How to Explain TPCASTT to Your Students

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We can use the TP-CASTT method to Understand a Poem

Thinking about the elements below can help readers understand and explain what a poem does and what it means. We think about HOW the poem says what it says, and that helps us figure out WHAT it means.

Title: Does the title reveal something the poem is supposed to do or mean?
Paraphrase: Jot down what each stanza shows, narrates, depicts, or is about.
Connotations: Do any poetic devices contribute to the poem’s meaning/effect?
- Identify the Speaker or Persona. (First or third person? Is the speaker the poet, an invented character, or a persona separate from the poet? What type of person is the speaker and whom is he or she addressing?)
- Consider the Setting. (What is the time, place, event, or occasion? Setting can influence imagery, diction, tone/mood, and meaning.)Identify dominant Images. (When and how does the poet use sensory language, tapping into the five senses? Does the imagery affect mood?
- Note Diction choices. (What specific word choices stand out? Can the word choices be categorized—military, religious, nautical, simple, abstract, concrete, etc.? Does the poet make use of connotations? In general, are the words’ connotations negative, positive, or neutral? Diction reveals tone and affects mood.)
- Analyze Figurative and Rhetorical Language. (Among other devices, look for metaphor, simile, personification, symbolism, hyperbole, paradox, apostrophe, irony, and allusion.)
- Listen for Sound Devices. (Listen for alliteration, assonance, consonance, onomatopoeia, and repetition. Sound can reinforce a tone, mood, or image!)
Attitude: Determine Tone. Tone is the attitude toward the poem’s subject(s) that the speaker’s words suggest. (Diction and imagery help develop a speaker’s tone. Use the tone-words list. Tone is often multi-layered, and it can shift!)
Shifts: Shifts may be indicated by transition words, punctuation, stanza divisions, changes in line/stanza length, changes in sound (meter, rhythm, and rhyme), changes in setting, and changes in diction. Often, tone shifts indicate either an epiphany, a shift in the message, or a shift in perspective.
Theme: What is the poem’s main idea, message, or lesson? (Is the poem meant to describe, compare, examine, narrate, argue, expose, reveal, depict, or show something? Is it sending a message—if so, what is it saying about being human, or what does the reader learn about the poem’s subject(s)?