The Great Kapok Tree: A Tale of the Amazon Rain Forest (Rise and Shine)

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The kapok tree is an emergent canopy species that grows on the forest edges and in the clearings of any primary forest. The ten lessons in this unit use drama, discussion and creative activities to help pupils to engage imaginatively with the text. Pupils will become familiar with the structure of dilemma stories and then write and edit their own dilemma stories based on 'The Great Kapok Tree'. There is also a grammar focus on using direct speech and plenty of activities designed to develop vocabulary. Kidadl cannot accept liability for the execution of these ideas, and parental supervision is advised at all times, as safety is paramount. Anyone using the information provided by Kidadl does so at their own risk and we can not accept liability if things go wrong. Sponsorship & Advertising Policy The tree is native to Mexico, Central America, and northern parts of South America. Kapok is also native to the Caribbean tropical West Africa and is found throughout the neotropics. Make a persuasive poster to encourage people to support charities that help to protect the rainforests of the world.

Make a list of animals shown in the book. Could you use a Venn diagram or a Carroll diagram to sort them in different ways?The leaf buds of a kapok tree appear in January and February just when the kapok tree flowers open. Cecilia Goodnow. "It's just Lynne Cherry's nature to get out the word on protecting the environment". Seattle Post-Intelligencer. September 25, 1995. C1. The Mayasn, Aztec, and a few other pre-Columbian Mesoamerican cultures consider the tree sacred and believe it symbolizes the link between the three levels of life; heaven, the earth, and the world. Thoumi, Gabriel (3 July 2014). "A children's book inspired by murder: the 25th anniversary of 'The Great Kapok Tree' ". Mongabay. Romans, Dorothy Jennifer (2013). The siren of syzygy: A textual hermeneutic study of the embrace of the anima/animus in Yucatec Maya culture as seen through the myth of La Xtabay (Thesis). pp.6, 11, 43–47, 60. ProQuest 1461758952.

The story of The Great Kapok Tree is told in the third person and follows the journey of two men that enter a forest. One man leaves while the other is confronted with a large tree (The Great Kapok). He attempts to cut it down but is unable to and falls asleep. The different rainforest animals around him whisper their individual reasons not to cut the tree down in his ear while he is unconscious. At the end a child whispers in his ear and he wakes up. To then look at the tree, turn around and leave. This element of a cliff hanger and suspense provides many different opportunities for the children to talk about and develop. The anteaters tell the man, “what happens tomorrow depends on what you do today.” Can you think of an example of when this has come true? What can you do today to make a positive change for tomorrow?The porcupines tell the man that the tree produces oxygen. Can you find out more about photosynthesis? Make a diagram to teach others about the process. This book still rather annoyed me, though, following a bit too close to one of the lines that I find extremely afrustrating in much of the conservation literature, etc. Namely, that the "Bad Guy" is the one who cuts down the trees (or hunts the wildlife, or...)and--that's it! rather than going the extra distance to show that, well, WHY is he cutting down the trees!? It's not just for fun. Is it that he is greedy? Well, perhaps. Or perhaps he is simply trying to provide for his family who might otherwise starve as native ways of life fade and industrialism creeps into all corners of the globe. And, further, would he be cutting down the trees if there was not a market for the wood or land--perhaps we should look deeper, to someone else down the line, all the way down the line, to the end-consumer??? These books do not reach far enough!!! Now, I'm not saying that I don't buy new things--I'm certainly not as "green" as I want to be--but I do try to be aware of how much I'm buying, from where, and what the impact may be if I'm not sometimes buying used or buying from sustainable sources. I think that environmental-message books for kids do a disservice to them if they simply stop at showing a South American man (dressed in "Western" clothes) attempting to chop down a Kapok tree... Make the children aware of their place in all this (or, at least, their parents' place) and this will give them also a greater sense of empowerment. I mean, as a kid I always though, well, gosh, OF COURSE I want to save the whales, of course I wouldn't cut down trees, of course I wouldn't hunt elephants! But, I didn't really realize how I could do anything about it until I started to talk it over with my parents.