Sky Tree

It's great to be back at Wheeler for the winter session. I have a small, mellow group of girls, including two previous students. For our first class, we looked at Sky Tree by Thomas Locker, which follows one tree through the seasons. The girls were in awe of the paintings and loved watching the landscapes change. They were particularly sensitive to the way the sky clothed the tree's bare branches in winter; stars, clouds, birds, and violet sunsets all acted as temporary "leaves."

After observing our own sky out the window (it was "church-quiet" and "white as rabbits"), I asked them to close their eyes and imagine any sky they liked. It could be a morning sky, a starry sky, or a fiery evening sky. What time of year is it? What time of day? What colors and weather do you see? Is it windy or still? Cloudy or clear? I passed out small pieces of paper ("sky windows") and colored pencils so they could draw the sky they had imagined.

When the drawings were complete, I asked asked them to write a poem describing their sky and the world below. Here are two examples (I might scan the drawings a bit later):

My sky is white summer
in the spicy afternoon. Children
playing on the sand,
children yelling, screaming,
and laughing. My sky turns
gray, lightning, thunder,
and loud.
-Safia

My sky was a little bit dark
and it was raining
and it was the middle
of afternoon. I was so happy
that everyone stayed inside.
It was soft and quiet.
-Asho