A Single Shard

A 

Single Shard

Parks, L. S. (2001). A single shard. New York, NY: Clarion Books.

A Single Shard is the winner of the 2002 Newbery Medal Award.   

The format/design of this multicultural book was deliberately designed to invoke curiosity in the reader.  The book included a dust jacket with endpapers ;on the front cover the author wrote, “Tree-ear was so called after the mushroom that grew on tree trunks without benefit of parent seed.  A good name for an orphan, Crane-man said.  Right of the bat the reader gets a clue, a foreshadowing, that the main character is an orphan.   The author also started the novel by simply using an entire page to introduce the setting, the author wrote, “A small village on the west coast of Korea, mid- to late 12^th century”. 

Tree-ear the main character is an orphan being raised by Crane-man. He is a curious young boy who likes to watch a local potter named Min.  One day Tree-ear’s curiosity got the best of him and he accidentally broke some of Min’s pottery.  In order to repay Min for the broken pottery, Tree-ear agreed to work for free for several days.  Tree-ear continued to volunteer his time long after he had repaid him debt.  Tree-ear wanted Min to teach him how to do his craft, but Min would not, he was only willing to pass it down to his son.  Unfortunately Min’s son died, so he had no one to pass the family tradition to.  Later Tree-ear was sent on an errand with pottery to show and a tragic accident happened, all the pottery was smashed to shards.  Min’s work was so exquisite he was able to obtain the commission with a single shard of his pottery, which leads to the title of the book.

This book is full of literary devices such as metaphors and similes.  This would be a great book to analyze and record literary devices, discussing how they enrich and develop the text.

According to Promethean Planet the following resource includes, “writing activities, comprehension and discussion questions for each chapter in the book. There is also an anticipation guide and an essay. The activities in this resource can be used for both small and whole group instruction. In addition, there are graphic organizers in this resource that can be printed and assigned for independent or small group work or displayed on your Smartboard for the entire class to share their responses.”

http://www.prometheanplanet.com/en-us/Resources/Item/89110/literature-guide-for-a-single-shard#.UKWLqWdSTbw