Teacher Guide

Phillis Wheatley: Poems Lesson Plan

Study Objectives

If all of the elements of this lesson plan are employed, students will develop the following powers, skills, and understanding:

  1. 1

    Students will be able to engage with the technical skills of Phillis Wheatley.

  2. 2

    Students will consider the relationship between Wheatley's work and her personal history.

  3. 3

    Students will consider the questions of justice that undergird the work of a poet who was enslaved.

  4. 4

    Students will engage with the multiple levels of meaning that exist in Wheatley's work.

  5. 5

    Students will consider the connection between June Jordan's critical work on Wheatley and Wheatley's poems themselves.

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