Shakespeare's Words

Disguises and role playing are the focus of a resource that uses Shakespeare’s As You Like It, Twelfth Night, and Henry IV, Part I, to demonstrate how we all play many parts in our lives; how we all are “merely players.” The many...

Use the ideas here for a Valentine's Day activity (or anytime you study sonnets) with your 11th graders. Demonstrate how to analyze a love poem by conducting a think aloud about Shakespeare's Sonnet 29. Then small groups analyze Sonnet...

Give life to a study of sonnets with a plan that models a lovely and more temperate approach to literary analysis. The resource packet includes a carefully scaffolded plan, graphic organizers, a copy of the poem, and everything else...

“Yea, there thou mak’st me sad and mak’st me sin/In envy that my Lord Northumberland/Should be the father to so blest a son--.” Henry IV, Part I, provides the text for a series of exercises that ask class members to examine the...

“There is nothing that becommeth a maid better than soberness, silence, shamefastness, and chastity, both of body & mind.” This line, from Thomas Bentley ‘s The Monument of Matrons published in 1582, typifies the way women were...

Spice up your traditional approach to teaching poetic structure with a wonderful animated video, which not only covers such terms as foot, meter, verse, but also stresses Shakespeare's unique use of iambic pentameter to convey emotion...

“Compared to war all other forms of human endeavor shrink to insignificance.” “War is not healthy for children and other living things.” These two views of war, embodied in George Patton’s statement and Lorraine Schneider‘s famous 1966...

Looking for ways to implement the words and works of William Shakespeare into your curriculum? This list of activity ideas is a great starting point, as it covers a wide range of grade levels and a wealth of online references to explore.

Hamlet's famous soliloquy (Act III, scene i) gets the close reading treatment in a group of skill building exercises. Assuming the role of a WWE wrestler, a kindergarten teacher, ninja assassin, and others, learners deliver a line from...

Gentle sleep eludes poor King Henry IV. Uneasy under the weight of his responsibilities, Henry contemplates the darkness of the night and in his soul. To develop their skill reading difficult text, class members engage in a close reading...