מבוא
All Summer in a Day- Unit 2 / Nechemia Litke
Activities For Teaching HOTS
Method for teaching “Uncovering Motives”:
The teacher comes into to class with a strange object (some kind of toy, stuffed animal- something that lights the students’ curiosity). The teachers starts teaching as if the object doesn’t exist, and then after a while one of the students will eventually ask why the teacher brought the object to class. The teacher will then ask the students to bring up different options. The main goal is to have the students understand that there was a reason or motive for bringing the object to class. From this we can learn that in literature everyone has a motive for saying or doing something, and we can only assume what the motive is without knowing for sure what is really is.
Method of teaching the thinking skill of "Inferring":
Tell the students that you are going to make a statement in class and that you would like for them to try to figure out what information you are not giving them and write it on a piece of paper.
(Ideas for statements: "I'm going to put on a sweater", "The class is going to be dismissed 10 minutes early").
Collect their notes or have them read them to the class. Discuss what they wrote and why they came up with each assumption. We are likely to find that they have written similar assumptions.
(Such as: "You are cold", or "You have to go somewhere").
Discuss how they come up with each idea: they inferred by the things I said and didn't say, by using previous knowledge as well as my body language.
You can use the following worksheet (on the following page) to practice inferring:
|Sentence |Emoticon |I can infer that……. |
|I have to go now. |[pic] | |
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All Summer in a Day
by
Ray Bradbury, 1954
No one in the class could remember
a time when there wasn't rain.
“Ready?"
"Ready."
"Now?"
"Soon."
"Do the scientists really know? Will it happen today, will it?"
"Look, look; see for yourself!"
The children pressed to each other like so many roses, so many weeds, intermixed, peering out for a look at the hidden sun.
It rained.
It had been raining for seven years; thousand upon thousands of days compounded and filled from one end to the other with rain, with the drum and gush of water, with the sweet crystal fall of showers and the concussion of storms so heavy they were tidal waves come over the islands. A thousand forests had been crushed under the rain and grown up a thousand times to be crushed again. And this was the way life was forever on the planet Venus, and this was the schoolroom of the children of the rocket men and women who had come to a raining world to set up civilization and live out their lives.
"It's stopping, it's stopping!"
"Yes, yes!"
Margot stood apart from these children who could never remember a time when there wasn't rain and rain and rain. They were all nine years old, and if there had been a day, seven years ago, when the sun came out for an hour and showed its face to the stunned world, they could not recall. Sometimes, at night, she heard them stir, in remembrance, and she knew they were dreaming and remembering and old or a yellow crayon or a coin large enough to buy the world with. She knew they thought they remembered a warmness, like a blushing in the face, in the body, in the arms and legs and trembling hands. But then they always awoke to the tatting drum, the endless shaking down of clear bead necklaces upon the roof, the walk, the gardens, the forests, and their dreams were gone.
All day yesterday they had read in class about the sun. About how like a lemon it was, and how hot. And they had written small stories or essays or poems about it:
I think the sun is a flower,
That blooms for just one hour.
That was Margot's poem, read in a quiet voice in the still classroom while the rain was
falling outside.
"Aw, you didn't write that!" protested one of the boys.
"I did," said Margot. "I did."
"William!" said the teacher.
But that was yesterday. Now the rain was slackening, and the children were crushed in the great thick windows.
"Where's teacher?"
"She'll be back."
"She'd better hurry, we'll miss it!"
They turned on themselves, like a feverish wheel, all tumbling spokes.
Margot stood alone. She was a very frail girl who looked as if she had been lost in the rain for years and the rain had washed out the blue from her eyes and the red from her mouth and the yellow from her hair. She was an old photograph dusted from an album, whitened away, and if she spoke at all her voice would be a ghost. Now she stood, separate, staring at the rain and the loud wet world beyond the huge glass.
"What're you looking at?" said William.
Margot said nothing.
":Speak when you're spoken to." He gave her a shove. But she did not move; rather she let herself by moved only by him and nothing else.
They edged away from her, they would not look at her. She felt them go away. And this was because she would play no games with them in the echoing tunnels of the underground city. If they tagged her and ran, she stood blinking after them and did not follow. When the class sang songs about happiness and life and games her lips barely moved. Only when they sang about the sun and the summer did her lips move as she watched the drenched windows.
And then, of course, the biggest crime of all was that she had come here only five years ago from Earth, and she remembered the sun and the way the sun was and the sky was when she was four in Ohio. And they, they had been on Venus all their lives, and they had been only two years old when last the sun came out and had long since forgotten the color and heat of it and the way it really was. But Margot remembered.
"It's like a penny," she said once, eyes closed.
"No it's not!" the children cried.
"It's like a fire," she said, "in the stove."
"You're lying, you don't remember!" cried the children.
But she remembered and stood quietly apart from all of them and watched the patterning windows. And once, a month ago, she had refused to shower in the school shower rooms, had clutched her hands to her ears and over her head, screaming the water mustn't touch her head.
So after that, dimly, dimly, she sensed it, she was different and they knew her difference and kept away.
There was talk that her father and mother were taking her back to earth next year; it seemed vital to her that they do so, though it would mean the loss of thousands of dollars to her family. And so, the children hated her for all these reasons of big and little consequence. They hated her pale snow face, her waiting silence, her thinness, and her possible future.
"Get away!" The boy gave her another push. "What're you waiting for?"
Then, for the first time, she turned and looked at him. And what she was waiting for was in her eyes.
"Well, don't wait around here!" cried the boy savagely. "You won't see nothing!"
Her lips moved.
"Nothing!" he cried. "It was all a joke, wasn't it?" He turned to the other children. "Nothing's happening today. Is it?"
They all blinked at him and then, understanding, laughed and shook their heads. "Nothing, nothing!"
"Oh, but," Margot whispered, her eyes helpless. "But this is the day, the scientists predict, they say, they know, the sun. . . ."
"All a joke!" said the boy, and seized her roughly. "Hey, everyone, let's put her in a closet before teacher comes!"
"No," said Margot, falling back.
They surged about her, caught her up and bore her, protesting, and then pleading, and then crying, back into a tunnel, a room, a closet, where they slammed and locked the door. They stood looking at the door and saw it tremble from her beating and throwing herself against it. They heard her muffled cries. Then, smiling, they turned and went out and back down the tunnel, just as the teacher arrived.
"Ready, children?" she glanced at her watch.
"Yes!" said everyone.
"Are we all here?"
"Yes!"
The rain slackened still more.
They crowded to the huge door.
The rain stopped.
It was as if, in the midst of a film, concerning an avalanche, a tornado, a hurricane, a volcanic eruption, something had, first, gone wrong with the sound apparatus, thus muffling and finally cutting off all noise, all of the blasts and repercussions and thunders, and then, second, ripped the film from the projector and inserted in its place a peaceful tropical slide which did not move or tremor. The world ground to a standstill. The silence was so immense and unbelievable that you felt your ears had been stuffed or you had lost your hearing altogether. The children put their hands to their ears. They stood apart. The door slid back and the smell of the silent, waiting world came in to them.
The sun came out.
It was the color of flaming bronze and it was very large. And the sky around it was a blazing blue tile color. And the jungle burned with sunlight as the children, released from their spell, rushed out, yelling, into the springtime.
"Now don't go too far," called the teacher after them. "You've only two hours, you know. You wouldn't want to get caught out!"
But they were running and turning their faces up to the sky and feeling the sun on their cheeks like a warm iron; they were taking off their jackets and letting the sun burn their arms.
"Oh, it's better than the sun lamps, isn't it?"
"Much, much better!"
They stopped running and stood in the great jungle that covered Venus, that grew and never stopped growing, tumultuously, even as you watched it. It was a nest of octopi, clustering up great arms of flesh-like weed, wavering, flowering this brief spring. It was the color of rubber and ash, this jungle, from the many years without sun. It was the color of stones and white cheeses and ink, and it was the color of the moon.
The children lay out, laughing, on the jungle mattress, and heard it sigh and squeak under them, resilient and alive. They ran among the trees, they slipped and fell, they pushed each
other, they played hide-and-seek and tag, but most of all they squinted at the sun until the tears ran down their faces, they put their hands up to that yellowness and that amazing blueness and they breathed of the fresh, fresh air and listened and listened to the silence which suspended them in a blessed sea of no sound and no motion. They looked at everything and savored everything. Then, wildly, like animals escaped from their caves, they ran and ran in shouting circles. They ran for an hour and did not stop running.
And then—
In the midst of their running one of the girls wailed.
Everyone stopped.
The girl, standing in the open, held out her hand.
"Oh, look, look," she said, trembling.
They came slowly to look at her opened palm.
In the center of it, cupped and huge, was a single raindrop.
She began to cry, looking at it.
They glanced quietly at the sky.
"Oh. Oh."
A few cold drops fell on their noses and their cheeks and their mouths. The sun faded behind a stir of mist. A wind blew cool around them. They turned and started to walk back toward the underground house, their hands at their sides, their smiles vanishing away.
A boom of thunder startled them and like leaves before a new hurricane, they tumbled upon each other and ran. Lightening struck ten miles away, five miles away, a mile, a half mile. The sky darkened into midnight in a flash.
They stood in the doorway of the underground for a moment until it was raining hard. Then they closed the door and heard the gigantic sound of the rain falling in tons and avalanches, everywhere and forever.
"Will it be seven more years?"
"Yes. Seven."
Then one of them gave a little cry.
"Margot!"
"What?"
"She's still in the closet where we locked her."
"Margot."
They stood as if someone had driven them, like so many stakes, into the floor. They looked at each other and then looked away. They glanced out at the world that was raining now and raining and raining steadily. They could not meet each other's glances. Their faces were solemn and pale. They looked at their hands and feet, their faces down.
"Margot.
One of the girls said, "Well . . .?"
No one moved.
"Go on," whispered the girl.
They walked slowly down the hall in the sound of the cold rain. They turned through the doorway to the room in the sound of the storm and thunder, lightening on their faces, blue and terrible. They walked over to the closest door slowly and stood by it.
Behind the closed door was only silence.
They unlocked the door, even more slowly, and let Margot out.
Pre- Reading
She packed my bags last night, pre-flight
Zero hour, nine AM
And I'm gonna be high as a kite by then
I miss the earth so much, I miss my wife
It's lonely out in space
On such a timeless flight
And I think it's gonna be a long, long time
Till touch down brings me 'round again to find
I'm not the man they think I am at home
Oh, no, no, no, I'm a rocket man
Rocket man burning out his fuse up here alone
Mars ain't the kind of place to raise your kids
In fact, it's cold as Hell
And there's no one there to raise them if you did
And all this science I don't understand
It's just my job five days a week
A rocket man, a rocket man
And I think it's gonna be a long, long time…
• Read song and discuss it with the students. Play the song and follow.
• Points for discussion:
1) Who is the song about?
2) Where is he going?
3) What are his feelings about leaving earth?
4) What does he think of Mars?
5) Could he take his family with him?
6) Do you think that it would be the same on other planets? Would it be the same on Venus?
LOTS Questions
1) Describe Venus's climate according to the story: _____________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
2) How many years had Margot been living on Venus? __________________________________
3) "When the sun came out for an hour and showed its face to the stunned world".
The word "stunned" means (circle the correct answer):
a. saddened
b. excited
c. amazed
d. happy
4) “They looked at everything and savored everything”.
The word “savored” means (circle the correct answer):
a. enjoyed
b. suffered
c. shared
d. fought
5) Why does Margot know more about the sun than her classmates do? ___________________
______________________________________________________________________________
6) Why did Margot's family live on Venus? ___________________________________________
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7) “Now the rain was slackening”.
The word “slackening” means (circle the correct answer):
a. strengthening
b. weakening
c. dancing
d. connecting
8) How does Margot describe the sun to her classmates? (Write two examples): _____________
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9) How long did the sun come out for according to the story? ____________________________
10) What would Margot’s family lose if they moved back to Earth? ________________________
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Literary Terms
Genre: There are different types of literature categorized by subject matter, form and technique; the following are examples of genres: tragedy and comedy, novel and short story, poetry and pros.
Climax: This is the point of highest interest, the crisis, and is therefore
also at the turning point of the action.
1) What is the genre of the story “All Summer in a Day”? Explain!
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2) Describe the climax of the story? _________________________________________________
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HOTS Questions
1) Why did William claim that Margot didn’t write the poem?
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2) Was Margot a happy child? ____________________________________________________
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3) Why do the other classmates dislike Margot? ___________________________________s___
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4) What does Margot’s appearance tell us about her? _________________________________
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5) Explain why the children ran wildly outside when the sun came out?
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Extended HOTS
1) How do you think the other children will treat Margot in the future? What thinking skill did you use and how did you use it?
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2) What were the children’s intentions when they pushed Margot into the closet? What thinking skill did you use and how did you use it?
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Bridging Text and Context
• Read the following quote by Ray Bradbury:
"You're not like the others. I've seen a few; I know. When I talk, you look at me. When I said something about the moon, you looked at the moon, last night. The others would never do that. The others would walk off and leave me talking. Or threaten me. No one has time any more for anyone else. You're one of the few who put up with me. "
―RayBradbury,Fahrenheit451
1) Make a connection between this new information and what you learned about the characters in "All Summer in a day".
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Post Reading
• Choose one of the following writing activities:
1) Write a continuation to the story describing Margot’s life after the incident of not seeing the sun.
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2) Write a letter from Margot’s parents to her teacher regarding the incident of her being locked up while the sun was out.
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Reflection
1) Did you enjoy reading the story? Why or why not? ___________________________________
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2) Think of a similar situation you have witnessed or experienced in school. How did you deal with it?
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3) How does the thinking skill of Uncovering Motives or Inferring add to your understanding of the story?
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Summative Assessment
LOTS (45 points)
1) Describe Venus's climate according to the story: _____________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
2) How many years had Margot been living on Venus? __________________________________
3) "When the sun came out for an hour and showed its face to the stunned world".
The word "stunned" means (circle the correct answer):
a. saddened
b. excited
c. amazed
d. happy
4) How long did the sun come out for according to the story? ____________________________
5) What would Margot’s family lose if they moved back to Earth? ________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
HOTS (40 points)
1) Why did William claim that Margot didn’t write the poem? ___________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
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2) Was Margot a happy child? ____________________________________________________
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3) Why do the other classmates dislike Margot? ______________________________________
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Extended HOTS (15 points)
1) How do you think the other children will treat Margot in the future? What thinking skill did you use and how did you use it?
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Bridging Text and Context Question
• Read the following quotes by Ray Bradbury:
“Some people turn sad awfully young. No special reason, it seems, but they seem almost to be born that way. They bruise easier, tire faster, cry quicker, remember longer and, as I say, get sadder younger than anyone else in the world. I know, for I'm one of them.”
― Ray Bradbury, Dandelion Wine
.
1) Explain the connection between this new information and the story “All Summer in a Day”_____________________________________________________________________________
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Answer to Summative Assessment
LOTS
1) It had been raining for 7 years with thousands upon thousands of days compounded and filled from one end to the other with rain.
2) For five years.
3) c. amazed
4) An hour.
5) Thousands of dollars.
HOTS
1) William claimed that Margot didn’t write the poem out of his jealousy of her memory of the sun, and to show her that she is in no way superior to him.
2) It is inferred that Margot is not a happy child since she stands apart from everyone, and based on her appearance of being frail (her face coloring has been washed away). Also, her great desire to see the sun proves that she is unhappy without the sun.
3) The various reasons that the other children dislike Margot are:
a. She is able to remember the sun and is able to describe it (Margot says the sun is like a penny, and the children’s immediate reaction is- “No it’s not!”). This would cause the other children to feel as if Margot is “superior” to them.
b. Margot stands apart from the other children; this would also cause a condescending feeling towards the other children.
Extended HOTS
1) Based on the children’s reactions (showing more pain when the rain resumed than when they realized that Margot was missing) one could assume that not much would change. Unless, an adult, such as the teacher would get involved and start an educational process with the children.
I used the thinking skill of Inferring because based on previous occurrences we can assume what might happen in the future.
Bridging Answer
1) Ray Bradbury's description of the people who turn sad at a young age and bruise faster and easier than others sounds like a description of Margot, the main character of "All Summer in a Day".
Ray Bradbury says that these people become this way for no apparent reason, however, we can guess that Margot became this way because of her lack of exposure to the sun as well as her being set apart from her classmates. This quote makes one think of the influence that we have upon each other's personalities.
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