Birds of a Feather

Level: TBD

Aims: Exposure to English culture, vocabulary development, dictionary lookup skills

Grammar: No grammar aims here

Time: 50 mins

Materials: Photocopies of the rhymes, dictionary

Introduction: Birds of a Feather is a traditional rhyme of the English world. It’s notable as a proverb, a rhyme that gives a kernel of wisdom.

The students will be given photocopies of the Text of the Rhyme. Using the Text of the Rhyme with Notes, go through the text. Follow this with the Discussion Questions.

Text of the Rhyme

Birds of a feather

Flock together

So do pigs and swine.

Rats and mice

Will have their choice

And so will I have mine.

Text of the Rhyme with Notes

Birds of a feather

• Dictionary lookup: feather
• Ask the students, “What does this mean?” Basically the line means, “Birds of the same kind.”

Flock together

• Dictionary lookup: to flock

So do pigs and swine.

• Dictionary lookup: swine. Point out the pejorative implications of the word when applied to people, e.g., “He’s a swine.”
• Point out the pejorative implications of “pig” when applied to people, e.g., “He’s a pig.”

Rats and mice

• Dictionary lookup: rat
• Dictionary lookup: mouse
• Point out the implications of the words when applied to people, e.g., “He’s a dirty rat,” “She’s as quiet as a mouse.”

Will have their choice

And so will I have mine.

Discussion Questions

1. What is this rhyme about? Discuss proverbs as rhymes that give a kernel of wisdom, or teach a lesson. What lesson does this rhyme teach? Basically, the rhyme suggests that you become like your friends, and that you should be selective in choosing your friends. The rhyme also suggests that you can infer things about a person’s character by looking at who his friends are.
2. Point out that pigs and rodents are traditionally “unclean” or taboo animals in English culture. With pigs, this draws from Judaism’s influence on European culture, and the prohibition against eating pork as an “unclean” food. With rodents, the taboo probably draws from the time of the Black Death in Europe.