Printable Renga links worksheet for Years 7–8

The opening stanza has three lines (about 5-7-5 syllables); each answering stanza has two lines of seven. Each stanza answers only the one before it, then the chain moves on.

Renga is linked verse written by more than one person. An opening stanza of three lines (about five, seven and five syllables) is answered by a stanza of two seven-syllable lines, which is answered in turn, each new stanza responding only to the one immediately before it — never to the whole poem, never to the original subject. That single rule creates the form's beautiful drift: a chain that starts with this morning's weather may end three links later at the sea, and every step still makes local sense. In a classroom, renga is the rare collaborative form where nobody can dominate, because each writer owns exactly one link and must let go. Run it on paper passed around a table, folded so each writer sees only the last stanza. Reading the finished chain aloud is the lesson: the class hears coherence and surprise produced by the same mechanism. Set one constraint per round — this link must include a sound; this one must change the season. The final discussion question never fails: where did the poem go, and who took it there? Nobody did, and everybody did.

Teaching this at Years 7–8

What changes at this level: Twelve writing lines (five to six links), groups of three, each link must change one of: place, season, or scale. Final link must echo an image from the first without repeating its words.

At Years 7–8 the echo rule teaches structure: the chain must drift and return. Groups of three rotating writers keep the fold honest. Assess a single link in isolation — read only stanzas two and three and ask what the writer noticed. That micro-reading shows students that responding closely to one text is the same skill as every essay they will ever write about a quotation.

Worked example: Chain of four links

rain on the awning —
the market opens slowly,
gulls argue over chips

salt on the wind, and somewhere
a radio learns the news

static, then a love song —
the bus exhales at the kerb,
nobody gets off

streetlights in puddles,
the whole town, doubled

Each stanza answers only its predecessor: weather → harbour sounds → radio → street. Ask students to find the exact word in each link that hands over to the next — that handover word is the entire craft of the form.

What a worksheet looks like

Theme drawn for this sample: sport and games. 12 writing lines. Tasks, in the order this sample drew them:

1. Answer your partner's stanza, not their subject.
2. Write an opening stanza about the weather right now.
3. Read the chain aloud: it should wander and still hold together.

Your download draws a new theme and task order, so no two students need get the same sheet.

Make your Renga links worksheet All Renga links levels

Other levels and forms

• Renga links worksheet for Years 5–6
• Renga links worksheet for Years 9–10
• Printable Acrostic worksheet for Years 7–8
• Printable Blackout poem worksheet for Years 7–8
• Printable Haiku sequence worksheet for Years 7–8
• Printable Found poem worksheet for Years 7–8

Teachers: the classroom packs collect ready-to-print forms, and the Builder makes class sets of 5–30 different sheets as one download.