"In Mrs Tilscher's class" Carol Ann Duffy

• Engels
• Upper Secondary (Key Stage 4)
• GCSE

Goals for today 

Completion "Stealing" 

Consideration of another poem by Carol Ann Duffy 

Exploration of some authorial choices made by the poet 

The poetic persona guiding question 

Visualising the poetic persona 

AWL

Goals for today 

Feedback and feedforward summative 

Reflection on the unit If This Is a Man

Reading "In Mrs Tilscher's class" 

WWW and EBI

• Read your feedback. 
• Look at the example parts of body paragraphs for criterion B. Collected from the internet. Consider what is the difference between each level criterion. Discuss in your group. 
  
• Complete your feedforward form in Teams general feed. 
  
• Complete your reflection feedback on this unit. 
  

ups and downs 

heavy 

to stick to 

build up of 

giving off a ...tone

Put into words 

zoomed out perspective 

Picking apart this quote 

get across 

play with emotions 

big of an effort 

accumulation of 

exploration of this quote 

convey

to influence

extensive effort 

tension 

extreme effort 

arduous 

distanced/objective tone 

emotional tension 

pursue  

"In Mrs Tilscher's Class" 

Reading to the punctuation 

On the sticky notes, write down in your groups something you see in the poem, something you think and something you wonder about. 

See, think, wonder 

Goals for today 

Revisiting see ...think ...wonder 

Exploring imagery in "In Mrs Tilscher's class" 

Exploring "In Mrs Tilsher's class" using guiding questions 

Considering the poem  "Valentine" 

chalky pyramids 

Blue Nile 

sugar paper 

coloured shapes 

Brady and Hindley 

gold star 

bell

I SEE ...

 books 

pencil

tadpoles 

three frogs 

Playground 

Reports 

• happy thoughts at the beginning towards the end it turns gloomy. 
  
• It is wrong to combine obscene topics with a poem about children. 
  
• The innocence of a child can disappear as quickly as the weather changes. 
  

I THINK 

• it is a typical experience of a young child in school.
  
• Learning about the world as you grow up. 
  
• Children having fun in the classroom. 
  
• it is summer
• it is a geography classroom 

• If they are planning a sort of trip? 
  
•  geography class? 
• what this has to do with murders?
• who is the poetic persona? 
• why is the classroom the setting? 

I WONDER

• what does the last line entail? 
  
•  how old are the children? 
• what is the context behind Brady and Hindley? 
• why is the concept of a classroom crucial to a horrific story and how it is relevant?

• your finger (tactile) 
  
• chanted (auditory) 
  
• Chalky ... dust (tactile) 
  
• laugh ... bell (auditory) 
  
• glowed like (visual) 
  
• sugar paper ... coloured (visual) 
  
• smudge (tactile) 
  

Imagery 

• scent of a pencil (olfactory) 
  
• xylophone's nonsense (auditory) 
  
• croaking (auditory) 
  
• feverish (tactile) 
  
• tasted of electricity (gustatory) 
  
• thunderstorm (auditory) 
  

Find all the instances in the poem where Carol Ann Duffy has used imagery that appeals to the different senses. 

Visual

Tactile

Auditory 

Olfactory 

Gustatory 

In Teams content library there is a document "10 questions for poetry analysis". Answer these questions for this poem in your class notebook. 

Using questions to guide your understanding

1. How does Duffy use imagery to evoke a sense of nostalgia or innocence?
   
2. What metaphors or similes can you find, and how do they enhance the poem’s themes?
   
3. How does the tone of the poem shift, and what language contributes to these changes?
   

Using questions to guide your understanding

"Valentine" 

1. What literally is happening in this poem? ​
   
2. (Look stanza by stanza first for paraphrase, then make a summary for the whole poem that is no longer than a tweet - 280 - characters) 
   
3. ​What is the poem really about? How do you know?​
   
4. ​What is the importance of the title?​
   
5. ​Find three literary devices or aspects that you think are important to understanding the poem. Make notes on the poem. Be ready to discuss your choices.​
   

Write your own "Valentine" 

On the paper given to you, write a "Valentine" poem inspired by this poem.