By David Ward (2006)
| Introduction | About the Willows | Strategies | Lessons | Helpful Resources | References |
Summary
Owen, his sister Holly and their Dad head out for the first time this winter when the ice on Humboldt Lake is thick enough for hockey. They share the lake ice with some ice fisherman and soon have a game going. When they stop for hot chocolate, an extra strong shot from Holly sends their puck down a fishing hole. Undaunted, their father leads them off into the woods to find a "hockey tree". They saw the trunk of a likely fallen tree into rounds the size of a hockey puck. When they take them back to the lake, they borrow the fishing hole to dip the pucks to "ice" them and the game begins again. As they leave later in the afternoon, Owen holds his special hockey tree puck and looks forward to more hockey fun.
Strategies
The Hockey Tree lends itself particularly well to the strategies of making connections and creating mental images or visualizing. If the story is used to model these strategies, the teacher would read to students and stop to think aloud when he/she makes a connection or visual image. If the story is being used for guided practice, the teacher would invite students to talk about their connections and mental images. Recording their thinking on paper might be a part of this guided practice or be done during independent practice. Responses might be written on chart paper, sticky notes with text codes and brief explanations or they might be written and/or drawn on something like two column note forms.
Connections
These are connections where I felt I could model my own thinking for students. If students are familiar with the strategy, I would invite them to make connections. Questions around these topics might help to get them started.
• Text - to - Self
- outdoor skating, hockey or some other activity particularly that first time each winter
- the anticipation of doing something with family and friends
- being disappointed and having someone (parent, grandparent or friend) find a creative solution
• Text - to - Text
- other stories that connections might happen with are hockey stories like The Hockey Sweater by Roch Carrier, Forever: The Annual Hockey Classic by Roy MacGregor or The Moccasin Goalie by William Brownridge. Students might also appreciate the companionship found in Owl Moon by Jane Yolen.
• Text - to - World
- The author's note at the end refers to NHL players who have played on Humboldt Lake, Saskatchewan. This might connect to what students know of other famous hockey players and where they played as children.
Whether recording connections in the large group on chart paper or individually in a journal or on sticky notes, students might benefit from knowing text codes that are suggested by the literature. These are ones suggested by Harvey and Gouvis (2000) for connections.
R = reminds me of…,
T-S = Text-to-Self,
T-T = Text-to-Text,
T-W = Text-to-World,
BK = Background Knowledge - brief explanation,
PE = Prior Experience - brief explanation
Visualizing
The words and illustrations in the story lend themselves to mental images created through all five senses and the characters emotions. Some of the "power" words that help to create images are these:
- Seeing - falling flakes, steaming mugs, sun, ice, puffy clouds of breath, thread and pull (laces), (puck) sailing, (puck) skittered, (puck) splash, soft rotten wood, cracked the puck, blazing sheet of ice, poplar trees blur
- Hearing - crunch of snow, smacked the ice (puck), cutting across the ice, slap (puck), shouts and laughter, saw,
- Feeling - noses dripping, hot chocolate, cheeks numb, feet frozen, warm air
- Smelling - scent of pine and poplar,
- Emotions - waiting impatiently, Holly's shoulder's slumped
Responses might begin with "I get a picture in my head of…", "When the author says____, I see…", "The movie in my head is…".
Once students are familiar with putting information in a two column note, getting them to use a three column note to reflect on how their thinking has helped them understand the story better is another step in helping them develop their metacognition.
A Three Column Note might look something like this:
| What the Text Says | What I See In My Mind | My Response |
| p. 6 Owen crunched through the snow…Their breath formed small, puffy clouds in the cold air. | I can hear the sound of boots in the snow and feel it under my feet. It's not the soft powdery snow but hard ice crystals. I can feel the cold air going into my nose and lungs and see my breath puffing out. | This is the part where anticipation makes it exciting. Thinking about what it felt like helped me feel that excitement. |
| p. 8 The puck smacked the ice. Holly was already cutting across the clean surface… | I can hear what the puck sounded like and hear Holly's skates make a scritching noise with each stride. | Hearing the sound in my head made my legs want to move and race to catch her. |
| p. 14 Holly's shoulders slumped. "Are we going home already?" | I pictured the looks on Holly and Owen's faces when the puck disappeared down the hole. I can see Holly walking with her whole body slumped. | Picturing how they looked helped me to feel how disappointed they were and how hopeful I was that their Dad could fix things. |
Strategies Used in the Activities Suggested on the Willow Awards Site
We identified the following reading strategies as being necessary for students to complete the activities that are suggested on the Willow Awards site. Depending on a student's familiarity with using the strategies, they may need some explicit teaching and modeling to be able to complete the activity independently.
Willow Awards 2007 - The Hockey Tree
http://www.willowawards.ca/nomdescribe/hockey.htm
- Find the town of Humboldt on a map of Saskatchewan. Find Saskatchewan on a map of Canada and then Canada on a globe or map of the world. Text - to - World Connections
- Research the Stanley Cup or Stanley Cup Champions. Questioning, Determining Importance
- Using a balloon, paper Mache a hockey helmet. Then paint a team logo or picture. Text - to - World Connections
- Design a team jersey. Text - to - World Connections
- Write a hockey song. Synthesis
- Create an ABC story using hockey terms and words. Determining Importance, Synthesis
| Making Connections | Questioning | Visualizing | Making Inferences | Determining Importance | Synthesis | Monitoring Meaning |
| Attachment | Size |
|---|---|
| The Hockey Tree.doc | 44.5 KB |
