New
New
Year 4

Reading and responding to ‘Who Has Seen the Wind?’ by Christina Rossetti

I can give a personal response to the poem and give some evidence to justify my ideas.

New
New
Year 4

Reading and responding to ‘Who Has Seen the Wind?’ by Christina Rossetti

I can give a personal response to the poem and give some evidence to justify my ideas.

Lesson details

Key learning points

  1. 'Who Has Seen the Wind?' is a short, simple poem that explores the invisible and mysterious nature of the wind.
  2. Personification is describing a non-living thing as if it is a person.
  3. The poem uses rhetorical questions to demonstrate the mysterious nature of the wind.
  4. The structure of a poem is the way it is ordered, including its pattern of lines, verses and rhyme.

Common misconception

Children may think rhyming words have to have the same spelling of the repeated sounds.

Explain that rhyme is repeated sounds, not spelling. Highlight the rhyming sections of the rhyming words within the poems. Look at the different spellings. Generate further rhyming words and identify the same or different spelling patterns.

Keywords

  • Repetition - the repeated use of sounds, words, phrases or structural elements that are repeated for emphasis or for a particular effect

  • Personification - describing a non-living thing as if it acts or feels like a human

  • Rhetorical question - a question asked that does not expect an answer, but rather to make a point or create emphasis

  • Elusive - something that is difficult to catch, find, or achieve, often because it is quick or hard to grasp

You could use the structure of the poem to generate two further verses, with pupils creating alternative ideas for Line 3 in each verse. What else shows us that the wind is around us?
Teacher tip

Licence

This content is © Oak National Academy Limited (2024), licensed on Open Government Licence version 3.0 except where otherwise stated. See Oak's terms & conditions (Collection 2).

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6 Questions

Q1.
What is a verse in a poem?
rhyming words
Correct answer: a group of lines
ending
Q2.
Which words rhyme with 'night'?
knit
Correct answer: kite
not
Correct answer: fright
Q3.
Match the rhyming words.
Correct Answer:bright,white

white

Correct Answer:flew,you

you

Correct Answer:one,fun

fun

Q4.
Select the true statements about poems.
Correct answer: Poems are a type of fiction text, that are often short.
Poems are a type of non-fiction text.
All poems rhyme.
Correct answer: Some poems rhyme.
Q5.
Select the definition of personification.
when words that begin with the same sound are placed together
when rhyming words are found at the end of each line
Correct answer: describing a non-living thing as if it is a person
a way of describing something by saying it is something else
Q6.
Which sentence shows personification?
The classroom is a fortress.
Correct answer: The sofa cuddled me at the end of the day.
The car was as fast as lightning.

6 Questions

Q1.
Who wrote 'Who Has Seen the Wind?'
Chris Rossetti
Correct answer: Christina Rossetti
Grace Nichols
John Lyons
Michael Rosen
Q2.
What is a rhetorical question?
a question beginning with the words 'Are you'
a series of three questions
a statement
Correct answer: a question asked that does not expect an answer
Q3.
Which line from the poem 'Who Has Seen the Wind?' is a rhetorical question?
Correct answer: Who has seen the wind?
Neither I nor you:
But when the leaves hang trembling,
The wind is passing through.
Q4.
Select the words which could describe the wind from 'Who Has Seen the Wind?' by Christina Rossetti.
violent
Correct answer: mysterious
loud
Correct answer: elusive
Q5.
What is the definition of elusive?
Correct answer: something that is difficult to catch or find
something very big
something transparent
something natural
Q6.
Which of the below are types of figurative language?
rhyming words
Correct answer: simile
Correct answer: personification
Correct answer: metaphor
facts

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