by Ken Bui
Langston Hughes’ “Mother to Son” is an uplifting poem centered around a mother imparting wisdom and advice to her son. It’s about adversity. It’s about grit. It’s about courage. When I share this short poem with students, I always admire how much conversation can stem from its mere 20 lines.Fittingly – seeing as the poem features the image of a staircase – invite students to think about all the ways the speaker “moves” and “shifts” through the advice to her son. To do so, consider the following questions or quick activities to frame the conversation your students could have:
- What is the mother’s advice to her son?
- What imagery or figurative language drives that message?
- Alternatively, can students complete a quick doodle of any of the images that catch their attention?
- How do verbs capture not only the mother’s movement, but the movement of the poem’s lines?
- How do punctuation and line breaks contribute to the pace of the mother’s story/advice?
- Or alternatively, where does the poem pause? Slow down? Quicken or build?
- Consider if and where the speaker shifts the language. If you had to break up the poem into three parts or stanzas, where would you do so and why?
- Have students draw lines to divide up the poem!
While students appreciate and discover how the speaker “moves” through the poem, they may also be “moved” by its tender yet frank sentiment on perseverance.
Further Reading:
Ken Bui is an English teacher at Central Bucks High School South in Warrington, Pennsylvania. He enjoys teaching a variety of courses such as English 11, AP English Language & Composition, Creative Writing, and Debate. He is also a contributing writer for Moving Writers. You can find him on Twitter @kenbuiCBSD.
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