Trapped! A Whale’s Rescue
by Robert Burleigh (Author) and Wendell Minor (Illustrator)
Booktalk: In the icy waters of the Pacific, a massive humpback whale unexpectedly finds herself tangled in a net abandoned by fishermen. When a rescue boat and a convoy of divers arrive to help the struggling humpback, a realistic and moving encounter bridges the human and aquatic worlds.
Snippet:
The chug-chug of a motor fills the air.
Rescuers. Are they too late?
Divers drop cautiously into the frigid water.
They know the whale is wild.
One quick roll of her immense body can crush.
One blow from her gigantic tail can kill.
Six Traits Mini Lesson
Trait: Organization The title of the book, Trapped! A Whale’s Rescue, sets up the way the book will be organized. We know what will happen just by reading the title. The whale will be trapped and then rescued.
This excerpt appears on the page after the whale becomes trapped in the forgotten fishing net. Notice how the events unfold in chronological order.
The sound comes first.
The chug-chug of a motor fills the air.
Then we find out more about that sound.
Rescuers.
At the end of the second line comes that essential, emotional question.
Are they too late?
And then the rescue begins . . .
Divers drop cautiously into the frigid water.
Trait: Organization There is another organization pattern at work in this book. Notice how the text is organized into three line units.
The chug-chug of a motor fills the air.
Rescuers. Are they too late?
Divers drop cautiously into the frigid water.They know the whale is wild.
One quick roll of her immense body can crush.
One blow from her gigantic tail can kill.
Organizing text into a predetermined number of lines is a poetic device. The Poetry Foundation Glossary defines it this way:
Tercet
“A poetic unit of three lines, rhymed or unrhymed.”
This week’s Poetry Friday Round-up is hosted by Keri Recommends.
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