Preparing Questions - poem "To Any Reader"

[Becca]

Can someone please explain this poem to me? I'm assuming that it is talking about your childhood/looking into the past etc. But in lines 4 and 12 it is talking about a book. So is it a child in the pages of a book??? Or ???

Please help!!!

Thanks, Becca

[Daisy]

Is this the poem you are speaking of? The poem compares a mother looking out a window watching her child play to a person reading a book about a child. This other child lives inside a book and is far away. Unlike a Mom who can call to her child through the window and have her child come inside, we cannot call to the children in our books. They are long gone. They cannot hear us when we read their stories. They will not come out of their garden or their book and play with us for in reality the children featured in books are grow and long gone.

I think the author's point is that when we read of children in books they seem so REAL. We become involved in their lives. We wish we could meet them, play with them, but in reality they are just memories written down and left behind. It's a moment frozen in time. Hope that makes sense.

And yes, I do think it can speak to the stories of our own childhood, our own growing up.

To Any Reader

by Robert Louis Stevenson

As from the house your mother sees
You playing round the garden trees,
So you may see, if you will look
Through the windows of this book,
Another child, far, far away,
And in another garden, play.
But do not think you can at all,
By knocking on the window, call
That child to hear you. He intent
Is all on his play-business bent.
He does not hear; he will not look,
Nor yet be lured out of this book.
For, long ago, the truth to say,
He has grown up and gone away,
And it is but a child of air
That lingers in the garden there.

[georgiamomof3]

Wow, Daisy! What a great explanation! We just finished this poem and I sure could have used your help explaining it to dd.

JoAnna

rameyhouseacademy.blogspot.com

[Kathleen]

When we read this poem this week, we saw it as RLS remembering his childhood. We thought the "book" was a scrapbook/photo album where he was looking to remember himself as a child. This seemed to make sense with the last lines of the poem that talks about the "child of air" in the garden. We didn't jump to talking about a story book in the middle, but I do see where that could make sense, too.

Kathleen

[Daisy]

Kathleen, I love the idea of him looking at a scrapbook. Now see my mind didn't go there. LOL. I think that is why I love poetry so much. You can see it from a million different angles. It just depends on how the light hits it.

[allforjesus]

Daisy,
Can you come to my house to do poetry with my kids? I think I'll post here when I don't get the poems either. It seems to be the toughest part of our school. And sometimes, I don't know the answers to the questions in the guide. Can you post your interpretation and answers to all the Preparing poems? (Just kidding)

[Daisy]

Ha, I'm not even using Preparing but I'm sure if someone posted we could all give it our best shot.

[LynnH]

I read this to my ds today and he looked at me with the funniest look on his face and said "huh?'. I tried the different explanations in this thread and he was still struggling. I finally thought of Christopher Robin in "House of Pooh Corner" which he loved when he was little and we talked about how Christopher Robin seemed so real and seemed like he was still a little boy when in fact he had grown up long ago and I think has now passed away. This seemed to make sense to him. I must say though I am dreading tomorrow's writing exercise that goes with this poem. I read what he is supposed to do and I am not sure I understand.

[Becca]

Thank you so much for your ideas! So helpful - you are amazing. Now I will look so intelligent as I discuss this with my children. LOL

[DHT1999]

We have been stuck on this poem for two units! Today, I decided we would go back and get the writing exercise done. We read and enjoyed the poem many times over the last couple of weeks but we still can not get a handle on how to do the exercise! We have talked about the images that it brings to our minds and possible meanings of various lines. We still can not get the exercise even started! I'm afraid we are just going to have to skip this one .

If anyone has actually completed this and wouldn't mind sharing what they have done, I would love to hear about it. It's a beautiful poem and we really like. We just don't know how to retell it using our favorite lines.

[MamaBear23Cubs]

It gave us a HUH moment also. We just started that poem on Friday.

[LynnH]

As much as I dreaded the writing exercises it ended up being great. I had him tell me some of the lines that brought a picture to his mind. He told me those and I put them on the white board. I then had him start with the one that appears first in the poem and rewrite it. He made it about seeing a cat in a tree outside instead of a child. I then had him think about a book that might have an animal as the main character and because of our earlier discussion he jumped at the idea of pooh bear. I just talked him through each line giving him the line as written in the poem and then asking him how he could make that about pooh. He did and I loved it. He was so proud of his work. For one line he wrote about a fuzzy, yellow bear hanging there. I asked him where pooh was hanging and he said "mom he is hanging down from Christopher Robins hand". I remembered an illustration that shows just that so that is what he visualized. He also wrote about pooh being over his honey bent and then had him end up in a bin since that is where all his old stuff animals are. I really thought he wouldn't be able to do this exercise and was thrilled that with just a little guidance he could.

[DHT1999]

Wow, Lynn, that sounds great! Maybe I can use Pooh Bear to get his brain to going. He's actually reading Winnie-the-Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner right now for DITHOR. Hmmmm... I think we'll try again tomorrow. He got stuck on picking out his favorite lines. He wanted to pick all of them.

[allforjesus]

We did this poem this week. This explains how difficult poetry is for us. My kids often don't understand poems and sometimes I don't know the answers to the questions. Are we just an extreme left brain family or what?

me: What was the poet probably remembering from his own childhood as he wrote this poem?
son: "How deaf and blind he was in his garden." what????
me: Why won't the child in the poem hear you?
son: "I said he couldn't hear. That must be why."
me: What do the last 2 lines of the poem mean?
son: "There was a creepy ghost in the garden who flew into the air. Maybe he was scared."
me: How will you be like the child in the poem someday?
son: "I hope I never am. I'm not blind or deaf. I don't like ghosts either."
me: I think the poem was about looking into a book.
son: "Ohhhhhhhh. 'chuckle' No wonder he was flat!"

And, that's a typical poetry discussion at our house. Sometimes my kids just look at me blankly when I read them. Very skilled at poetry, aren't we?

Any helps or insights to help us would be wonderful. The logical brain is a little strong around here!

[Michelle]

I totally agree with Daisy! I love this poem! We're doing this poem this week too. My ds didn't get it right away either. I am soooo enjoying this poetry. Not sure if my son is, but I sure am!
God bless, Michelle