The Lamb

William Blake

Teacher card

Published: 1794, in Songs of Innocence and of Experience
Length: 20 lines, 113 words, no long words
Year band: Reading load: Years 3–4. A guide from word length, not a curriculum level.
Themes: birthday, christmas
Time: 5–10 min, depending on the activity

The text

Little lamb, who made thee?Does thou know who made thee,Gave thee life, and bid thee feedBy the stream and o’er the mead;Gave thee clothing of delight,Softest clothing, woolly, bright;Gave thee such a tender voice,Making all the vales rejoice?Little lamb, who made thee?Does thou know who made thee?

Little lamb, I’ll tell thee;Little lamb, I’ll tell thee:He is callèd by thy name,For He calls Himself a Lamb.He is meek, and He is mild,He became a little child.I a child, and thou a lamb,We are callèd by His name.Little lamb, God bless thee!Little lamb, God bless thee!

William Blake (died 1827), Songs of Innocence and of Experience (1794), lines 204–224 of Project Gutenberg ebook #1934. Public domain in Australia: the author died before 1955. Copied word for word and checked against the ebook.

What to do with it

One link and one task line for each activity. Send a student the one you want them to do, or print this page and hand it round; each link has a QR code.

Its lines are dealt for names in posy cardsin posy · 20 lines · about 5–10 min
Task for students (you can change the sentence before you print; nothing is saved)See how posy takes lines from this poem, then make a card for someone using them.
See how posy takes lines from this poem, then make a card for someone using them.
posy.popplepoetry.com/sources#bl-lamb

Send the whole hand-out

This page’s link. Students open it, read the text and pick what to do; nothing asks them to sign in.

Link for the whole text

https://popplepoetry.com/find/blake-lamb · popplepoetry.com