What is this tiny thing?

What is this tiny thing?

Pencil and paperOnline interactive
Overview
Using this Resource
Connecting to the Curriculum
Marking Student Responses
Working with Students
Further Resources
This task is about predicting what a poem could be describing by making inferences.
You will read a poem in three parts, one part at a time.
After reading each part:
  • in the left hand boxes, predict all the things you think the poem is describing.
  • in the right hand boxes, explain how the evidence in the text, and what you know, supports your predictions.

Question 1Change answer

A tiny
island 
appears 
on your 
finger
Part 1
I think this poem could be describing any one of these things:  because:

Question 1Change answer

A tiny 
island 
appears 
on your 
finger

prudently 
she 
moves 
her neat 
pebble

Part 2
Now I think this poem could be describing any one of these things:  because:
 

Question 1Change answer

A tiny
island
appears
on your
finger
 
prudently
she
moves
her neat
pebble
 
see on
her back
coins she
carries to
heaven.
Part 3
Now I think this poem could be describing any one of these things:  because:
 

Question 1Change answer

Pause, look, and think back: 
Something I'm still wondering about is ...

Question 1Change answer

To do this activity, you used the reading strategy of making inferences.
 

Select any other reading strategy you used and describe when and how you used this reading strategy for this poem:
 
Making connections between what I know     
Asking questions
Creating a picture in my head, or visualising
Identifying the writer's purpose
Identifying the main idea
Summarising
Analysing and synthesising ideas and information
Evaluating ideas and information
Task administration: 
This task can be completed online (without auto-marking) or with pencil and paper.
 
Four important points to tell students are:
  1. There is no right answer. The best answers are those based on a combination of the evidence in the text and their prior knowledge.
  2. On their sheet or screen, the left hand boxes are for brainstorming predictions of what the poem could be describing. The right hand boxes are for giving evidence from both the poem and their knowledge that supports their predictions.
  3. When reading a new part, use the new evidence to build on previous evidence.
  4. Not to erase any of their initial ideas when they read new evidence.

The poem needs to be progressively revealed to the students in three stages. That is why it has been presented in three sections. It can be enlarged or done on an interactive whiteboard for a class or group situation.

Copyright: 
The poem "Ladybug" by Francois Dodat, translated by Bert and Odette Meyers, is from the book of poems "Three Small Stones", selected by Norma Farber and Myra Cohn Livingston, published by Harper and Row Publishers, 1987. Every effort has been made to trace the ownership of this material. 
Level:
5
Curriculum info: 
English, Making meaning, Reading
Key Competencies: 
Thinking
Keywords: 
comprehension, inference, synthesis, metaphor, poetry, progressive disclosure
Description of task: 
A poem is disclosed in stages to students. The task assesses their ability to make inferences using evidence from text and prior knowledge to work out what it could be describing.
Curriculum Links: 
Links to the Literacy Learning Progressions for Reading:
This resource helps to identify students’ ability to:
  • use comprehension strategies
  • monitor their reading for accuracy and sense
  • evaluate and integrate ideas and information
as described in the Literacy Learning Progressions for Reading at: http://www.literacyprogressions.tki.org.nz/The-Structure-of-the-Progressions.
 
Learning Progression Frameworks
This resource can provide evidence of learning associated with
Making sense of text: processing system, sets 6-7
Reading for literary experience, sets 6-8
within the Reading Learning Progressions Frameworks.
Read more about the Learning Progressions Frameworks.
Answers/responses: 
    Y10 (06/2005)
Part 1 Student response demonstrates links to evidence in text of something that:

  • is "tiny", i.e., something is very small, e.g., a freckle.
  •  "appears", i.e., something that is able to move or grow on a person's finger, e.g., a blood blister, a mite.
very easy
easy
Part 2 Student response demonstrates links to evidence in text of something that:

  • is a "she", i.e., it is female.
  • "moves", i.e., she is alive/living.
  • is like a "pebble", i.e., it is rounded like a pebble.
  • is "neat", i.e., it is an even shape.
moderate
easy
difficult
difficult
Part 3 Student response draws on the evidence from the following sections of
text:

  • "on her back".
  • "coins", i.e., markings.
  • "carries to heaven", i.e., is able to move/flies.
difficult
difficult
difficult

Results based on trial sample of 186 Year 10 students

Diagnostic and formative information: 

Analysis of student responses from the trial of this resource revealed one main area of difficulty:

Distinguishing between literal and metaphorical meanings

In the trial, the students found the clues in Part 1 easy to unpack. The reference in this part to an island (which is metaphorical), did not interfere with the other clues and literal interpretation of something tiny being able to appear on your finger. However, in Parts 2 and 3, the majority of students interpreted the metaphoric use of language literally. For example, students associated "pebble" with sweets, "coins" was interpreted as having something to do with wealth, rather than "see on her back coins" being markings or spots on something, and "heaven" with death rather than the ability to fly. The trial students inability to unpack metaphorical meanings also meant that they were not able to see the links between this evidence and previous evidence, e.g., how "pebble" could relate not just to something being like an island, but to being tiny as well.

An example from the trial of a student who did unpack most metaphors is:

Part 1
I think this poem could be describing any one of these things:

a pimple

mud

a bug

 because:

they are small

mud is dirt and dirt makes islands under your finger nails

from a distance they appear to be tiny islands

 

Part 2
Now I think this poem could be describing any one of these things:

a bug

 because:

it's referred to as a living creature, and a bug is small enough to look like an island on a finger.

 

Part 3
Now I think this poem could be describing any one of these things:

a ladybird

 because:

they say she = lady. The coins are the dots on the ladybird's back. When she carries them to heaven it means she is flying.

N.B. This student articulated an awareness of not being able to fit 'her neat pebble' into his synthesis.

Next steps: 
Making comparisons
 
Similes
In everyday language, we describe things by comparing them with other things.

  • She was as brave as a lion.

The words "as" or "like" tell us comparisons are being made. The technical name for these comparisons is similes

Metaphors
We can make comparisons without "as" or "like".

  • Her gaze was icy.

This is a hidden comparison, and the technical name for it is a metaphor.

We distinguish between literal meanings and metaphorical meanings.

  • The footpath was icy. (literal meaning)
  • Her gaze was icy. (metaphorical meaning)
  • He couldn't digest anything the nurse gave him to eat. (literal meaning)
  • He couldn't digest anything the nurse told him. (metaphorical meaning)

We use metaphors all the time in everyday language. Often we are probably not conscious that they are metaphors.

  • The whole enterprise had a fishy smell.
  • Your letter was buried under my papers.
  • That salesman was a shark.

  
Many experiences, feelings, and ideas are difficult to express in words. Therefore we try to describe them by using comparisons, such as similes and metaphors.
They are frequently found in poetry:

My love is like a red, red rose
That's newly sprung in June:
My love is like the melodie
That's sweetly played in tune.

Robert Burns

They are also used in academic writing.

  • Those people were at the bottom of the social heap.
  • Plants are complex chemical factories.
  • Light is trapped by a special pigment in the leaves.
  • The xylem seems to be the main piping system for water in the plant.

To understand the full meaning of some academic writing, it is necessary to "unpack" the metaphors (Exploring Language: A Handbook for Teachers, page 54-55).

ARBs with a focus on metaphors are: Making comparisons , Making comparisons II , Extended metaphors .