The colourful, whimsically painted illustrations match the text perfectly in a naïve folk art style. The lyrical House-That-Jack-Built format is sure to delight young audiences with its singsong quality and language that is positively irresistible: “This is the grass,all brown and dead,that needed the rainfrom the cloud overhead.” “But one year the rainswere so very belated,That all of the big wildcreatures migrated.” A marvellous cumulative poem ensues, gaining momentum through repetition and anticipation, until Ki-pat “changes the weather” by shooting an eagle’s feather into a storm cloud, releasing the rain. The rich, verdant savannah is home to many African animals: zebras, giraffes, storks, buffalo and more. This Kenyan folk tale rhythmically tells of a young man named Ki-pat who brings the rain back to the Kapiti Plain following a drought. Compare to the impact of snow and rainstorms in Québec.įolklore, African folk tales, animals, cumulative stories, droughts, pourquoi tales, stories in rhyme, weather Discuss the impact of monsoons and droughts. Use this story as a model to write a cumulative story about a climatic situation such as bringing the snow in December, the sun in May or a rainbow in June.Ĭompare the weather in Kapiti Plains with ours. List the animals from the Kapiti Plain. Add them to your personal dictionary with a short definition or picture to remember them. Each student (or pair) takes a sentence to retell in a cumulative way.

Practise reading the text as a class or divide into groups to read sections of the text aloud. Why do they stand this way? How old was his son when he started watching the herd? How long do you think they spend tending the animals? Why do the animals need to be watched? Try standing on one leg like Ki-pat and his son. Compare the weather in Kapiti Plains with ours here in Québec. Predict what Ki-pat will use his bow and arrow for.ĭiscuss the impact of monsoons and droughts. List them in alphabetical order.ĭiscuss the characteristics of folk tales such as this one. Would you like to go on an African safari? Which animals would you like to see? List the animals in the illustrations. Estimate how long it would take to get there and confirm your hypothesis through research.

Kapiti plain