Robert Frost - The Ax-Helve

Designed to accompany the Robert Frost poetry anthology for CIE AS English, but will be appropriate for any senior study of the poem ‘The Ax-Helve’. This lesson is intended to be taught over two periods though it can be condensed into one.
The first lesson starts by asking students to demonstrate their knowledge of previous poems, matching first lines to titles.
The main part of the first lesson begins with a quotation by Frost regarding Canadian woodchoppers, establishing his possible opinion on art and skill. Unfamiliar vocabulary is glossed, and students then listen to the teacher read the poem, identifying the speaker and situation. Some wider context regarding Canadian immigration in the 1920s is explained, and students then focus on discussing character, considering who in the poem has more power and why. As a plenary, students compare the characterisation of Baptiste and the narrator to the attitudes they discussed from Frost’s comment in the lesson starter.
The next lesson begins with a recap of the characters through an adjective-generation starter. Students then copy down useful vocabulary and appropriate language techniques necessary for studying the poem, particularly looking at the idea of tropes. The second lesson then moves on to close analysis of the rest of the poem, prompting students to demonstrate their learning through a discussion of the symbol of the ax-helve. Students link in relevant contextual detail, and finally, as a plenary they can write a scaffolded paragraph that demonstrates their learning through a close analysis of the symbol of the ax-helve.
Blank and annotated copies of the poem are included with this resource.