the author says “like birds in their nest” what type of figurative language is he using? What if he had said, “birds in their nest, ready for rest”?
  7. Author’s Purpose
  8. Why does the author use the words “echoing green”? What image is he trying to convey?
  9. Inferences
  10. Why do you think William Blake wrote this poem?
  1. Opinions, Arguments, and Intertextual Connections
  2. Do you think this poem could have a deeper meaning than just talking about children playing?

10 minutes

Journal Writing:

Write about why you think William Blake used the repeated line “on the echoing green”. What does this do for the poem? Why did he change the line at the end of the poem?

10 minutes

Christie Leigan