MAKING CONNECTIONS
H
ave you ever read something that seems like it was written just
for you? If so, there is something in the piece that you were
able to connect to your own experiences and feelings. For example,
you might connect what you are reading to something else you read
before. You might connect to an event about which you have seen or
heard. When you take the time to make these connections, you gain
a better understanding of what you are reading by comparing new
information to what you know.
As you read “Aunt Sue’s Stories,” use your Response Notes to
jot down any connections you make between the people, ideas, or
experiences in the story and those from your own life.
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LESSON
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Aunt Sue’s Stories by Langston Hughes
Aunt Sue has a head full of stories .
Aunt Sue has a whole heart full of stories.
Summer nights on the front porch
Aunt Sue cuddles a brown-faced child to her bosom
And tells him stories.
Black slaves
Working in the hot sun,
And black slaves
Walking in the dewy night,
And black slaves
Singing sorrow songs on the banks of a mighty river
Mingle themselves softly
In the flow of old Aunt Sue’s voice,
Mingle themselves softly
In the dark shadows that cross and recross
Aunt Sue’s stories.
And the dark-faced child, listening,
Knows that Aunt Sue’s stories are real stories.
He knows that Aunt Sue never got her stories
Out of any book at all,
But that they came
Right out of her own life.
The dark-faced child is quiet
Of a summer night
Listening to Aunt Sue’s stories. p
Response
Notes
like my grandfather
MAKING CONNECTIONS
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Reread the poem and consult your Response Notes in order to
complete the chart below. List as many connections as you can
make to “Aunt Sue’s Stories.”
Connections to you
Sometimes I have a head full of
stories to tell.
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LESSON 2
Share your list with a partner. What connections do you have in
common? What different connections do you have? What, for
each of you, is the strongest connection?
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•
Connections to world
Connections to other texts
events, places, or
(movies, books, etc.)
situations beyond your life
Confessions of Nat Turner
Current events in Africa
created a vision of slavery and demonstrate how people are
sorrow.
still enslaved today.
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•
Langston Hughes describes Aunt Sue as having a “head full of
stories.” You have stories, too. What story of yours do you think
Aunt Sue would appreciate hearing? Connect to Aunt Sue, the
storyteller, by telling a story of your own back to her.
Connecting your
experiences and knowledge to
the people and events in the story
helps you better understand
what you read.
MAKING CONNECTIONS
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