Teaching Figurative Language: Part 2

I’m back with the long overdue part 2 of my teaching figurative language blog post. We finished up our unit on figurative language about two weeks ago. You can read about our first week here. During the second week, I taught hyperbole, onomatopoeia, oxymoron, and allusion. In this blog post, I also shared a few activities we did to review for the unit test the following week. I usually spent three weeks on figurative language and then incorporate it into weekly lessons. I LOVE using these figurative language stories as a way to provide a spiral review and keep it fresh and current with the kids. 

To introduce and practice identifying and understanding examples of hyperbole, we did a snowball fight. I added a game aspect to this fight and I LOVED how this upped the activity. I did 4 versions of the same hyperbole sentence. For example, I wrote on 4 different slips of blue paper “I’m so hungry I could eat a horse.” I did this for 5 different examples of hyperbole. The kids threw the “snowballs” and found one to unwrap and write. If it was a statement that they hadn’t written down, they recorded under the “HITS” column on their paper. If they got a snowball that they had already written down-because remember, there are four of the same sentences for 5 different examples- they wrote it down under the “MISS” section. The first student who got all five examples won the snowball fight. They- and I- LOVED this! 

For onomatopoeia, I did this really fun lesson that I taught several years ago. You can’t not use the old batman when teaching sound words, right? 🙂

For allusion, I had the kids do a “sticky stroll” (you can read about how I do these here). They had a recording sheet where they had to write the sentence, identify the allusion, and explain what it meant.

To introduce oxymorons, I showed these two videos from Youtube. For the first one, I have the kids get out a piece of paper (or Google Doc!) and I tell them to put their pencil under their seat. I have them watch the video and then write down as many oxymorons as they can remember and we see who can come up with the greatest number. Then we practice recognizing more oxymorons with the sheet from this resource.

I divided the kids into 5 teams of four each. Each round, we focused on a different type of figurative language. They worked together to fill out one sticky note per group (sticky notes were color coded). Each round, the teams had to define the type of figurative language using student friendly terms AND give an example of each. I awarded one point for:

*the best definition

*the best examples

*the best teamwork

All three points in a round could go to the same team or different teams just depending on the answers and collaboration. This is a GREAT way to review that makes it fun and engaging for the kids. Plus, you can do it for lots of content, not just figurative language! 

We also did these figurative language drawings as a way to study and review all the types of figurative language. The requirements were to draw a picture or a pattern however you want. You just had to include the title of “Figurative Language,” list all nine types of figurative language that we learned about, and give an example of each. 

And we finished out Google Presentations, which evolved to SHMAAPOIO 🙂

For each slide, the kids had to tell the definition of the element of figurative language and then give an example.

It was a BUSY unit, but one of my very favorites to teach! Hope you enjoyed and found something to try out in your own classroom 🙂 Happy Teaching!