Topic: Reading + speaking (2 hours)
THE HUNTER WHO WANTED AIR
After Alex Whitney
Form: 11th
Objectives:
Students will learn to understand the author’s purpose and the means by which this purpose is achieved. They will think critically about value systems. Students will be given an opportunity to reflect upon the text.
Skills development:
Students will practice reading for understanding the characters’ feelings and their actions. They will practice expressing different attitudes to the text. They will discuss implied meaning. They will develop their strategies for dealing with philosophical issues. They will practice understanding the author’s message.
Plan
1. Warming-up: Answer the questions:
What does a hunter usually do?
What must a hunter know?
What should/ shouldn’t a hunter do?
2. You are going to read the text. The title of the text is “THE HUNTER WHO WANTED AIR”. What do you think it is about? Give your ideas.
3. Read the text (reading time 8-10min.).
The first time Marupi the hunter noticed Tafeela, she was making a basket. He was so charmed by her grace and beauty that he immediately went into the hut of her father, Okono, and asked for permission to marry Tafeela.
“I shall let Tafeela decide for herself whether or not she will marry you,” said Okono and called his daughter.
When Tafeela entered the hut, Okono explained why Marupi was there. She looked at Marupi and then whispered something into her father’s ear.
“Tafeela thinks you are handsome,” Okono told Marupi, “but she says she will only marry someone who has wisdom, I know that you are a good hunter and a skilled catcher of fish, - but I am not sure that you are wise.”
“Then I shall become wise at once!” Marupi answered quickly.
“And how do you plan to do that?” Okono wanted to know.
“Very simply,” said Marupi. “I have heard that Mankato, chief of those who live upriver by the waterfall, is great in wisdom. I shall go to him, and when he has taught me all that he knows, I shall return and marry Tafeela!”
Early the following morning, Marupi ran to the river and got into his canoe that he had carved from a tree trunk. Then he paddled hard upstream until he heard the noise of the waterfall. When he had pulled his canoe onto the sand, he hurried toward a group of huts on the river bank. He exchanged greetings with a group of villagers and told them he had come to see Mankato.
Marupi was led to a large thatched hut. Seated cross-legged in a doorway was an old man with beautiful graying hair. Marupi stood before him and said at once, “Mankato, I wish to learn how to be wise.”
The old chief’s eyes twinkled from behind half-closed lids. “Before one can have wisdom, one must truly desire it,’ he said.
“I desire it more than anything else at the moment!” cried Marupi.
“Then you shall have your first lesson,” said Mankato, rising slowly to his feet. “Come, let us walk to the river.”
When they arrived at the river bank, Mankato told Marupi to kneel in the shallow water. But as soon as Marupi had done so, Mankato firmly pushed the young man’s head underwater and held it there for a moment or two. Choking, Marupi raised his head out of the river. Then he drew in great gulps of air.
“What did you think about while your head was underwater?” asked Mankato calmly.
“Air!” answered Marupi.
“What!” cried Mankato. “Did you not think of how well you do in the hunt?”
“No!” gasped Marupi. “All I could think of was air!”
“Did you not think of your nets full of fish?” said Mankato.
“No,” said Marupi, “I thought only of air!”
“When you want wisdom as much as you wanted air, then you will become wise,” said Mankato. And without looking at Marupi, the old man walked away.
It was early evening when Marupi returned to his village. As he walked tiredly past Okono’s hut, Tafeela stood in the doorway.
“Did you learn how to be wise, Marupi?” she asked.
Marupi hung his head and looked sadly at his feet.
“Alas, Tafeela, I have learned only one thing,” he said. “Air is more important to me than wisdom.”
Tafeela’s eyes sparkled. “Then, I shall accept your offer of marriage.”
Marupi could hardly believe his ears. “Impossible!” he cried. “Surely you must realize that many, many moons and many, many suns will come and go before I will be able to claim wisdom!”
Tafeela laughed softly. “That may be true, but you possess something else – something that is more valuable than all the animals in our forest, more priceless than all the fish in our river. You have honesty. And honesty, Marupi, is the first step on the path to wisdom,” said Tafeela.
4. Discuss the text (work in pairs):
What was Marupi? What can you tell the class about him?
And about Tafeela?
Why did Marupi want to marry Tafeela?
What did Tafeela answer Marupi?
What did Marupi decide to do?
What lesson did Mankato teach the hunter? How did he do it?
Did the hunter understand the lesson? (Prove it using the text.) What was Marupi’s reaction to the lesson?
What did Marupi tell Tafeela about his attempt to learn how to be wise?
Why did Tafeela agree to accept Marupi’s offer of marriage?
Prove using the text that the story is given from an Indian’s point of view?
Names mean much for Indians. What can you say about names in the text?
Look through the text and find how the author rendered Marupi’s desire to learn how to be wise (verbs, images, feelings).
5. Ideas for discussion (work in groups):
a) What do you value in people: appearance, clothes, speeches or behavior?
b) What human characteristics do you value most in people? Why? Explain your choice?
c) Is it difficult to learn to be wise? What should you do for it? Should you hurry to learn to be wise?
d) Which way in your opinion is the best to learn to be wise: reading, traveling, speaking to clever people, working or observing life and people? Choose one and comment upon it.
e) What do you think it means to be wise? Do you agree that Mankato was really a wise man?
f) You are young, but your experience is big enough. Give the class an example of the most important lesson you have had.
g) It’s very difficult to explain to people philosophical issues. If you were Mankato, what would you tell Marupi?
h)” Invent” a new “lesson” which gives people some valuable knowledge or experience.
i) Tafeela said: “That may be true, but you possess something else – something that is more valuable than all the animals in our forest, more priceless than all the fish in our river. You have honesty. And honesty, Marupi, is the first step on the path to wisdom.”
Do you agree with Tafeela? Do you think that honesty is the most valuable human possession and the fist step on the path to wisdom? Give your reasons.
6. Homework (you may choose any point):
a) Write your own fairy-tale with philosophical meaning.
b) Give your opinion about the text.
c) Describe any character of the text.