Lessons In Life (Poem)

Poem: Lessons in Life

Brigette Bryant & Daniel Ho

Warm-up

• What do you feel when you meet your friend after a long time?
• Is building a friendship with someone easy or difficult? Why do you say so?

Lessons in Life

Having a friend is like planting a flower
Show love and kindness it one day will bloom
Let’s be aware as we walk on this planet
Even the tiniest creature needs room.

Lessons in life aren’t always so simple
Nothing you’re given will ever come free
Even the smallest of gifts deserves “thank you”
I respect you and you respect
I think of you and you think of me.

Remember everyone here is important
When you’re forgotten it makes you feel sad
Know that you matter and you make a difference
Let no one shame you or make you feel bad.

Lessons in life aren’t always so simple
Nothing you are given will ever come free
Even the smallest of gifts deserves “thank you”
I respect you and you respect
I think of you and you think of me.

Glossary

• kindness (n) – humble, friendly behaviour
• bloom (v) – come into flower
• tiniest (adj) – smallest
• forgotten (v) – out of mind
• deserves (v) – be qualified for

A. Comprehension Questions

1. What is planting a flower compared to?
2. What does the tiniest creature need?
3. What do the smallest gifts deserve?
4. What will happen if you fail to give importance to others?
5. What life lesson do you learn from the poem?
6. Pick out the rhyming words from stanza III.
7. Explain the phrase “Having a friend is like planting a flower.”

Figures of Speech

1. Simile

A simile is a figure of speech in which two unlike things are compared using the words ‘like’ or ‘as’.

Examples:
- as blind as a bat (someone unwilling to notice)
- like peas in a pod (two people very similar)
- as wise as an owl (very smart / knowledgeable)
- quiet like a mule (very calm)
- as brave as a lion (very courageous)

Exercise

1. Write a sentence using ‘as fast as the wind’.
2. Write a simile using the word ‘like’.
3. Think of a simile using the word ‘as’.
4. What does ‘as smart as a fox’ mean?

2. Metaphor

A metaphor is an implied comparison. Unlike similes, metaphors directly state the comparison without ‘like’ or ‘as’.

Examples:
- My father was boiling mad. (very angry)
- She is the apple of my eye. (very dear)
- Your brain is a computer. (smart & quick)
- Her voice is music to his ears. (pleasant to hear)
- The given task was a breeze. (not difficult)

Exercise

1. Which of the given options is a Metaphor?
   a) Life is like a chocolate box.
   b) Raj is like his twin brother.
   c) His words are pearls of wisdom.
   d) The bus is slow as a snail.

2. What does “The world is a stage” mean?

3. Identify the Metaphor in the sentence:
   Her hair is always a rat’s nest in the morning.
4. Write a sentence with a Metaphor.

William Shakespeare invented over 1700 words that have become very common by changing nouns into verbs, verbs into adjectives, connecting words never before used together, adding prefixes and suffixes, and devising wholly original words.

Parallel Reading

A Time to Talk

Robert Frost

When a friend calls to me from the road
And slows his horse to a meaning walk,
I don’t stand still and look around
On all the hills I haven’t hoed,
And shout from where I am, What is it?
No, not as there is a time to talk.

I thrust my hoe in the mellow ground,
Blade-end up and five feet tall,
And plod: I go up to the stone wall
For a friendly visit.

Practice Practice Exercises

What do you feel when you meet your friend after a long time?

Is building a friendship with someone is easy or difficult? Why do you say so?

1 What is planting a flower compared to?

2. What does the tiniest creature need?

3. What do the smallest gifts deserve?

4. What will happen if you fail to give importance to others?

5. What life lesson you learn from the poem?

6. Pick out the rhyming words from stanza III

7. Explain the phrase “Having a friend is like planting a flower.”.

1. Write a sentence using ‘as fast as the wind’.

2. Write a simile using the word ‘like’.

3. Think of a simile using the word ‘as’.

4. What does ‘as smart as a fox’ mean?

1. Which of the given option is a Metaphor?

2. What does "The world is a stage” mean?

3. Identify the Metaphor in the sentence.

4. Write a sentence with a Metaphor.