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Emily Ianniello
Student-Trinity College, Hartford, CT
Grade: 2nd or 3rd
Language Arts
Title: Picture Setting

Objectives: The students will verbally identify the definition of a setting and its purpose in a story. The students will use a picture set to write their own story with a predetermined setting.

Old magazines for the children to cut "settings" out of

Loose-leaf paper

Glue

One copy of Roxaboxen by Barbara Cooney without the setting (see below)

One copy of Roxaboxen by Barbara Cooney in its original form

Procedure:

1) Set up the lesson by asking introductory questions, such as: How many of you like to read and write?; What are the parts of a story?; What does the setting tell you about a story? When the students have elicited that the setting tells you where the story is taking place, move on.

2) Ask the students to close their eyes and listen carefully to the story. Tell them to try to imagine where the story is taking place.

3) Read Roxaboxen with the setting removed (see below)

Roxaboxen by Barbara Cooney (setting removed)

Marian called it Roxaboxen. (She always knew the name of everything). There across the road. It was a special place. You had to cross the street to reach Roxaboxen. Of course all of Marian's sisters came: Anna May and Frances and little Jean. Charles from next door, even though he was twelve. Oh, and Eleanor, naturally, and Jamie with his brother Paul. Later on there were others, but these were the first. Well, not really the first. Roxaboxen had always been there and must have belonged to others, long before.

When Marian dug up a box filled with pebbles everyone knew what it was: it was a buried treasure. Those pebbles were the money of Roxaboxen. You could still find others like them if you looked hard enough. So some days became treasure-hunting days, with everybody trying to find that special kind of pebble. And then on other days you just might find one without looking.

A town of Roxaboxen began to grow. Houses first, and later on there was a town hall. Marian was mayor, of course; that was just the way she was. Nobody minded. And because everybody had plenty of money, there were plenty of shops. Jean helped Anna May in the bakery and there were two ice cream parlors. Was Paul's ice cream the best, or Eleanor's? Everybody kept trying them both. (In Roxaboxen you can eat all the ice cream you want).

Everybody had a car. All you needed was something for a steering wheel. Of course, if you broke the speed limit you had to go to jail. The jail was uncomfortable and Jamie was the policeman. Anna May, quiet little Anna May, was always speeding--you=d think she liked to go to jail. But ah, if you had a horse, you could go as fast as the wind. There was no speed limit for horses, and you didn't have to stay on the roads.

Sometimes there were wars. Once there was a great war, boys against girls. The girls had Fort Irene, and they were all girl scouts. The boys made a fort at the other end of Roxaboxen, and they were all bandits. Oh, the raids were fierce, but when you reached your fort you were safe.

Roxaboxen had a cemetery, in case anyone died, but the only grave in it was for a dead lizard.

Sometimes in winter, when the weather was bad, no one went to Roxaboxen at all, not for weeks and weeks. But it didn't matter; Roxaboxen was always waiting. Roxaboxen was always there. And spring came and everybody built new rooms. That summer there were three new houses on the east slope and two new shops on Main Street. And so it went. The seasons changed, and the years went by. Roxaboxen was always there.

The years went by, and the seasons changed, until at last the friends had all grown tall, and one by one, they moved away to other houses, to other towns. So you might think that was the end of Roxaboxen--but oh, no. Because none of them ever forgot. Years later Marian's children listened to stories of that place and fell asleep dreaming dreams of Roxaboxen. Grey-haired Charles picked up a pebble on the beach and stood holding it, remembering Roxaboxen. More than fifty years later, Frances went back, and Roxaboxen was still there.

4) Ask the following discussion questions:

a. Can you describe Roxaboxen? Where is it located? What do the houses and shops look like? Who lives there?

b. The people in the story were driving cars and riding horses. Can you describe those things? What did they look like? Were they real or imagined?

c. Can you describe the war?

5) After the majority of the class has been allowed to give their predictions to these and other questions, read the entire story to the students.

6) Lead a discussion about the differences the students noticed between the first and the second readings of the story. Ask them to describe the importance of the setting in a story.

7) Hand out the magazines to the students and instruct them to find a setting in the magazine. For example, a house, a car, a boat, an airplane, etc. Tell the students to cut out the picture and paste it in the middle of their loose-leaf paper.

8) Ask the students to write a story around the picture. Explain that the picture they have selected is the setting for their story, where their story is taking place.

Have the students share their stories to illustrate how the setting is an integral part of story structure and how one setting can have infinite possibilities.

Most of the evaluation will be done through listening and observing the students' responses. If the students answer readily and correctly during the discussions, one can be confident they understand the material. Looking at the stories written by the students can help the teacher further evaluate student progress.