John Anderson, My Jo

Robert Burns

Teacher card

Published: 1786, in Poems and Songs of Robert Burns
Length: 16 lines, 87 words, 1 word in 12 is long
Year band: Reading load: Years 5–6. A guide from word length, not a curriculum level.
Themes: love, retirement, wedding
Time: 5–10 min, depending on the activity

The text

John Anderson, my jo, John,When we were first acquent;Your locks were like the raven,Your bonie brow was brent;But now your brow is beld, John,Your locks are like the snaw;But blessings on your frosty pow,John Anderson, my jo.

John Anderson, my jo, John,We clamb the hill thegither;And mony a cantie day, John,We’ve had wi’ ane anither:Now we maun totter down, John,And hand in hand we’ll go,And sleep thegither at the foot,John Anderson, my jo.

Robert Burns (died 1796), Poems and Songs of Robert Burns (1786), lines 15710–15726 of Project Gutenberg ebook #1279. 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 · 16 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#bu-john

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/burns-john-anderson-my-jo · popplepoetry.com