Remixing A Holiday Song

Objective

Students will use the patterns of A Visit From St. Nicholas but rewrite the poem to work with another holiday.

There are a couple of possible extensions related to this poem:

• There is a dispute about who actually wrote the poem. Can students find info about and explain the argument?
• When poets form groups of syllables, those groups are called "feet." And, depending on the stress pattern, each foot has a specific name. The three-syllable, ba ba BUM grouping is called an "anapaest." ba BUM ba has another name, and "BUM ba ba" has yet another. Here's more information.

Steps

1. Students note patterns in A Visit From St. Nicholas.
2. Students look for moments when the poet deviates from his rhythm.
3. Students choose a holiday and brainstorm vocabulary for that holiday.
4. Students break those words and phrases down into their stressed and unstressed syllables.
5. Finally, they rewrite at least one stanza from the original poem to fit their holiday.

Resources

• The 12-syllable table
• The entire poem