You rip the October page off of the calendar and count the actual teaching days and clutch your heart. November and December are the worst and the best of months in Teacherland. The best, because there are lots of days off and lots of festivities and usually, cupcakes. The worst, because time will F-L-Y and come December,
results will be expected. Amid all of the festivities , time off, and cupcakes. How do you make it happen?
The only way I could ever get it all done well was to use fabulous literature for my reading/literacy 90 minute slot that covered the important things in the content area. In November, I always liked to start with Native Americans in literature and poetry. Children are
fascinated by the topic and are capable of the
deep thinking the stories entail. First up, my favorite Native American Cinderella story is The Rough-Faced Girl by Rafe Martin.
Just looking at the cover for a while will bring up lots of good questions. What is she looking at? Is she afraid?
Why are her hands and arms all bandaged up? What are those marks on her face from? Is she poor? Her dress is ripped up!
Now your lovely listeners are ready to hear the story. They hear about a village of people who live near a lake and live in wigwams. Included in this village, but apart from the others, is a
very large wigwam that is supposed to house the most powerful, the richest, and the handsomest man in the village....but no one has ever seen him! He is known as the Invisible Being. He lives with his sister, who quizzes any girl who tries to pretend that she has "seen" him. Only the girl who has truly seen the Invisible Being can become his bride.
The Rough-Faced-Girl has been scarred from tending the fires for her two horrible sisters. Her father is poor and she has to wear awful clothing. But she believes that she has seen the Invisible Being, and bravely goes to the wigwam of his sister, wearing her pitiful "best" and despite having scars all over her face. Her sisters have recently tried to scam the sister into believing one of them saw him, but she sees they are imposters and kicks them out.
The Rough-Faced-Girl is able to describe the Invisible Being, whom she has seen in the natural world around her. She is instructed to take a swim in the lake. When she emerges, all of her scars have vanished and she is as beautiful outside as she is inside.
She and the Invisible Being are married and paddle away together.
The illustrations in this story are not to be believed. They convey so much feeling. Along with great discussion (this story is good for grades 3-5 as well) first and second graders will identify similarities between this story and our own Cinderella, which you can post up on a Venn diagram. In their Reader's Notebooks, they can draw a part of the story that they liked and tell about what was happening then. Older students can write about how the Invisible Being's sister was able to truly see inside the Rough-Faced-Girl's heart, and not just judge her on her outside appearance.
Happy Reading and Happy November!
Till next time, Nancy
When you ask your class to predict what this book is about, based on the cover only, I predict that at least one little person will suggest that this is a story about a witch. This is the perfect time to go to your already-prepared chart paper, and ask students for "proof" that they can find within the cover to back up the thought that maybe this lady is really a witch. Decide to make a list of the clues. During literacy time, you can dip in and out of reading and writing skills as you wish, since they are always combined, aren't they?
The list may look something like this:
1. She has a mean face.
2. She is ugly.
3. She has a broom.
4. She has a big pot to make a witch's brew in.
5. It looks like she is doing something magical.
6. She has on a black dress and black shoes.
7. She has ugly, messy black hair.
8. She looks really mad!
9. Instead of a black cat, this one has a duck. (That will be your high achiever!)
As you read along in the story, your listeners will find out through the words and pictures that Mrs. Biddlebox is nothing more than a person who woke up cranky, found her breakfast stale, and is suffering from a bad-hair day. Or so it seems.
How does she solve her bad day problem? She uses her pot and broom to gather up the day, including rolling up the sky, and shoving everything inside her big pot. Her skills border on magical in this area. She says:
I will cook this rotten morning!
I will turn it into cake!
I will fire up my oven!
I will set the day to bake!
When I read this page, I always pause to think aloud about a text-to-text connection this gives me. "You know what, this kind of reminds me of Hansel and Gretel! There was a witch in that story and she had a pretty fired-up oven herself!" This is modeling how a real reader continues to think while he or she is reading, sifting through new ideas that suggest themselves as more of the plot is revealed. Readers are allowed to change their opinion!
In the end, she does bake the day into a perfectly scrumptious cake, eats it until she is stuffed, and then toddles off to bed. Fabulous.
It is a great time to identify the genre of this story as fantasy, because we know that in real life we can't roll up a bad day and bake it away. However, this leads into a great Reader's Notebook
independent assignment.
Have the students use a full page of their notebook to draw the biggest cake they can. Then ask them to make up something bad that could happen to them and write or draw it inside the cake. I like to model the drawing and a few items myself before they begin. This gives them confidence for some reason! I might include the sentence "I fell down the stairs.", and "I dropped my tray at lunch." I would caution that you should remind them that you don't want to see blood and guts or scary movie stuff. No, thank you. Just one sentence like "My dog bit me."
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When done writing their ideas, allow them to decorate around the writing with colored pencils, and share their stories together later on the rug.
This makes a great bulletin board display as well!
Happy Reading! Until next time....Nancy
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