I plan on teaching metaphors, similes, hyperboles and personification to my 4th graders. In the past I have had them create their own and draw an illustration of their sentence. I have been searching to find other ideas to liven up the lessons. I found online the idea of using pictures books and locating the various figurative language used. I like the idea, however I'm still looking for other. Does anyone have any suggestions or ideas to share? Thanks!
I tie figurative language into my poetry unit, and have students read & identify figurative language, and then write poems with lots of figurative language. My kids always have a hard time with similes and metaphors, so we end up having to go over and over those two!
As either a final evaluation or a formative assessment task, you may want to do a poetry Scavenger hunt. Have them look through poetry books (or, since your kids are gr. 4, you may want to photocopy suitable poems). You can either have them find X number of examples of each type you've taught, or have them find specific ones. (Eg. both a simile and a metaphor for black might be "black as coal" and "the inky darkness"...)
I did this over a fairly long period of time, and it was their assignment when they were done that day's work. They really enjoyed it, and it was wonderful to see a classroom of kids all reading poetry books!
I was looking through my files and found a couple more pages you might be able to use.
Both pages were developed by my fourth grade colleague.
This attachment is a page we used this school year for the different stories we read in our basal reader, our read-alouds or independent home reading.
It's divided into sections with the term, brief definition and example of
onomatopoeia,
simile,
metaphor,
hyperbole,
alliteration,
idiom, or
personification.
As students read (or listen to) their stories, they write the examples they encounter. We used this page as a group for many stories before they were asked to use the page independently. (We also keep track of these figurative language examples on sticky notes that are placed on the appropriate figurative language charts in the room.)
This attachment, also developed by my fourth grade team partner, is a page (or chart, if done on tag board) which the students create as partners or in teams.
I typed the explanation and some examples in red text, but after downloading it, delete the text you don't want and use the format with your students, if you decide to try this out.
(I haven't tried this activity personally, but my team partner has done this for several years.)
have trouble with metaphor being taught as a separate literary device, when metaphor is actually a large umbrella, under which sit simile and personification? I have stopped teaching metaphor as "saying something IS something." Metaphor is a huge blanket term that actually encompasses the others.
Actually, although it's been done and done, having them write and illustrate their own examples is probably one of the best ways to cement these terms for them. I know we get tired of the same little projects, but I don't know that I'm willing to get rid of this one. It's simple and very effective.
I recently taught a similar lesson to the 6th graders I student teach. I began by having a short video from United Streaming that explained about the different types of figurative language. I had also prepared a short PowerPoint presentation to further explain the types. I had my class create a figurative language quilt that I could put up in the classroom. I gave each student one square of paper, and one type of figurative language (I used each type more then once) and had the student write what type they had, a definition of what it is and how it is used, A few sentences illustration the type, and a picture to go along with the sentences. This worked very well for me because my students learned, but also had a lot of fun while learning. There was time at the end of the class to allow each student to present his or her quilt piece. I put this up in the classroom during lunch and created a quilt with it. I hope this helps!
I introduced figurative language by reading More Parts by Ted Arnold...I love it as much as the kids do!
I let them go through magazines and cut out examples they found of each type of figurative language, advertisements are full of them.
To close it out, I let them make figurative language posters like you said-they illustrated their favorites. I put them in the hall under "Getting Figurative in Fifth". The whole elem. got a kick out of their interpretations!
I haven't read all of the posts so I apologize if this has already been suggested. I am going to use the Amelia Bedelia books to do a short little play with my 4th graders.
This is a fantastic thread. I have saved many of these ideas to my scrapbook. I plan on implementing them next year. Thanks for these great contributions!
i teach in a school with students that love hip hop music. so i use it to my advantage and have them find the similes and metaphors in the songs they love. all the popular songs use them. waterfalls by TLC which was popular years back is a good one because they are comparing life and things that are out of one's reach as a waterfall. song says, "don't go chasing waterfalls, just stick to the rivers and the lakes that you're use to."
03-24-2008, 04:47 PM
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