THE RIVER

by Valerie Bloom

SYNOPSIS
The River is about the many faces of a river.
The river is a wanderer where he moves all over
the place. He does not sit still and is always in
motion. He is also a winder where he twists and
turns. He meanders. He is also a hoarder
where he keeps things deep down in his
river bed. Sometimes, he is a baby when he is
happily flowing along. At times, he is a singer as
seen through the happy sounds of the water.
Finally, he is also a monster and can devour
trees (most probably referring to a flood).
 TOPSY TURVY,
MAKE IT RIGHT

Aims

1. To train students to listen, read and

comprehend the poem
2. To enable team work while having
fun rearranging the lines
Materials

• Video from Movie Maker

• Computer/ laptop
• Overhead projector (preferred)
• A stop watch
• A blank piece of paper per large group
• Adhesive
• Sentence strips in an envelope
Steps
Instruct the students to sit in their
respective groups, away from the teacher.
Tell them to listen to the model reading of
The River and watch the short video
presentation.
Play it again.
Hand out the envelopes (one envelope per
group). Tell them not to open until
they are told to do so.
Start the race! Tell them to rearrange the
strips correctly to form the poem The River.
Tell them to secure the strips with adhesive.
Check the order. If one sentence is wrong,
students must go back to their corner and try
again.
Tell them that the group that hands up the
correct arrangement in the shortest time
wins. Alternative: The group that gets the
most strips arranged correctly at the end of
the set time wins!
THE SOUND MACHINE

Aims

• To enable students to understand the

meaning of the stanzas
• To create the appropriate sounds made by
the river in the different stanzas
• To enable students to read with the correct
pronunciation and intonation
Materials

• Cut out stanzas of the poem

Steps

• Divide the students into 6 groups.

• Read out the poem to them with the right
enunciation and intonation.
• Distribute one stanza to one group.
• Tell them to practice reading the stanza.
• Get them to read the stanza aloud to the
class.
• Then tell them to think of certain sounds
and actions that they can use together
with the stanza that they have been given.
• Appoint a student (or a few students)
within the group to read the stanza while
the other students practice the sounds
and movements.
• Give them some time to practice.
• Then get them to present but do it this way – tell
them to form a long line with students with stanza 1
at the beginning and students with stanza 6 at the
end. Get them to start moving like a river,
undulating and wavy with the appropriate
movements and sounds. Make it like a Mexican wave
with Stanza 1 being read aloud with the movements
and sounds, then Stanza 2 being read out with
movements and sound and so on till Stanza 6.
• Then get them to do all 6 stanzas simultaneously
with the reading, movement and sounds.
• Finally, get them to do just the movements and the
sounds without the stanzas being read out.
You can be guaranteed that this exercise will bring out the vividness of the
poem and it will be something that the students will never forget!
Notes
1. You may
need to find a
room or space
large enough to
carry out this
activity.

2. Perhaps the
hall or gym may
help.
PELMANISM

Aims

• To introduce students to the meanings of

the words used in the poem
• To introduce vocabulary in a fun way
Materials
• word cards
Steps

• Prepare sets of word cards (Handout 3)

• Divide students into groups of 4.
• Give each group a set of the word cards.
• Tell them to set the cards face down on
the desk.
• Get each of them to open the cards one
by one.
• They are not to look at the cards before
opening them face up on the table.
• Their task is to match words and
meanings together.
• If they manage to match the word and the
meaning, they are allowed to keep that
pair.
• The winner in the group will be the one
who collects the most pairs.
In this
activity,
pelmanism
can be
likened to the
game of
Snap.
LET’S MAKE SENSE

AIMS
• To sensitise students to words and how
they help to construct meaning
• To sensitise students to rhyme
• To enable students to reconstruct a
stanza using contextual clues and the skill
of sense-making
Materials

• Strips of paper, each bearing a line of

the poem
Steps
Divide students into groups of four.
Give each group strips of paper, each
of which has a line of the stanza.
Perhaps give each group either 2 or 3
stanzas which have been all cut up
(Handout 3)
Tell them to unscramble the lines and
reconstruct the stanzas.
Get them to present their work and
read the stanzas out in class. Here,
perhaps one group could read out one
stanza.
Then get them to look again at the
actual stanzas of the poem and
decide if their stanzas (the
assumption being that their stanzas
may vary) can also stand.
It is not the accuracy of
reconstructing the stanzas that
matters. It does not matter if the
reconstructed stanza varies from the
original stanza. What is important is
if the reconstructed stanza makes
sense.
Variation

•You could give them the

first line of the stanzas and
get them to reconstruct the
stanza.
Let’s discuss

• Get them to discuss the strategies

they used in order to
reconstruct the stanzas.
Note
1. Use your discretion here.

2. It may not be feasible to

give them all 6 stanzas.
3. They might pull their hair
out in frustration!
CROSSWORD PUZZLE

AIM
• To strengthen students’
understanding of the poem
through solving a crossword
puzzle
Steps
Hand a copy of the Worksheet 1 to each
student.
Tell the students that the words are from
the poem.
Tell the students to solve the puzzle on
their own or in pairs.
Discuss the answers with the students.
If time permits, ask the students determine
in which stanza the words are found.
Alternatively,
the teacher
may ask
students to
lead the
discussion.