The Poetry of Emily Dickinson Educational Resources K12 Learning, Literary Studies, Reading Lesson Plans, Activities, Experiments, Homeschool Help

Lesson Plan - Get It!

Audio:

If you were a poet, where would you want to live?
Do you think you would spend most of your time indoors or outdoors?
Do you think one setting would be more inspiring than the other?

For the poet Emily Dickinson, the answer was her family's home in Amherst, Massachusetts.

Dickinson spent nearly her entire life in the small town of Amherst. In the last decade of her life, she rarely left the grounds of her parent's home.

Despite this relatively confined existence, Dickinson wrote over 1,000 poems, most of which she wrote in her late twenties and early thirties.

Emily Dickison sitting for a portrait in 1848

Dickinson died at age 55, having only published a handful of her poems.

It was only after her death in 1886 that her friends and family discovered and published the manuscripts she left behind, which led to the posthumous (or after-death) title of "The Bard of Amherst" being bestowed upon Dickinson.

As you learn more about Dickinson's unusual life, write the answers to the following questions on a separate sheet of paper.

Which family members influenced Dickinson's childhood?
What type of education did Dickinson receive?
How would you characterize Dickinson's personality as a young woman?
How did Dickinson feel about religion?
Other than writing poetry, what hobby was Dickinson's passion?
Why were Dickinson's writing years so productive?
What did Dickinson do with most of her poetry?
What themes did Dickinson incorporate into her poems?
What difficulties did Dickinson experience in her later years?
Why did Dickinson become more reclusive in her later years?

To find these answers, read this Biography of her life. Be sure to follow the links to explore all the years of her life as well as her family and friends.

Then, watch the video below.

Do you think you would have been content to live like Dickinson did?

Now that you've learned about Dickinson's life, explore the different literary techniques and themes that Dickinson used in her poetry.

Take notes as you watch the video below and read about the Major Characteristics of Dickinson's Poetry. You will use these notes in the Got It? section.

When you've finished, move on to the Got It? section to practice your knowledge of Dickinson's themes and techniques while reading several of her poems.