Stone Fox

We just finished reading Stone Fox (thanks to the recommendation of Ms. Andrews, one of my fellow teammates!), and the kids LOVED it! It started of kind of slow, the first three chapters introducing the main characters. After Chapter 6, the kiddos BEGGED me to keep going! They didn't even want to go to recess!

 Stone Fox is set in the late 1800's on a farm in Wyoming near the Teton Mountains. The protagonist, Little Willy, learns his Grandfather has given up on life because of the amount of debt owed to the State in taxes. Little Willy decides to enter into a dogsled race with his dog Searchlight to win the prize money and pay of the debt. I focused on Characters and Character traits. Little Willy is a strong little boy, perfect for students to think of character traits for. Also, Grandfather's character changes as a result of certain events in the story, the making a perfect example of how characters may change in a story and how events influence it. I tried to focus on adjectives to describe the characters, but will eventually incorporate the likeliness of a character doing certain actions ( I can't recall what the term is right now, my brain is fried!) 

Also, to make text to media and text to world connections, I pulled up articles and videos from the annual Alaskan Iditarod. The kids LOVED watching stories about the different dogs, and reading about dogsledding! I believe there is a Disney movie called "Eight Below" that might be fun to watch as a wrap up to our Stone Fox.

 The book never mentions the outcome of the tax situation, Grandfather, etc. which was pointed out by one of my students, so tomorrow I'm going to have them write an "Afterword" as some authors include in their stories. I just love books that have students (and me!) begging to no more about the character and also not wanting the book to end! As a writing assignment as well, I had the students write an encouraging letter to Little Willy to try and offer condolences about his grandfather and possibilities of how he can raise money to pay off the debt. The kids came up with some great letters!