Three dips from the Dragon's ladle
calmed the lapping waters.
Deepest love from a little girl
awakens a luminous pearl.
The Dragon King's daughter
finds a lasting love.
The story for the 2nd half of our week was "The Luminous Pearl", a Fairy Tale from China. In the story, one brother saves a town from a flood by borrowing a magical ladle from the Dragon King, while the other selfishly avoided the troubled town to return faster to the princess both were wooing. Both suitors' task was to bring the most luminous pearl they could find. The selfish brother's pearl was the largest, but the brother who saved the town had a small black pearl that a little girl from the town gave him in thanks for his help, and that was the pearl that became the most luminous, winning the hero the hand of the Dragon King's daughter. Here's J's drawing of the ladle, and the pearl.
Zoo Boy's story drawing. The boys readily saw the letter "L" in their drawings (the ladle) this morning. They seemed a bit confused about a few of the story's details during recall yesterday, so this might be a story we use again next year. That makes two stories in a row they've had a bit of trouble with the recall of, I may resort to either finding simpler stories for the rest of this block, or perhaps introducing a couple of silks as props during the telling to aid with comprehension of key moments. I'll be sitting with that thought for the next few days before deciding what course to take.
The boys' Ls. Neither of them was particularly focused today. In fact, the past couple of days seem to have been challenging for them in general -- there have been a lot of "silly" behavior and even some tears. I may need to step up the physical aspects of our adventure circle on these days when we're not walking in the mornings due to the temperatures -- I'm thinking that perhaps they are not getting enough of their energy needs met before doing the more concentrated work. Again, more to think on.
Given everything else, I wasn't surprised when J showed a lack of stamina for writing the verse. He made it through the first section then abandoned the activity. 
My story drawing. This was actually one of my favorite stories of those we've read thus far, adding to my inclination to repeat this one again at some point. 
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