Teaching poetry: a descriptive case study of a poetry unit in a classroom of urban deaf adolescents.
A qualitative study was conducted that reflected an analysis of a 6-week poetry unit in a language arts classroom of 6th and 8th graders at a school for the deaf in a large city in the northeastern United States. The school served a large population of children of poverty who were of Latino and African American descent. The study was guided by 4 research questions: (a) Would students benefit from having American Sign Language (ASL) poetry as a part of the unit? (b) Would teachers' signing of poems increase students' understanding of the poems? (c) Could students analyze the meaning of poems independently? (d) Would students view writing poetry as a vehicle for expressing their feelings and ideas through themes that were important to them? The evidence provided support for affirmative answers to questions a, b, and d.