McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader, Revised Edition · Lesson XC · Part 9: Soldiers, birds, seeds and society

96. Break, Break, Break (Tennyson)

Goal: Your child reads Tennyson's short poem with the right slow rhythm and explains the feeling behind it.

⏱ About 25 minutes · 6 steps

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You'll need

  • The book, open to this lesson
  • A notebook or lined paper and a pencil

What's in the book

Tennyson's four-stanza poem: by the sea, the speaker wishes he could say what he feels. He sees a fisherman's boy and a sailor lad at play, and the ships going on, but longs for a hand and voice that are gone.

The lesson, step by step

  1. About the author

    The book says Alfred Tennyson was born in 1809 at Somersby, Lincolnshire, England, studied at Trinity College, Cambridge, and became poet laureate in 1850.

  2. Read aloud

    Read the poem aloud very slowly. Make each "break" sound like a wave hitting rocks:

    Break, break, break,

    On thy cold gray stones, O sea!

    And I would that my tongue could utter

    The thoughts that arise in me.

  3. Talk about it

    SayThe speaker watches children playing and ships sailing. Why don't these happy things cheer him?

    SayWhat has he lost? Which lines tell you?

    SayWhy does the poem begin with the same word three times? What sound does it make?

  4. Tell it back

    Close the book.

    SayTell me what the speaker sees and what he feels, in your own words.

    This is a short poem; a few sentences are enough.

  5. Memorize

    Learn the first stanza (above) by heart. Notice how the short first line slows you down.

  6. Optional writing

    Your child describes a place (the sea, a lake, a field) and how it looks when they are happy and when they are sad.

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