MTEL General Curriculum (78) Subtest 1 Practice Test

Meter is the rhythmic pattern created by arranging stressed and unstressed syllables in a line. In iambic pentameter, the line uses five iambs, with each iamb having an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed one, giving a da-DUM rhythm five times per line. This focus on the pattern of emphasis distinguishes meter from rhyme schemes (patterns of end rhymes), free verse (lacks a regular meter), or genre (a category of literature). So the term that describes the rhythm of stressed and unstressed syllables is meter.