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Mending Wall By Robert Frost

Decent Essays

On the other hand, interpretative strategies refer to those activities that will help the students to develop their ability to unravel meanings and improve their critical approach to the literary text. Some literary theorists argue that ‘interpretation only takes place when the reader has developed more “influence” on his/her construction of meaning from a text’ (Schade, 2002). Consequently, through the interpretative activities, the student will be able to (Beach, Appleman, Fecho, Simon, 2017):
 Identify their personal emotions to those met in the different characters of the text;
 Understand the characters actions in the social and cultural context for example for Macbeth at the Elizabethan period;
 Elaborate on connections with other …show more content…

Robert Frost (1874-1963) is an American poet known as ‘the most recognised poet in American and European literature’ (New world Encyclopaedia, 2017). His poem Mending Wall is considered as one of his famous poems which includes interplay of voices, written in simple English and is of a very visual nature. The poem is about the construction of a literal wall but which eventually cascaded down to a deeper message of ‘on the value of tradition and boundaries full of Frostian sense of mystery and loneliness (Shmoop Editorial Team, …show more content…

A second reading may be required for better understanding due to the length of the poem and the medium level of technicity. By the end, some minutes are provided to the student to immerse themselves in visual and vivid aspect of Frost’s poem. The teacher asks the students for their reaction. This should lead to the prominent item of the poem which is the ‘wall’ and the ‘fence’ and the way the poem consists of two contrasting ideas with ‘something there that doesn’t love a wall’ and ‘good fences make good neighbours’. In this respect, the class is divided into two groups with those who are for and against the contrasting ideas. Time is allocated for each group to find words/sentence in the poem which may support these ideas. Sentence such as ‘my apple tree will never get across’ can be used as arguments for ‘good fences make good friends’. Associative words identified during the warm up exercise can be used to back each group arguments. A small debate could be undertaken between the main representatives of each ideas with the teacher acting as moderator. This activity will contribute to the understating of the dual concepts and the nuances that exists in the

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