Teaching Poetic Devices in Langston Hughes’ “Mother to Son”
Target Grade Level: Middle School
Time: 2-3 class periods
Key Concepts: Literary Analysis, Reading Comprehension, Poetic Devices, Writing Process

Contributed by Dr. Madeline Pan. Dr. Madeline Pan has made a career of teaching English to students at all levels. As a district and school administrator, her emphasis was on providing professional development on research-based writing instruction to teachers at the middle and high school level. She thanks the 8th grade students in Red Clay, Delaware and Milwaukee, Wisconsin for their enthusiasm and well-written analytical responses for “Mother to Son” by Langston Hughes.

Teacher’s Reflection. Langston Hughes’ “Mother to Son” is a poem for all ages and a delight to teach because students “get it” very quickly. They like it at first, love it soon after, and quote it throughout the year. Better yet, they don’t balk at writing a literary analysis about the poem, even writing about it very well, regardless of whether they have had experience writing a literary analysis or not. (more…)