Department of Education

Region III
Division of Nueva Ecija
NUEVA ECIJA HIGH SCHOOL
Burgos Avenue in Cabanatuan City, Nueva Ecija, Philippines

DETAILED LESSON PLAN IN ENGLISH GRADE 9

I. OBJECTIVES:
At the end of the 1-hour discussion, the students should be able to:
 analyze the poem “The Man with the Hoe” by Edwin Markham;
 share thoughts, feelings and intentions in the material viewed; and
 speak out the importance of justice among workers

II. SUBJECT MATTER:

Topic: “The Man with the Hoe” by Edwin Markham
References: A journey through Anglo-American Literature, pages 135-136
Materials: Pictures, PowerPoint Presentation and Video Clips
Value Infused: Fairness & Justice

III. PROCEDURE:

Teacher’s Activity Student’s Activity

A. Classroom Management

Good morning, class! Good morning, Ma’am!

Kindly pick-up the pieces of paper under

your chairs.

Let’s start our class with a prayer.

(Prays…)

B. Motivation
The teacher will play a video clip about
forced labor.

What is the video clip you’ve watched all

about?

What happened to the man? He is forced to work, Ma’am.

What is forced labor? Forced labor is any work or service which

people are forced to do against their will,
under threat of punishment, Ma’am.
(Answers may vary)

Okay, very well said.

Our lesson for today is connected to the

video you’ve watched. It is a poem “The Man
with the Hoe.” By Edwin Markham.

The lesson objectives will be shown to the

students.
 C. Lesson Proper

Edwin Markham got inspired with the

painting of Jean-François Millet’, which is a
man holding a hoe. Both painting and poem
have similar themes.

Now, let us have an activity

Do you want an activity? Yes, Ma’am!

Directions: The teacher will divide the class

into five (5) groups. Each group will be
given a photo and a stanza that has the same
message. The task of the students is to find
and write down the meaning of the stanza
by comparing to the given photo.

The students must have 2-3 representatives

to present their work.

The Man with the Hoe

BY EDWIN MARKHAM

God made man in His own image,

in the image of God made He him. —Genesis.
Bowed by the weight of centuries he leans
Upon his hoe and gazes on the ground,
The emptiness of ages in his face,
And on his back the burden of the world.
Who made him dead to rapture and despair, The first stanza is about burden, Ma’am
A thing that grieves not and that never (Answers may vary)
hopes,
Stolid and stunned, a brother to the ox?
Who loosened and let down this brutal jaw?
Whose was the hand that slanted back this
brow?
Whose breath blew out the light within this
brain?

How do you think the speaker of the poem The poet describes the man with the hoe as
feels about the man with a hoe? a pitiful figure.

What do you think the speaker means when

he describes the man as showing "the This could mean that the unfairness of the
emptiness of ages in his face"? laborer has been going on for a long time

Why do you think the speaker of the poem He is described as 'Stolid and stunned, a
refers to the man as "a brother to the ox"? brother to the ox'. His labors have been
appropriated to sustain the world's blind
greed.' He related the man to something
nonhuman, an animal.
To sum it up, in the first stanza, the poem
describes the burden and miserable
condition of the laborer because of the
cruelty of his master.
Is this the Thing the Lord God made and
gave
To have dominion over sea and land;
To trace the stars and search the heavens
for power;
To feel the passion of Eternity?
Is this the Dream He dreamed who shaped
the suns
And marked their ways upon the ancient
deep? The second stanza is about the purpose of
Down all the stretch of Hell to its last gulf God, Ma’am (Answers may vary)
There is no shape more terrible than this—
More tongued with censure of the world’s
blind greed—
More filled with signs and portents for the
soul—
More fraught with danger to the universe.
What gulfs between him and the seraphim!

In the poem, what does God intend him to From the poem is trying to tell us that God
be? originally intented the laborer to be a
powerful human being one with supremacy
and control over the sea and land.
This laborer was meant to live fully and to
search out the mysteries of the stars and the
universe.

In the second stanza, it illustrated the

contradiction of situations where the
laborer should live freely and pursue his
dream but in fact, lives with terrible fear.

Slave of the wheel of labor, what to him

Are Plato and the swing of Pleiades?
What the long reaches of the peaks of song,
The rift of dawn, the reddening of the rose?
Through this dread shape the suffering ages
look;
Time’s tragedy is in that aching stoop; The third stanza is about slaves and their
Through this dread shape humanity sufferings, Ma’am (Answers may vary)
betrayed,
Plundered, profaned and disinherited,
Cries protest to the Judges of the World,
A protest that is also prophecy.

The man with the hoe is a "Slave of wheel of The wheel here symbolizes never-ending
labor symbolize?" servitude.
What is meant by the line "What to him are
Plato and the swing of Pleiades?"
Plato is a classical Greek philosopher and
mathematician. He represents education,
knowledge. And Pleiades is a group of stars
named for the daughter of Atlas in Greek
Mythology, it represents our astronomy. In
conclusion, the laborer does not have a
chance to learn any knowledge neither
philosophy nor astronomy.

His betrayed by faceless 'masters, lords and

rulers in all lands' who have "plundered,
profaned and disinherited" from his true
heritage.

In the third stanza, the poem conveys that

there js a big difference between the laborer
who suffered and the ruler who lived in
happiness and wealth.

O masters, lords and rulers in all lands,

is this the handiwork you give to God,
This monstrous thing distorted and soul-
quenched ? The fourth stanza the rulers and their
How will you ever straighten up this shape; power, Ma’am (Answers may vary)
Touch it again with immortality;
Give back the upward looking and the light;
Rebuild in it the music and the dream;
Make right the immemorial infamies,
Perfidious wrongs, immedicable woes?

Who is being called on in the fourth stanza? The speaker asks question to someone who
calls master, which addressed to the ruler
who has unlimited power.

In the fourth stanza, the speaker satirizes

the masters to fix their mistakes and stop
their cruelty because God created humans
not to act against their will.

O masters, lords and rulers in all lands,

How will the Future reckon with this Man?
How answer his brute question in that hour
When whirlwinds of rebellion shake the
world?
How will it be with kingdoms and with The fifth stanza is asking for solution or
kings— help, Ma’am (Answers may vary)
With those who shaped him to the thing he
is—
When this dumb Terror shall reply to God
After the silence of the centuries?

What does the word 'Future' with a capital It symbolizes hereafter. Life after death
letter symbolize?
What is the message of the stanza? In this stanza, it clearly conveys the anger
tone of the speaker to the masters who
treated farmer inhumanely. The speaker
here also hopes the laborer to rise up and
revolt after being silent for centuries.
In the fifth stanza, the speaker conveys (Answers may vary)
anger tone to the master. He believes that
there will be a judgement day in the future
and when that time comes, the cruel
masters have to be responsible for what
they did to the laborers. (Lower class
people)

Good job to everyone! Overall, the main

theme of the poem is about the social issue
in labor. It is a striking poem of protest
against exploited labor.

D. Generalization:

What did we learn today?

Again, who wrote The man with the hoe?

What is it all about? We learned about the poem “Man with the
Hoe”, Ma’am

Who are the modern “man with the hoe” Ma’am, it is written by Edwin Markham

How does the society treat them?

What does the bend body of the man
signify?
Do you think justice is important?
Do you understand the poem
It is about the sufferings of the exploited
workers
Forced laborers or Exploited laborers.
The society treat them unfairly, Ma’am.
Burden of the work

Yes, Ma’am.

Yes, Ma’am.
IV. EVALUATION

The teacher will play a video presentation about forced labor.

Directions: Directions: In ¼ sheet of paper, in 4-5 sentences explain the

importance of justice among workers.
Start your answer with “I believe…”

V. ASSIGNMENT
Be a poet. On your notebook, make your own 2-stanza free verse poem regarding
to what we have discussed. Be creative!

Criteria for scoring:

Creativity- 30%
Appropriateness- 30%
Cleanliness- 20%
Overall Appearance- 20%
100%

Presented by:
Joanabel P. Joaquin
Practice Teacher

Checked by:
Ma’am Grace P. Mendoza
Critic Teacher