|
Silent Night
The Song From Heaven
by Linda Granfield
illustrated by Nelly and Ernst Hofer
Themes include: music, art, history, language / vocabulary, culture
|
|
About this book:
The world's favorite carol, illustrated with traditional folk art.
Teaching Ideas:
|
|
Before reading the book:
ART CONNECTION
Invite students to look closely and comment upon the
cover design. (If you have a large group of
students, consider distributing photocopies of the cover, or
enlarging it onto an overhead projection.) Ask the students
what they notice about the picture: what images do they see?
Which images occur more than once? Which images do not?
Call their attention to the ways in which there is symmetry
in this picture, as well as the parts of the picture that do
not work symmetrically.
Next, introduce the term "silhouette", which may be
already familiar to students, as a form of cut-paper shadow
portrait. Invite students to make their own shadow
portraits of each other using dark paper taped to the wall
and a bright light such as an overhead projector lamp.
Lastly, introduce the term "scherenschnitt," the German
word for silhouette. Point out the sounds in the word that
suggest its meaning to English speakers: "scheren" sounds
like scissors or shears, and "schnitt" might remind us of
the word "snip." The art of making beautiful illustrations
using only paper and scissors was popular in Europe at the
time the story in this book took place.
Students can try their hand at scherenschnitt using
printouts.
CULTURAL CONNECTION:
This book tells the story of the day before Christmas in
a small village in Austria almost two hundred years ago.
(Point out Austria on a European and a world map, and show
its location in relation to your own.) The children, Hans
and Maria, are excited because they will be building a
Christmas creche in their church.
Explain to students that the word creche comes from a
French word for crib, and that the word has its origins in
the German language, which is also the language spoken in
Austria. The tradition of the Christmas creche originated
in Europe in the late Middle Ages as a way for Christians to
act out, and remember, the Christmas story. Today, many
Christians have creche scenes in their homes, with small
figurines made of porcelain or wood. Often, creche figures
are handed down through generations.
Ask children to think of physical objects in their homes
that can be used to tell a story or to remember an event.
Such objects can be considered artifacts, defined as
"objects produced or shaped by human craft." These objects
can represent a religious heritage as well as other,
non-religious stories and traditions. Invite students to
bring in and share an item from their home that could help
them remember or retell an important story. Children with
creche scenes in their homes could each bring in a figure,
and the class could compare the different styles and methods
used in creating creche figures.
During the winter holiday season some organizations, such as
a local art museum or an international group like Oxfam,
might sponsor exhibits of creche scenes from around the
world to which you could bring your class on a field trip.
[
Up to Top ]
|
|
|
As you read the book:
The opening page, headed "1818, Oberndorf, Austria,"
sets the scene, and its layout and illustration are
different from the ones that follow. Before you read the
text, invite children to notice the details in the large
picture at the left: the evergreen boughs and trees, the
horse-drawn sleighs, the children riding toboggans, and the
church building in the center. Also call the children's
attention to the small black silhouette detail under the
text, which highlights one scene (people carrying
freshly-baked pies).
Turning to the next page, notice that the large
scherenschnitt picture now has two parts: the small scene
within the six-pointed star at the bottom of the image
(representing scenes from the biblical account), and the
larger scene that makes up the top and sides of the circle.
Similarly, the text on the left-hand page also has two
parts: the larger body of the text at the top tells the
story of building the creche scene, while the italicized
lines at the bottom are whispered questions between Maria
and Hans about the events of the first Christmas.
After you read the text on each page, ask students to
identify what is happening in the large part of the picture,
calling their attention to the motion and action, the sleds
and ladders, and the objects being carried. Likewise,
observe what is happening within the "star" frame at the
bottom, and invite students to find the elements that the
two parts of the picture have in common on each page.
|
|
|
After reading the story: extension activities
HISTORICAL:
After the story, a chronological history of the hymn
"Silent Night" and its authors is presented in narrative
form. To encourage students to put this story into a larger
historical context, ask them to make a time line that
extends from about 1750 up until today.
[Alternatively, you could have a time line that extends
as far back as the year 1 A.D., which would allow for a
discussion of the terms B.C. (Before Christ), A.D. (Anno
Domini, Latin for "in the year of our Lord"), and B.C.E. and
C.E. ("Before the Common Era" and "Common Era"), which is a
non-religious way of explaining our system of counting
years.]
After laying out the time line (with a suggested scale
of one centimeter for every year), mark dates that represent
significant events with which your students are already
familiar. Point out the year in which most of the class was
born, and indicate how much space on the time line would be
taken up by their life span.
Using slips of paper cut into the shape of an arrow, have
the students place the dated events in the history of Silent
Night in their proper places along the time line. How long
after the song was written did it come to Germany? When did
it come to the United States? How many years after the song
was written did it help to contribute to a truce between
British and German soldiers during World War I?
LINGUISTIC:
The last page of the book provides the equivalent verses
of the song in English and German. The class could read
aloud the German version to hear how it sounds and notice
how it feels to speak in this language. If possible, invite
a fluent speaker of German to read or sing the words to your
class. Next, students could guess the meanings of the
various German words based upon their positions in the
sentences or upon similarities to certain English words,
then check their guesses using a German-English dictionary.
Students should also notice that both the German and the
English versions rhyme.
MUSICAL:
One legend about the origin of this song is that it was
written because the organ in the church had broken. It was
probably first performed with a guitar as accompaniment, yet
the piece of music that is reproduced at the front of the
book calls for violins and an organ. Discuss with the
students the choices that a composer makes when writing a
piece of music and suggesting the instruments it be played
on. If possible, play recordings of this melody as
performed on a variety of instruments, or perform it
yourself using instruments readily available at your school.
Then ask the students to consider the different moods and
effects of the various instruments on the tone or feeling of
the song; for example, an organ may add a tone of depth or
solemnity, whereas a guitar might suggest lightheartedness.
DANCE / MOTION:
Invite someone who is fluent in sign language to
teach your students the sign language version of this
hymn. Alternatively, invite students to develop their own
sequence of movements to relate the message of the hymn.
VOCABULARY REVIEW:
Connect to a printable
word search that reviews some of the key terms and concepts
from Silent Night, The Song From Heaven.
|
|
Other Tundra Teacher Guides:
Amazing Grace,
Charlotte,
Dippers,
The Legend of the Panda,
The Long Road,
Lucy Maud and the Cavendish Cat,
A Mountain Alphabet,
|
|
