Читать книгу English for Life Reader Grade 9 Home Language - Elaine Ridge - Страница 7

Pre-reading
1.	What do you know about rainforests and their role in stabilising the world’s climate and maintaining the water cycle? How does chopping down rainforests in other countries affect us in South Africa?
During reading
2.	We are given a number of perspectives during this poem. Note how the mood and the tone shift with a shift of perspective.

A poem for the rainforest

Song of the Xingu Indian

Judith Nicholls

They have stolen my land;

the birds have flown,

My people gone.

my rainbow rises over sand, my river falls on stone

Amazonian Timbers Inc.

This cannot go next –

here, let me draw the line.

That’s roughly right, give or take

a few square miles or so.

I’ll list the ones we need.

No burn the rest.

Only take the best,

We’re not in this

For charity.

Replant? No –

You’re new to this, I see!

There’s plenty more

where this comes from,

no problem! Finish here

and then move on.

Dusk

Butterfly, blinded

By smoke, drifts like torn paper

to the flames below.

Shadows

Spider,

Last of her kind,

Scuttles underground, safe;

Prepares her nest for young ones. But

None come.

The coming of night

Sun sinks

behind the high canopy;

the iron men are silenced.

The moon rises,

The firefly wakes.

Death pauses for a night.

Song of the forest

Our land has gone,

Our people flown.

Sun scorches the earth.

Our river weeps.

canopy – a covering of cloth held over a throne, or a bed, to protect it

Post-reading
3.	Of the five genres which follow, choose the one that you feel best describes this poem. Give a reason for your choice:
a)	a praise poem
b)	a ballad
c)	a sonnet
d)	a protest poem/song
e)	a traditional song
4.	In your opinion, which of the lines that the Amazonian Timber representative speaks most show his heartless business-like attitude?
5.	Who are “the iron men” of stanza 5?
6.	Why do none of the spider’s babies come to the nest she has prepared?
7.	Contrast the first and the last stanzas. Focus particularly on the verbs. Explain why the last stanza is even more tragic than the first one.
8.	Work in groups of six readers to present the poem. These are possible roles.
	the Xingu Indian
	a representative from Amazon Timber Inc. (a company which chops down trees)
	a butterfly (who speaks Dusk's words)
	a spider (who speaks Shadows' words)
	the night
	the forest
	Prepare carefully. The group should discuss the readers’ interpretations of their parts, and whether they have captured the tone and meaning of the particular part of the poem.
9.	Do some research on this very important issue. There is a website called kids.mongabay.com/ which would supply you with a lot of information on the subject of where rainforests can be found, why rainforests are so important, and why people cut trees down.