Language Orientation Planning Sheet
Excerpt: One morning Hunwick sat up and sniffed the wind. A storm was on its way and when it broke, what a storm it was! The world was tossed inside out and upside down.
Board Language Focus: Effective orientations
Specific Language Foci: marked theme, pronoun references, conjunctions (and), vocabulary (broke), metaphor
Script
Preparation The first two words tell us when Hunwick realised the powerful storm was coming.
Identification (pointing) Those words are “One morning”. Let’s underline those words that tell us when. (Teacher underlines and students underline their copy)
Elaboration “One morning” tells us when. Mem Fox has put the words “One morning” right at the beginning of the sentence. (pointing) This special position, called the “theme position” at the beginning of the sentence is like a message from the author to the reader. The message is “Look here. The beginning of the sentence is where you find the most important information.” We know it must be important to the story that Hunwick was awake in the morning. Remember bilbies are nocturnal. They sleep during the day. Hunwick would not have woken up for a little storm. Only a very powerful storm could wake a bilby up in the morning.
Preparation The next three words tell us who the subject of the sentence is and what he did first.
Identification These words are “Hunwick sat up”
Elaboration This part is pretty easy to understand. “Sat” and “up” work together in this sentence to make the verb. Let’s draw a box around the verb group “sat up” so we know the first thing Hunwick did. Teachers might use this verb. I might talk about a student “slumping” at his desk (act out) and then he “sat up” (act out). When Hunwick “sat up” his body was stiff and he was really concentrating on sniffing (refer to text illustration of Hunwick sniffing)
Preparation The next word, “and” is a joining word. It links together pieces of information about Hunwick.
Identification Let’s underline “and”. (Teacher underlines and students underline on their copy) Now we read on to learn what else Hunwick did.
Elaboration After “and” Mem Fox doesn’t need to write Hunwick’s name again. Hunwick is the subject of this sentence. The information before and after the “and” is about Hunwick.
Preparation The next three words tell us what else Hunwick did.
Identification (Pointing) Those words are “sniffed the wind”. Let’s put a box around those words. “…sniffed the wind” is another verb group (Teacher make a box and students do the same on their copy).
Elaboration These three words tell us that Hunwick used his clever nose to sniff (Teacher acts out) and figure out that a very powerful storm was coming.
Preparation The next 2 words tell us what Hunwick could smell.
Identification (Pointing) Those words are “a storm”. Let’s underline the words “a storm”.
Elaboration The word “a” is a little word Mem Fox uses to tell us the storm in this story is just one of many storms that happen “on the edge of (the) wide and dusty desert” where Hunwick lives. This is “a storm”. Like Claude is “a boy” and Adrienne is “a boy”. But we also know this was a special storm because it woke Hunwick up in the morning and when we keep reading we learn how violent the storm was.
Preparation The next 4 words tell us about what the storm was doing.
Identification Those words are “was on its way”.
Elaboration The verb here is was. Let’s put a box around the verb “was”. The words “on its way” tell us more about the verb. This adverbial phrase tells us the storm was moving towards where Hunwick and the other animals live.
“On its way” is an English expression. It means moving towards something. If Madame Louise was walking out of her office to speak at lines we could say she was “on her way”.
Preparation The next 4 words tell us more about the storm
Identification (Pointing) Those words are “and when it broke”. Let’s underline those words that tell us when. (Teacher underlines and students underline their copy)
Elaboration Look at the words “when it broke”. Circle the little word “it”. “It” is the storm. Instead of writing “when the storm broke” the Mem Fox has written “when it broke”. She’s is doing something all good authors do. She’s using a type of word called a pronoun so she doesn’t have to keep repeating “the storm, the storm, the storm” or “Hunwick, Hunwick, Hunwick”. When we read “it or he (or she)” good readers think backwards and forwards in the story to figure out what the author means. We can draw an arrow from “it” to “A storm” to remind ourselves that that “it” is another way of writing “A storm”.
The next word is “broke”. Broke has a few different meanings in English. I could say “I broke the bowl” if I drop it on the floor and it smashes (act out). I could say “I am broke” which means “I have no money”. In this sentence broke means “really started”. At the beginning of the storm there might have been just a little wind and maybe some drops of rain. But when the storm “broke” it was very powerful. There was very strong wind, and lightening (see illustration) and lots of rain. We can see from the animals’ wide eyes that they were frightened when the storm “broke” and they rushed to find shelter.
Preparation The next 5 words tell us more about the power of the storm when it broke.
Identification Those 5 words are “…what a storm it was!” After these words is an exclamation mark. Let’s find those words and the exclamation mark and underline them. (Teacher underlines and students underline their copy)
Elaboration Here’s another example of a pronoun. Circle the word “it” and draw an arrow back to the first “storm” in the sentence. Here “it” is another way of writing “the storm”.
Now read the 5 words together “What a storm it was!” When Mem Fox wrote “What a storm it was!” she was using words in a way more often found in books than in talking. We don’t usually say “What a storm it was!” We might say, “It was a huge storm!”
Mem Fox uses these words to tell the reader how powerful the storm was. She uses the exclamation mark for emphasis. It tells the reader what kind of voice to read with. Rather than reading “What a storm it was” (Teacher reads with flat voice and affect) we read “What a storm it was!” (Teacher reads with expression).
Preparation The last sentence tells us more about the storm’s power and helps us to build a picture in our mind of what the storm was like.
Identification The last sentence is “The world was tossed inside out and upside down.” Let’s find that sentence and underline it. (Teacher underlines and students underline their copy)
Elaboration In this sentence Mem Fox uses a metaphor. Good writers use metaphor to say how things are like other things. Mem Fox uses metaphor to tell us how powerful the storm was.
Tossed means “threw” as in “I tossed the ball to Dan”. Imagine if the whole world was “tossed” so hard it turned “inside out and upside down”. (Teacher models turning a cap/hat inside out and upside down)
Mem Fox doesn’t mean the world was really tossed so hard it went “inside out and upside down”. She wrote this sentence to tell her readers the storm was so violent it was as if the whole world “was tossed inside out and upside down”.
There’s a second, very important reason why Mem Fox chose these words “The world was tossed inside out and upside down.”
She wrote this sentence to tell the reader that the storm also caused a huge change in Hunwick’s life. Sometimes in English people say “My whole world has changed” after something important happens to them. For example, when you moved to Australia you could say “My whole world has changed.” Hunwick’s whole world changed when the storm brought the “most curious egg” to his burrow. After the egg arrived his life was very different. We could say Hunwick’s “whole world changed”. His world “was tossed inside out and upside down”.
Now that we’ve looked closely at this excerpt of the book, it’s your turn to have a go at reading just these words to me. (Students then take turns to read the excerpt aloud and teacher provides the students with specific feedback about reading strategies they observe each student using well.)
Karen Green U3088603 Scaffolding Literacy PG Unit Convenor Misty Adoniou