Book Club: Trees by Mark Haddon

Welcome to book club!

Learning Intention: Good readers discuss stories with others to deepen their thinking.
Success Criteria:
• I have read along with the read-aloud of the poem ‘Trees’ by Mark Haddon.
• I have used the prompts to discuss the poem ‘Trees’ with my peers in a breakout room.
• I have made my thinking visible by writing a ‘Quick write’ short response to one of the prompts.
 I see, I think, I wonder

While reading/listening to the text use

the space here to note down:
• What do I see/visualise?
• What do I think about that?
• What does what I’m seeing/visualising
make me wonder?
 They stand in parks and graveyards and gardens.
Some of them are taller than department stores,
yet they do not draw attention to themselves.

Trees – By Mark You will be fitting a heated towel rail one day
and see, through the louvre window,
Haddon a shoal of olive-green fish changing direction
in the air that swims above the little gardens.

Or you will wake at your aunt's cottage,

Mark Haddon is an English your sleep broken by a coal train on the empty hill
novelist and poet. as the oaks roar in the wind off the channel.

Your kindness to animals, your skill at the clarinet,

these are accidental things.
We lost this game a long way back.
Look at you. You're reading poetry.
Outside the spring air is thick
with the seeds of their children.
I see, I think, I wonder
In your breakout room, use the
sentence starters I see, I think and I
wonder to discuss the text.
Every book club member should share
at least one ‘See’, one ‘Think’ and one
‘wonder’.
If your thinking/wondering changes,
note it down here:
 Instructions

Quick write: Write for the full 5 minutes.

Spelling is not important.
Grammar is not important.

Choose one of these prompts to respond to:

1. (Making Connections) What did this poem remind
you of? Why do you think you connected to it in
that way?
2. (Inferring) What do you think the main theme of
this poem is? Is it really about trees?
3. (Self-Monitoring) Describe your emotional
reaction to this poem. Why do you think it made
you feel that way?
 Answer these questions:
1. How did discussing the story change your
thinking about it?

2. Were you surprised by other people’s

See/Think/Wonder responses?