Abstract

The Post Graduate Teachers who teach English as a second language to Higher  Secondary Classes that is 11^th and 12^th grades  need to cultivate a good sense of appreciation for poetry. They must have an inherent thirst for reading poetry aloud and competence to elucidate the essential characteristics of poetry. A study was launched to understand the level of appreciation of poetry of the Post Graduate Teachers by giving a test with 25 items for testing their skill of understanding of alliteration, metaphor, simile, personification, repetition, sound–patterning, stress-patterning, imagery, unpatterned rhyme, connotative words and suggestive words. A sample of 90 post graduate teachers of both sex working in State Government Higher Secondary Schools, Private Matriculation Schools and Private CBSE schools in Chennai city answered the test in fifty minutes time. The ‘t’ test was applied. The Post graduate teachers  in CBSE schools in Chennai City  had the highest mean scores in their competency in appreciating the elements of English poetry. Those in Government Schools and Matriculation Schools came next in the order. But there was no significant difference in their competencies between any two types of schools. They have a high level of appreciation of poetry but with slight difference in mean scores.

Key words: Alliteration, imagery, metaphor, personification, repetition, sound patterning, stress-patterning, symbol, tone.