Happy Birthday to…Shakespeare!

It is the 23rd April … which means that it is Shakespeare’s birthday and St George’s Day, a day of all things English!

William Shakespeare was born in 1564 in Stratford-Upon-Avon and is regarded as one of the greatest English poets and playwrights in the English language. His work consists of about 38 plays, 154 sonnets, two narrative poems and several other poems. His plays have been translated into most languages and are performed more often than those of any other playwright!

Shakespeare’s Sonnets

A sonnet is a poem which contains 14 lines, each line containing ten syllables and with the last two lines in a rhyming couplet. Of Shakespeare's 154 sonnets, we have put our four favourites on the Teleprompter and Text Feature Tools.

Teleprompter Tool

In the Teleprompter tool, there is a Shakespeare category in the Text Bank which contains Sonnets 18, 30 and 116. Use the sonnet on the whiteboard so that the class can engage in shared reading and take turns to be a news reader or narrator.

Text Feature Tool          

Using the Text Features Tool in conjuction with Sonnet 18 in the Text Bank, pupils can use the highlighters and pencil to pick out the poetic features of the sonnet and teachers can enter whatever they like onto the highlighters.

The sonnets can be found in the following tools, years and regions:

Teleprompter Tool –

  • England: Years 5 and 6
  • N.Ireland: P6 and P7

Text Feature Tool –

  • England: Years 5 and 6
  • Scotland: Second ***
  • Wales: Year 6
  • N.Ireland: P6 and P7