Text-to-text: The Boy Who Cried Wolf

Heavy paper for the pages, simple illustrations, and straightforward text combine to create a book young children, especially boys, will enjoy. Tim tells the truth about the unbelievable things that happen in his house and yard, but his parents do not believe him. He then lies and says it was him that did the things, but also gets punished, by having to rake leaves, even though he is innocent. Finally he thinks to write a letter and invite the culprits to his home for a party. His parents make all of them rake, then they have a party. It would be fun to compare with The Boy Who Cried Wolf. Young children will be entertained and enlightened by young Tim.

Compare and Contrast: The Boy Who Cried Wolf

Drawing Conclusions: The parents draw the conclusion that the boy is being dishonest.

Point of View: The story is told from Tim’s POV.

Genre: traditional literature

Setting: Virginia

Predicting: Predict what young Sam will do when the man comes back with the request to make his wife young again

Character Motivation: What motivates young Sam to charge the man for what the hired hand did?  What motivates him to change at the end?

Compare and Contrast young Sam and old Sam:

Characterization of young Sam: He damaged the saw blades because he didn’t clean the logs first concluding that he is lazy; he cuts the boards unevenly concluding that he is careless; he refuses to sweep the shop concluding that he is again lazy and disrespectful toward his father; he is dishonest and arrogant as he “puts on airs” when he is in charge.

Characterization of old Sam: hardworking and kind

Internal consistency of young Sam’s character: What types of things would you see young Sam doing in the future?

Big Idea or Theme: Work hard and treat people well or trouble will find you.

What evidence supports the conclusion that young Sam learned a lesson?

Text-to-Text Connections: Sylvester and the Magic Pebble by William Steig has similar illustrations of the animals.  The Teeny Tiny Woman also has a talking bone in the story. 

Personification: The bone takes on human characteristics and feelings.

Compare and Contrast with Chris Van Allsburg’s The Widow’s Broom.  How are the bone and the broom alike?

How did the bone help Pearl and her family?

How did the broom help the widow?

Characterization: List the fox’s characteristics.  Hungry when he describes Pearl, cruel when he talks about eating the bone,

Text-to-text connection: The Great Kapok Tree by Lynne Cherry

Author’s Purpose: persuade readers not to cut down the Mangrove tangles

Cause and Effect: Because the propagule falls off the mangrove tree, the effect is that a new mangrove tangle begins. 

Drawing Conclusions: The fisherman drew the conclusion that he should not cut down the mangrove tangle to make a shrimp farm because of what the other fisherman told him.  He was persuaded to leave the tangle alone.

Point of View: The story is told from the point of view of the animals that inhabit the tangle.

Synthesis: The reader will synthesize that there are certain things that keep the balance of nature.

Compare and Contrast the character traits of the two men: This story presents a wonderful opportunity to show students this strategy.  A Venn diagram could be used to show the differences and similarities between Fred and Walt, characters based on the author’s grandfathers.  It’s fun to read through the book, then go back and read the top half all the way through, then go back and read the bottom part all of the way through.  As you read, write the traits of each of the men in the diagram. 

Differences: Walt likes to be with lots of people,  but Fred liked to be alone.  Walt was bored in the barn with the cats, but Fred would not have chosen to be at the tavern. 

Similarities: both men worked in delivery services of goods to people,  but Fred could leave his milk daily without talking to anyone, and Walt would have to make appointments to see who needed the wood and where they wanted it stacked.  Both men were not dressed warmly.  Both had food, a bed, and a shelter from the storm.  Both agreed they didn’t have much choice in where they stayed.

Inferences from the illustrations: Walt liked dogs, Fred liked cats.  Outgoing people are more like dogs, and introverts are more like cats.

Drawing Conclusions: I am drawing the conclusion that each man will head to his favorite place to be the next time a blizzard comes rather than working a little longer and getting stuck in the places they were this time around.  Text evidence: each man said the three days they spent either in the barn or the tavern were the worst.

Point of View: Each man is describing the same event from his own perspective, one who likes crowds, and the other who prefers to be alone.

Cause and Effect: Because of the blizzard, the effect is that each man had to find shelter in a place they did not want to be.

Setting: This book takes place in the woods.

Compare and Contrast: This is a great book to use a Venn Diagram to compare and contrast real bears and imaginary bears. 

Real: would not befriend a person, would not stand and hide behind a tree day after day, would not treat books kindly, hibernates during the winter

Imaginary: comes when called, listens to the woman reading, gently carries books back to cave

Inference: Readers will infer in this story that a bear wants to know what letters are and what it has to do with books.

Text-to-Self Connection: mind runs free, letting our imaginations run wild

Text-to-Text Connection: Both books are about kids who are outside at night with a full moon.

Compare and Contrast:

Similarities:  In both books the kids are out after dark, and in both, they are a little afraid of the dark, the full moon, and the night sounds.   Both books feature the oooo sound of an owl or the wind.  Both books refer to the  moon as an eye.

Differences: Ghost Eye is about a boy and his big sister.  Night in the Barn is about brothers and a cousin, all  boys and a dog.  In Ghost Eye the mother sends the kids on the errand.  In Night in the Barn, the boys think up the challenge themselves.

Author’s purpose: to create a connection with a scared feeling when in the dark at night and showing how the imagination can run away with itself.

Mental Images: The image of the “mind running free” in Ghost Eye, imagining scary things in Night in the Barn when the dog comes in at the end,  imagining the bare tree, the full moon, the owl’s eyes, the cat’s eyes

Inference: What makes you infer that the big sister loves her little brother more than she lets on  in The Ghost-Eye Tree?

Sequencing: Both stories can be sequenced with the events leading up to feeling safe again at the end.

Author’s Purpose: make readers aware of the importance of wolves in the ecosystem. Create a chart of the temperate forest food chain.

Cause and Effect: This book is filled with great examples of cause and effect.  A graphic organizer such as the Cluster/Word Web Chart or the Multi-Flow from Thinking Maps works perfectly with this read aloud.  Park directors had encouraged anyone who saw a wolf to shoot it so that the animals left would all be peaceful ones. After 1926, there were no wolves in the U.S. The ecosystem in Yellowstone National Park was broken. In 1995 ten wolves were brought to Yellowstone from Canada.  After some time the ecosystem was restored.

Because the wolves were back the effect is mountain goats were forced to go back into the  mountains, the coyote population thinned leaving more squirrels for the badgers to eat,  bears thrived on the left overs the wolves provided, bison were driven away from the river areas allowing grass and the aspen trees to return, erosion around the river stopped as grasses returned, beavers returned creating  ponds which attracted dragonflies.  These are just a few of the cause/effect relationships mentioned in the book.  The paintings are also quite beautiful making for a great read aloud.

Compare and Contrast the before and after the wolves.

Synthesis: Have students reflect on what would happen if the wolves multiplied and nature became unbalanced with two many wolves.

Questions to activate background knowledge:

Can you think of another time in history where a group of people have been treated unfairly because of the color of their skin?

Can you imagine being taken away from your family because of your ethnicity?

Why is the title so far from the sea when it looks like the sea behind them?

Why does the woman have spring flowers in the winter time?

Have you ever heard of World War II?

Who was locked up and killed during that war?

What is a spy?

Point of View: Who is telling the story?

Text-to-Self Connections: going somewhere that makes you feel nervous, making emotional connections

Inference: I am inferring that it is winter because they are putting on their jackets.  The wind is cold from the Sierra.

Setting: 1942, popular song: Don’t Fence Me In

Drawing Conclusions: Look at the location of Manzanar and draw a conclusion about why the author made the title “So Far from the Sea”

Mental Images: the field bigger than a football field, seeing it empty like erasing a blackboard, imagining he could climb on the mountain’s back and it would become a big eagle to fly him away, boat( a real American scout sail)  moving on as a way to say his grandfather had moved on, and so were they

Cause and Effect: Because Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, the United States, the effect is “the U.S. was suddenly at war”

Metaphor: What could the author mean when he says the grandfather began dying the moment he was put on the bus and taken to Manzanar?  The author is comparing dying to being taken so far from the sea and losing his boat and freedom.

Metaphor: What is “moving on” a metaphor for as the family leaves the cemetery? a boat moving on, the family moving on to Boston, the family moving on and letting the hurt of the grandfather’s mistreatment go

Organizational Strategies: What did you notice about the way the illustrator organized the illustrations with the color pages and the sepia no color ones?  What is he trying to show? Can you think of any other text-to-text connections that show a shift in time?

Compare and Contrast: The way the camp looks before and after the war.

Text-to-Text Connection: Tree of Cranes by Alan Say is set in Japan and a mother is telling her son what Christmas was like in America when she was a child.

Synthesis: Can you think of other groups of people who are thought of as suspicious because of their heritage in our present day time or in the past?–Jewish people during WWII, slavery in the U.S., today’s airport security with certain names, appearances, the Muslim religion, the controversy in NYC about the Mosque being built near the 9/11 site?

Synthesis: Can you think of a time when you had to “move on” and let something go that has hurt you?

Text to self connections: Pirates of the Caribbean’s Jack Sparrow, Peter Pan’s Captain Hook

Compare and Contrast the pirates in the book with the pirates in the movies using a T-chart.  Read the “Here’s How it Was” information at the end of the book.

The pirates in the book lead many boring days at sea, eat hard bread, receiving no pay: “Another Day at Sea”

Eating hard bread and soup that make them feel sick: “Table Talk”

Being whipped for fighting: “Cat-O’-Nine-Tails” vs. in the movies the fighting is viewed as fun

Point of View: “Through the Glass” from the POV of an official government ship captain

“Coming for Your Gold” from the POV of the Pirate

“Fog Attack” from the pirates POV

“What’ll the King Say, Cap’n? from the pirates POV

“Trouble” from one of the pirates POV about getting his share of the loot, the “plunder”

“Marooned” from the POV of a pirate that has been left on a deserted island

“On the Run” from the pirates POV

Characterization: “Blackbeard” characterized the pirate, Blackbeard.

Author’s purpose: to make a mental images and feel emotions of what it was like for real pirates

Characterization: Use the Cluster Word Web to list the traits of the pirates in the poems as you read.

Reader’s Theater of “The Pirate’s Code” could be performed after reading the book.

Cause and Effect: “Ship Rules” talks about the effect of breaking the rules.  Because you have joined the Pirates, the effect is that you will regret it.

Because you steal, the effect is being beaten with a whip.

Because you commit mutiny, the effect is being shot and thrown to sharks alive.

Because you lose an arm in battle, the effect is you will be paid well.

Drawing Conclusions: What evidence or clues can you find in the poems that supports the conclusion that people who chose to become pirates made a bad choice in careers? they were beaten, not fed well, lost body parts in fights, died young

“Captured” and “Farewell” support the conclusion as the pirates are realizing their lives are over.