Keep in mind scanning symbols are always placed above each word, never below. This will make it easy for you to keep track of your scan of each line.
If you are using a poem in a book, you may need to type it up double spaced and print it out or write it down on a piece of paper.
You may also tell others around you that you are not to be disturbed while you scan the poem so you can concentrate.
You can also try putting your hand under your chin while you read the poem. Notice when your chin drops into your hand and when it does not touch your hand. Stressed sounds usually cause your chin to drop into your hand.
For example, in the line, “My girlfriend hit me in the head,” you would use a “/” over “girl,” “hit,” and “head. ” These are the stronger syllables in the line. Keep in mind one word can have a stronger syllable and a weaker syllable. For example, “girlfriend,” has a stronger syllable in “girl” and a weaker syllable in ‘“friend. ”
Usually any words that are not marked stronger syllables can be marked weaker syllables. For example, in the line, “This sunlight shames November where he grieves,” you would place a “u” over “This,” the “light” in “sunlight,” the “No” and “ber” in “November,” and “he. ” These are the weaker syllables in the line. Remember that you can have a stronger syllable and a weaker syllable in the same word. For example, “November” has a stronger syllable in “vem” and weaker syllables in “No” and “ber. ”
For example, you may have a hard-to-scan line like, “Full of passionate intensity, grappling and free. ” A word like “grappling” may be difficult for you to scan as it has three syllables that may sound only partly stressed.
An easy way to do this is to count the wands, or “u” symbols in a line. For example, the line “This sunlight shames November where he grieves” has five “u” symbols (over “This,” “light,” “No,” “ber,” and “he”). You would place the foot boundary after “he” to note the foot boundary is five feet in the poem.
For example, for the line “This sunlight shames November where he grieves,” there are five “/” symbols (over “sun," “shames,” “vem,” “where,” and “grieves”). This means it has five feet per each line, or ten feet for every two lines. You can determine the meter based on the feet length in the poem. For example, a poem with a ten foot length is called a pentameter. A poem with a two foot length is called a dimeter.
For example, a common meter in poetry is iambic pentameter. This means there are five stronger syllables, or wands, per a line and the syllable count is 10/10/10. The pattern is one less stressed syllable, followed by a strongly stressed syllable. Each line has a five syllable length, following a 10 syllable count for every two lines.
