Yeats’s Poetry: “Leda and the Swan” Summary The speaker retells a story from Greek mythology, the rape of the girl Leda by the god Zeus, who had assumed the form of a swan. Leda felt a sudden blow, with the “great wings” of the swan still beating above her. Her thighs were caressed by “the dark webs,” and the nape of her neck was caught in his bill; he held “her helpless breast upon his breast.” How, the speaker asks, could Leda’s “terrified vague fingers” push the feathered glory of the swan from between her thighs? And how could her body help but feel “the strange heart beating where it lies”? Form “Leda and the Swan” is a sonnet, a traditional fourteen-line poem in iambic pentameter. Commentary Like “The Second Coming,” “Leda and the Swan” describes a moment that represented a change of era in Yeats’s historical model of gyres, which he offers in A Vision, his mystical theory of the universe.
Five close reading strategies to support the Common Core I walked in to my first college class, Political Science 101, eager to learn. For my inaugural college assignment, my professor asked the class to read the first three chapters of the textbook for the next class period. That night, I returned to my dorm room, determined to learn everything I could in those three chapters. I pulled out my textbook and highlighter. However, when I opened my textbook it was unlike anything I had read in high school. I shrugged, pulled out my highlighter and started highlighting. I quickly realized that I had no real game plan for reading this complicated textbook. Flash forward to my first few years of teaching. While this method may have been slightly more effective than what I used that first day of college, it was still too vague and ambiguous for my students. Last fall, I attended an AVID workshop about critical reading strategies. 1. The Common Core asks students to be able to cite and refer to the text. 2. 3. 4. 5. · Ask questions.
Interpretation of Leda and the Swan by Yeats | Marcin Obolewicz Interpretation of W.B. Y eats’s poem ‘Leda and the Swan’ ‘Leda and the Swan’ by William Butler Yeats is a poem with a title important to its understanding. brings the whole scene into the reader’s imagination and helps to decode the meaning of the poem. Without the title, the text would be harder to understand and the strongest connection to its subjectwould be the name of Agamemnon. the poem’s intertextuality anddirectly links the text with Greek mythology and literature, which enhances the text’s importance and authority.What also gives the text its authority is its form. may be found in almost all verses in the poem (e.g. Before the indifferent beak could let her drop?’ Theoctave describes the sc ene of Leda and Zeus’s meeting, where the god transforms himself into a big swan and takes advantage of the girl. of the Swan’s appearance (‘A sudden blow: the great wings beating still’). used present tense and vivid vocabulary to create a passionate and sensual vision . . . . War. . ’s death. .
Understanding Differentiation in Order to Lead: Aiming for Fidelity to a Model by Carol Ann Tomlinson and Marcia B. Imbeau "I'm glad you found it useful," I responded. She paused as she searched for her next comment. She was puzzled. Misunderstanding: Differentiation is a set of instructional strategies.Reality: Differentiation is a philosophy—a way of thinking about teaching and learning. The purpose of this chapter is to provide a brief summary of what we call differentiated instruction; a full explanation of the elements of this approach is available in other resources (e.g., Tomlinson, 1999, 2001, 2004; Tomlinson, Brimijoin, & Narvaez, 2008; Tomlinson & McTighe, 2006). Key Elements of Differentiated Instruction Differentiation can be accurately described as classroom practice with a balanced emphasis on individual students and course content. Content The knowledge, understanding, and skills we want students to learn. Process How students come to understand or make sense of the content. Product Affect How students' emotions and feelings impact their learning. Readiness
Close Reading: "So mastered...could let her drop?" (12-14) - Changing 20th Century Attitudes on Feminism and Femininity These final lines of "Leda and the Swan" are of utmost importance in understanding the poem as a whole. They present to the reader a question, not rhetorical as its predecessors in the second stanza, but one that must be answered by the reader. Leda here is completely "mastered" by Zeus' inherent "power" as God and as a male entity, and it seems that her struggles have indeed been futile, but Yeats does not end it at that, although he easily could have. Instead, Yeats wonders whether or not, in those harsh moments, Leda understood her role as Helen's mother, as the vessel of destruction and death in the future proposed by lines 10-11. Did she understand that it was she who must bear this physical and mental burden, she who must be and would be held accountable for her children, she who must bear the twisting of her story from one of rape and violence to one of love and lust? See: Connections: Other Poems by Yeats
Leda and the Swan: Stanza I Summary Lines 1-2 A sudden blow: the great wings beating stillAbove the staggering girl, her thighs caressed The swan comes in from above and knocks the girl off her feet.This swan might be larger than average: his wings are huge. Lines 3-4 By the dark webs, her nape caught in his bill,He holds her helpless breast upon his breast. Leda realizes what's caressing her thighs: the dark, rubbery webs of the swan's feet.The swan begins to intertwine its graceful body with hers.It grabs the back or "nape" of her neck with its bill.In line 4, the swan is called "he" for the first time.
Poetry: Close Reading Introduction Once somewhat ignored in scholarly circles, close reading of poetry is making something of a comeback. By learning how to close read a poem you can significantly increase both your understanding and enjoyment of the poem. The following exercise uses one of William Shakespeare’s sonnets (#116) as an example. Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments. Which alters when it alteration finds, Or bends with the remover to remove: O no! That looks on tempests and is never shaken; It is the star to every wandering bark, Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken. Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks Within his bending sickle's compass come: Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, But bears it out even to the edge of doom. If this be error and upon me proved, I never writ, nor no man ever loved. Performing the close read The number indicates the sonnet’s place in a cycle or sequence of sonnets. Admit impediments. Love is not love