New
New
Year 10
Edexcel

Understanding how Hood presents the past and present in 'I Remember, I Remember'

I can explain how Hood presents his past and his present in 'I Remember, I Remember'.

New
New
Year 10
Edexcel

Understanding how Hood presents the past and present in 'I Remember, I Remember'

I can explain how Hood presents his past and his present in 'I Remember, I Remember'.

Lesson details

Key learning points

  1. Hood's poetry reflects some Romantic ideals - nature and the innocence of childhood.
  2. Hood's poetry also reflects the more realist ideas of Victorian poetry.
  3. Hood's adult life was plagued with illness, perhaps why he is so wistful for his childhood.
  4. Hood's poem is nostalgic, remembering his happy times as a child.
  5. There is also a mournful tone to Hood's poetry; he is melancholic that he will not feel that joy again.

Common misconception

That a poet can only be a part of one literary movement.

Often, we can see poets as referencing more than one literary movement and that can help us understand the poem.

Keywords

  • Belonging - a feeling of being happy or comfortable as part of a particular group

  • Nostalgic - a feeling of pleasure and also slight sadness when you think about things that happened in the past

  • Melancholic - expressing feelings of sadness

  • Romanticism - an artistic movement from the late 18th and early 19th century, focused on emotions and nature

  • Realism - a genre of literature that presents ordinary day-to-day experiences as they occur in reality

It would be useful for pupils to share their ideas on how the poem relates to ideas of belonging, as that will help pupils to conceptualise where the poem fits with the anthology.
Teacher tip

Equipment

You will need access to a copy of the Edexcel Belonging anthology for this lesson.

Content guidance

  • Depiction or discussion of sensitive content

Supervision

Adult supervision recommended

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.
Typically, light imagery such as the "sun" generally creates a __________ atmosphere.
Correct answer: positive
neutral
negative
Q2.
We typically think of birds as symbolising ...
Correct answer: freedom.
beauty.
love.
Q3.
'A feeling of being happy or comfortable as part of a particular group' is the definition of .
Correct Answer: belonging
Q4.
'Lack of knowledge or information' is the definition of .
Correct Answer: ignorance
Q5.
The Romantics believed that humans ...
Correct answer: belong in nature.
belong in cities.
should innovate.
Q6.
The Romantics __________ the idea of childhood.
reviled
Correct answer: revered
resented

6 Questions

Q1.
In 'I Remember, I Remember', Hood presents the speaker's childhood in a __________ manner.
negative
neutral
Correct answer: positive
Q2.
In Hood's 'I Remember, I Remember', the speaker presents their present, adult life in a __________ manner.
positive
Correct answer: negative
neutral
Q3.
Which of the following quotations from Hood's 'I Remember, I Remember' shows Romantic ideals?
Correct answer: "The tree is living yet!"
"childish ignorance"
"I'm farther off from heav'n / Than when I was a boy"
Q4.
'A genre of literature that presents ordinary day-to-day experiences as they occur in reality' is the definition of .
Correct Answer: realism
Q5.
'Expressing feelings of sadness' is the definition of .
Correct Answer: melancholic, melancholy, melancholia
Q6.
'A feeling of pleasure and also slight sadness when you think about things that happened in the past' is the definition of .
Correct Answer: nostalgia, nostalgic