Module 17, Session 3, Activity 1

Teaching Writing and Reading for Students with Challenges
Teaching Narrative Appreciation, Comprehension, and Composition

Angela Rickford, Ph.D.
Professor, Special Education
San Jose State University

~ Module 17, Session 3~
Handout 1
THE WOMAN AND THE TREE CHILDREN
(Abridged Version)

Once there was a woman who had grown old and whose days had been filled with trouble. "Why have I had so many problems and troubles in my life?" she said to herself.
She thought and thought. "Perhaps it is because I did not have a husband and did not have children."
She decided to go to the medicine man and ask him to give her a husband and children. [End Episode 1]
The medicine man lived deep in the forest beneath a giant tree and it took the woman many hours to reach him.
"I have had a very unhappy life," she explained to the medicine man. "I think it is because I did not have a husband and children. So I have come to ask you to give me a husband and some children."
"I cannot give you both," he answered. "You must choose one or the other."
The woman thought for a long time. Finally she said, "Children."
"This is what you must do. Take some of your cooking pots into the forest until you find a fruit-bearing sycamore tree. Fill the pots with the fruit, leave the fruit-filled pots in your house and go for a walk."
"That is all?" the woman wanted to know.
"That is all," the medicine man said. [End Episode 2]
The woman did exactly as the medicine man had told her. She cleaned her pots until they shone like stars. Then she carried as many as her arms could hold into the woods until she came to a fruit-bearing sycamore tree. She climbed the tree and picked the fruit and filled her pots. The pots were very heavy but she carried them to her house and set them inside. Then she went for a walk until the sun began to set.
She returned to her house. As she came close, she heard voices, children's voices. She hurried along the path and there, the yard of her house was filled with happy children playing with one another.
When she walked into her house, she saw that the children had swept and cleaned the floor, washed and dried all the dishes, made the bed and brought the cattle in from the field. The woman was very happy. [End Ep. 3]
Many months passed and the woman and the children lived peacefully together. Then, one day, something happened. It does not matter what. It was nothing important. Perhaps the woman had not slept well the night before, and was feeling tired and irritable that day. Perhaps something she had eaten was hurting her stomach.
In any event, one of the children did something—laughed too loudly for the woman's ears, dropped a dish or a glass and broke it, or something else. The woman yelled at the child.
"It is no wonder you did that. You are nothing but a child of the tree. You are all nothing but children of the tree! One can't expect any better from children born out of a tree."
The children became very quiet and still and did not say a word to the woman. Later that day the woman went to visit a friend. That evening when she came home, the children were not there. The house felt empty and lonely, and the woman cried and cried and cried.
The next day the woman went to the medicine man and asked him what she should do. He said he did not know.
"Should I go back to the fruit-bearing sycamore tree?" she wanted to know. The medicine man shrugged and said he did not know what she could do.
The woman returned to her home and washed all the pots and carried them to the fruit-bearing sycamore tree. She climbed the tree and reached to pick the fruit.
But the skin of the fruit parted and revealed eyes, the eyes of the children. They stared at the woman and their eyes were filled with tears. They stared and stared until the woman climbed down from the tree and returned to her home.
And she lived in sadness for the rest of her life. [End Episode 4]