Figurative language in songs

WALT: identify language features in songs

This lesson follows on from our lesson about metaphors and figurative language (inspired by Get NZ Writing). While learning about figurative language, students loved finding examples in music, so I decided that analysing one song for figurative language would help to further deepen their understanding of figurative language.

Click here to view the extended plan .

Lesson reflection:

This week has been a very successful week, with lots of learning happening. I attribute the success to the fact that I chose to use music to hook my learners in. As a part of the previous lesson sequence, students had to find examples of figurative language in songs. I noticed that my learners were really engaged, and were excited when they noticed that the songs they liked had figurative language in them. It provided them with an authentic context which they could relate to. This is why I chose to create this lesson for my learners.

My big takeaway from this week is the importance of creating lessons which really hook into student's interests. This lesson was planned very last minute, because of the success of the previous lesson. which also shows the importance of noticing fantastic opportunities for students to learn and being flexible in planning. It is always best to go with your instincts. If the learners are loving what they are doing, then teachers should find a way to continue to capatalise on it.

Additional Resources

Brain dump: students prior knowledge

Before we began identifying figurative language in the song, we shared everything we could remember on a Padlet. Students shared the types of figurative language they remembered, as well as examples.

What makes a song sound 'good'?

Next, they shared their ideas in response to the question "Besides the music, what makes a song sound 'good'?". The purpose of the second Padlet was to get the learners to make the connection between a good song and its use of figurative language.

Note: there were two lines which we did not include in our analysis as they were not appropriate. However, since the rest of the song was appropriate and had many different types of figurative language, I made the decision to use it.