Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Literature Part 5

THE WIND AND THE LEAVES

(First Reader, page 49)

It is the aim of this lesson to help the pupils to appreciate imaginative descriptions of some natural phenomena. This lesson will be best appreciated if taken some day in autumn when the leaves are falling. If the pupils have recently noticed the wind rushing through the trees, scattering the many-coloured leaves and driving them before it along the ground, they will be in the best mood to enter into the spirit of the poem.

What is the time of the year that the poem speaks about? The autumn.

Select all the things that tell you this. The leaves have "dresses of red and gold"; "summer is gone"; "the days grow cold"; the leaves come "fluttering" down; the "fields" are "brown".

What did the wind mean by "Come o'er the meadows with me, and play"? It meant that they should come down from the trees and be blown away by the wind across the fields.

What does it mean by "Put on your dresses of red and gold"? Before they fall, the leaves have many beautiful colours.

What was the colour of their dresses in summer?

When do they begin to change colour very quickly?

What leaves show the most beautiful colours?

What different colours have you noticed that leaves have?

When does the wind call? When it blows loudly or whistles.

Do you know what the wind says when it calls?

Why not? We do not understand the language that it speaks.

How did the leaves show that they understood?

They obeyed at once and came down from the trees.

What is meant by "fluttering" down? They came down slowly, moving from side to side, and turning over and over as they fell. (This could be shown in the cla.s.s-room quite easily.)

Which line in the first stanza corresponds in meaning with the third line of the second? The second line.

What makes the fields "brown"? It is the end of the summer, and the gra.s.s and the plants have dried up.

What colours have the fields at other seasons of the year? Green in the spring, golden in the summer, white in the winter.

What are "the soft little songs" of the leaves?

The rustling sounds they make as they are blown about by the wind.

Why do we not understand their songs? For the same reason that we do not understand the call of the wind--their language is not ours.

"Winter had called them." What is the voice of winter? The cold winds that roar and whistle.

What is meant by "content"? The leaves were quite glad to answer the call.

Why were they content? The work that they had been doing all summer long was done; they were tired and sleepy and glad to go to bed.

When may it be said that the leaves are "fast asleep"? When they lie quietly on the ground, no longer blown about by the wind.

How were they kept warm during their long sleep? The snow came and covered them up warmly, like a "blanket".

What does the whole lesson describe? The falling of the leaves.

What does the first stanza speak of? The call of the wind.

The second? The answer of the leaves.

The third? The leaves asleep.

Tell the story of the poem in your own words.

PIPING DOWN THE VALLEYS WILD

(First Reader, page 52)

AIM

To enable the pupils to appreciate the pretty pictures and the music, and to learn how their pretty songs were written.

PREPARATION

In far-away countries there are many sheep, and they require shepherds. These shepherds, as they can rest while their sheep feed, sometimes amuse themselves by cutting oat straws and making them into little flutes. They cut holes in the straws, just as you see holes in flutes or in tin whistles. They learn to play very pretty tunes. David, king of Israel, was, in his youth, a shepherd boy, and he learned to play beautiful music while he watched his sheep. The Psalms that you find in the Bible were composed by him.

PRESENTATION

Now let us read about a shepherd who was playing music. (The teacher reads the poem.) While he was playing, what did he see? He saw a little child sitting on a cloud.

What was the child doing? He was laughing.

Why? He liked the music.

What kind of music was it? It was pleasant, full of joy.

Where was the shepherd? In a valley.

Tell what the valley was like. It was wild. It had big rocks and hills on each side, and a cloud was over the valley.

What did the child ask him to do? To play "a song about a Lamb".

Why did he do that? Because the sheep were pretty and he thought he should like to hear pretty music about them.

How did the child like it? He asked the shepherd to play the tune again, and it was such beautiful music that the keen enjoyment of it made the tears come to his eyes.

What did the child next ask? He wished to have the music put into words, so he asked the shepherd to "sing" it.