My Shadow
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I have a little shadow that goes in and out with me,
And what can be the use of him is more than I can see.
He is very, very like me from the heels up to the head;
And I see him jump before me, when I jump into my bed.
The funniest thing about him is the way he likes to grow--
Not at all like proper children, which is always very slow;
For he sometimes shoots up taller like an india-rubber ball,
And he sometimes gets so little that there's none of him at all.
He hasn't got a notion of how children ought to play,
And can only make a fool of me in every sort of way.
He stays so close beside me, he's a coward you can see;
I'd think shame to stick to nursie as that shadow sticks to me!
One morning, very early, before the sun was up,
I rose and found the shining dew on every buttercup;
But my lazy little shadow, like an errant sleepy-head,
Had stayed at home behind me and was fast asleep in bed.
~by Robert Louis Stevenson
When sharing this poem with your children, consider the following ideas for activities or discussion:
- Who is speaking in this poem?
- What do you think the speaker is like?
- What words and word-choices give you clues to the identity and characteristics of the speaker?
- Why is the shadow "very, very like [him]"?
- Why does the shadow jump before him into bed? (There is the obvious scientific reason of the light being behind him and casting the shadow toward the bed. You may also find that your kids come up with funny motives--like, he's afraid of the monster in the closet; he wants to hog the pillow, etc. Don't discourage such creativity! This is a wonderful way to engage with poetry! Literature is interactive and you don't want to limit "right" answers to the literal ones...)
- What does the speaker mean about the strange way the shadow grows?
- What is an india-rubber ball?
- What does the speaker mean when he says the shadow doesn't play in the way children ought, and makes a fool of him?
- Who is "nursie"?
- Can you picture a child "stick[ing] to nursie"? What sort of child is this, and why would the speaker be shamed to be like this?
- Why did the shadow stay in bed when the speaker when out early one morning?
- Using a bright light shining on your child toward a wall which has a paper fastened there, draw a silhouette of your child's profile.
- Compose an acrostic poem from the word "SHADOW".
- What shadow puppets can you make? A rabbit? An eagle? A turtle?
- Can you tell a story using shadow puppets?
- Watch this amazing and inspiring shadow puppet performance! (You really don't want to miss this!)
~Rachel DeMille, TJEd.org
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Highlights include:
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