Book Group begins again....The Trumpet of the Swan

We've started up our book group gatherings again....we've been doing this for four years and we still have a great time. This month we read the book The Trumpet of the Swan by E.B. White.

We have changed things a bit, this year we are using the Teaching the Classics curriculum guide by Adam and Missy Andrews as a guide for our discussion. It guides the learner through key elements to look for in analyzing literature and uses the Socratic Method of questioning.

This month we focused the context and authorship....learning about the background of the authors and the time period they live/wrote the book in to see how that influenced the book.

Along with the novel we've also added the element of reading a children's book. It's easier to identify the basic concepts. We read Thank you Mr. Faulkner by Patricia Polocco. This book was her story--how she struggled with reading and how her teacher, Mr. Faulkner, realized this and then helped her learn to read at the age of 11 or 12.

Clearly this book showed the context and authorship concepts.

Afterwards, we talked and discussed about our book of the month--The Trumpet of the Swan, and had some great discussion about overcoming trials and not giving up!

During the month, we read a few factual books about swans and other water fowl. We learned why ducks don't get wet! To experiment with this we took two paper bags-- coated one with oil and left the other one dry. Then we wet down both of the bags and looked at the results. Delaney was amazed at the water beading up on the oiled bag.

"This one is just getting wet."

"Look at this one, Wow, it just rolls off."

(Jared and Connor working hard to write their story.)

As for group activities, all the kids became hired as field reporters and wrote about their favorite part of the story--or drew pictures--soon, I'll get all the stories put together in a newspaper format for all to enjoy.
EB White interwove many facts about swans in his book. We learned that they loved to eat many items found in the water...including wild rice or other grains. We took some grain and made some crackers for our cooking activity.