Teacher’s Guide
What the Orangutan Told Alice
By Susan Glover
Copyright
2001 Deer Creek Publishing
Smashwords Edition
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Contents
Pre-reading and concurrent activities
Comprehension and Discussion Questions
What the Orangutan Told Alice is a book of environmental fiction geared toward an audience of students from sixth through twelfth grade. It gives them an opportunity to learn about orangutans and their fight for survival as an endangered species, preserving the environment, and the rain forest in an easy-to-read, fantasy story form. Though some names, characters, places and incidents may be recognizable, what the characters say and where they say it are products of the author’s imagination. However, the story is based on true facts from the author’s experience and research.
Teachers who use this guide will find the following features to supplement their own valuable ideas:
• A summary of the
book
• Pre-reading and concurrent reading activities
•
Comprehension and discussion questions with possible answers, by
chapters
• Post reading activities that include the study of
literary elements including character study, conflict, similes,
metaphors and setting
• Class, partner, or individual projects
that connect the curriculum through social studies, science, drama
and art activities
• Research ideas for nonfiction report
writing
“Alice's most recent adventures further establish Dale Smith as one of the leading environmental writers for children. Alice communicates with the animals as only a child can. What the Orangutan Told Alice will give children of all ages a deep sympathy and understanding of the plight of young orangutans who are driven from their natural habitats. If only more of us stopped to listen to the animals, the conservation movement would move forward at the speed of light.”
Dr. Jane Goodall
JANE GOODALL
INSTITUTE
“This novel for young adults opens a magical door into the haunting world of orangutans - and what they teach us about ourselves.”
Amory B. Lovins
ROCKY
MOUNTAIN INSTITUTE
“Many thanks to Dale Smith for giving the young reader a true picture of the plight of today's orangutans and of those trying to help - all dipped in a sweet coat of fantasy that makes it a most palatable read for any age.”
Betty White
ACTRESS, ANIMAL
ADVOCATE
What the Orangutan Told Alice is wonderful reading for teens and adults, too. It stands the human belief that we are superior to other beings on its head! Read the book and listen to orangutans and gibbons tell you how humans appear to our fellow earthlings as we destroy our, and their, world. And meet some caring humans trying to help.”
Shirley McGreal, Chairwoman
INTERNATIONAL PRIMATE PROTECTION LEAGUE
“This could be the book that at last awakens us to our obsession with self-importance at the expense of even our closest genetic neighbors. The fight for Species Rights lags far behind progress in Civil Rights and Human Rights. What the Orangutan Told Alice is an important work to plant the seed for this awareness in our children and to energize those of us who have seen the shameful treatment of our fellow creatures to be vocal in their defense. Dale Smith's excellent photographs deepen the passion of this uniquely conceived and clearly written book.”
Fred Bauer
CEO, CHINA PRAIRIE
COMPANY
Chapter 1
BEING THERE
A
reluctant visitor to Indonesian Borneo, fourteen-year-old Alice has
accompanied her writer father on a mission to research orangutans for
a book he intends to write. While her father is away, Alice tries to
save the life of a baby gibbon that is being harassed by neighborhood
children. Though her effort to save the life of the baby fails, she
is enticed to accompany the baby’s mother, Siti, on a quest to free
her mate, Yayat, who is being held captive in a nearby village.
Chapter 2
STRANGER IN A
STRANGE LAND
Seventeen-year-old Shane Bailey is a foreign
exchange student living in a small village on the island of Borneo.
Homesick and lonely, Shane makes friends with a gibbon that is kept
as a pet on the end of a chain at the school. He feels sorry for the
gibbon and makes a promise to one day set him free.
Chapter 3
EMOTIONAL RESCUE
Siti leads Alice to where Yayat is chained at the back of the
schoolyard. Here she meets Shane and together they hatch a plot to
free Yayat. Reunited at last, Siti and Yayat tell Alice and Shane
they should meet the Old Man of the Forest, a wise old orangutan.
Chapter 4
BATMAN AND THE
HORNBILL
Alice and Shane meet Nik, a sub adult orangutan, and his
friend Sarijan, a hornbill who has recently lost his mate to a
hunter’s dart. Yayat convinces Nik to guide Alice and Shane through
the rain forest to meet the Old Man of the Forest.
Chapter 5
A NIK OF TIME
During their trek through the rain forest, Nik tells Alice and
Shane how, as an infant, unscrupulous black-market pet traders
poached him.
Chapter 6
HEY, JUDE
In the
forest, Nik, Alice and Shane meet Jude, a rehabilitated orangutan who
loves junk food and who is having a hard time adjusting to life as a
free-living orangutan. Jude tells Alice and Shane she once lived as a
child substitute with a military man and his wife.
Chapter 7
TERMITE TAKE-OUT
Alice and Shane sample some of Nik’s favorite foods, including
termite larvae.
Chapter 8
IBU ANNE
Deep in
the forest, Alice, Shane and Nik meet Ibu Anne, a primate
psychologist who is studying how rehabilitated orangutans think. Anne
invites the teenagers to stay the night at a forest outpost, Camp
Djamaludin.
Chapter 9
ALICE AND SHANE’S
DINNER WITH ANNE
Over dinner, Anne explains why orangutans are an
endangered species and tells them about some of the work being done
to save them from extinction.
Chapter 10
THE FOLLOW
Anne
invites Alice and Shane to accompany her on a ‘follow.’ They
follow Bento, another sub adult, through the forest and learn what a
typical day in the life of an orangutan is like.
Chapter 11
UCE’S GIFT
Much to everyone’s surprise, a rehabilitated female orangutan that hasn’t been seen in seven years and was feared dead appears at Camp Djamaludin with a baby.
Chapter 12
THE CONFISCATION
Still in the forest, Alice and Shane meet Willie, the man
responsible for establishing the orangutan rehabilitation center.
Willie tells them how he confiscated several orangutans from illegal
pet traders.
Chapter 13
THE WALL
During
a dinner conversation with Anne and Willie, Alice and Shane come up
with a plan to raise funds to build a wall around the forest into
which rehabilitated orangutans are released. They wall, they hope,
will help protect the orangutans from poachers.
Chapter 14
THE REHAB CENTER
Alice and Shane take an imaginary tour of the Wanariset Orangutan
Rehabilitation Center and learn about the process that prepares
orangutans for their return the forest.
Chapter 15
THE OLD MAN OF THE
FOREST
Deep in the rain forest, the Old Man of the Forest
surprises Alice and Shane.
Chapter 16
THE VALLEY OF
DESTRUCTION
The Old Man uses his magical powers to show Alice and
Shane the destruction of orangutan habitat that is in progress all
over Borneo. The Old Man also advances a theory that perhaps human
beings don’t really belong on the planet.
Chapter 17
OUT OF THE TREE
The
Old Man challenges Alice and Shane to think ‘out of the tree’ to
solve the mystery of man’s evolution on the earth.
Chapter 18
THE LONG CALL
When
the Old Man leaves them alone, Alice and Shane are transported out of
the forest in a gravity-defying orangutan nest.
Chapter 19
THE LAST TAXI RIDE
Shane arranges for a taxi to take Alice and her father to the
airport. The journey is filled with accidents and close calls but
eventually they arrive at their destination safely. Alice and Shane
vow to see each other again to discuss what they can do to help save
the orangutans from extinction.
Glossary
SOME WORDS YOU MIGHT
NOT KNOW
Chapter-by-chapter definitions of words help readers
build vocabulary.
Pre-reading and concurrent activities
1. Make predictions from the title, cover, table of contents and illustrations (photographs) of the book. Check your predictions as you read.
2. Alice’s Dad brought her with him to a remote foreign country when she would much rather have gone on vacation to a place of her own choosing. Describe a similar experience traveling with your family or friends and include your feelings about this journey.
3. Locate the island of Borneo on a world map. Describe its location including longitude and latitude lines, as well as its proximity to the equator. What can you assume its climate would resemble?
4. Make a KWL chart (what you know, what you want to know, what you learned) or as individuals or pairs do a "five-minute write." (Write in narrative form everything you know about orangutans. After five minutes jot down questions or share ideas with a partner.) Look for answers to your questions as you read.
5. If you read this book to a class as a read aloud you might consider the "stop, write and draw" technique as you read. Before you begin reading, have your students fold a piece of white paper into eight sections and label each section with a number from one to eight. After you have read several pages say "Stop, write and draw" and have your class draw a picture of some important event that happened during your reading in the first section, adding a sentence describing it at the bottom. After two or three minutes ask several students to share their picture and sentence. This is a great way to keep a running summary of important events in their minds
Comprehension and Discussion Questions
Chapters One to Three
1. Where are the only places orangutans live in the wild?
• Borneo and Sumatra
2. Why was it important for Alice’s Dad to write a book about Orangutans?
• Orangutans are near extinction
• Educate people to help
save them
3. What was so unusual about the magazine story of the boy and the gorilla?
• One species came to the aid of another
4. Summarize Alice’s experiences with the baby Gibbon.
• Kids threw stones and killed a baby gibbon
• Alice scared
them away and buried the baby
5. Why was Shane in Borneo and how did he feel about this experience?
• Foreign exchange student
• Disappointed at living
conditions
6. Who is Berani and how was Shane’s behavior and attitude different toward him than the other kids?
• Gibbon ape that was captured and kept as a pet at the elementary
school
• Students considered Berani "only a monkey" -
Shane felt it deserved more humane care
7. How do you think Yayat will "set Shane free"?
• Answers will vary
Chapters Four to Six
1. How did Nik travel from one tree to the next?
• Rocked the trees until they bent close enough to grab
2. How were Nik and other animals able to help grow more trees in the rain forest?
• Eat the fruit and spit seeds onto ground or eat fruit and "plant" the seed after going through digestive tract
3. Why didn’t Sarijan trust Alice and Shane?
• People killed his mate for her tail feathers
4. Why did the men kill Nik’s mother?
• Only way to take baby to sell as pet and sell Mother’s head as souvenir
5. What are the rehab centers used for?
• Food, shelter, teach skills to survive
6. How did Jude get from the forest to the rehab center?
• Mother was killed taking bananas from plantation
• Jude was
sold to a military man who brought her to rehab
Chapters Seven to Nine
1. Name some food that Orangutans eat.
• Fruit, leaves, bark, termites, rattan shoots, honey
2. What makes Ibu Anne special?
• Respect for rain forest, practical, understands her environment, focused, works hard, curious, expresses strong opinions
3. Ann told Shane that he could "write the book" of his life. How would you write yours?
• Answers will vary
4. Why would an animal or insect in the rain forest be brightly colored?
• Show it is poisonous, dangerous, not good to eat
5. Explain Anne’s graph about extinction.
• Shows how number of extinct animals has risen greatly over last 100 years
6. How are human beings adding to the problem of extinction of species?
• Deforestation, loss of habitat, clear cutting, planting of crops where natural forest used to be, consumption of natural resources, political greed
Chapters Ten to Twelve
1. What things do Orangutans learn in the Rehab Center and why do they need to learn them?
• How to find food, survival skills
• No mother to teach them
2. What were signs of the Orangutan's intelligence?
• Using tools and reasoning to solve problems
3. How is Borneo rich in biodiversity and why is this biodiversity so important?
• Numerous species of plants and animals
• Possible cures for
diseases
4. How does the "Black Market" affect Orangutans?
• Poachers kill mothers and sell baby Orangutans for pets and mother’s skulls for souvenirs
5. How did children affect the Orangutans in Borneo?
• Started project which became the Rehab Center
6. How is the Halfway House important to Orangutans?
• Learn variety of food available in forest
• Make friends,
socialize, learn from others
• Survival skills - build nests,
obtain food from plants
7. Why do the natives of Borneo treat the Orangutans so poorly?
• Cultural ideas, feeding family more important to them than Orangutans, amount of money paid for poaching, no education to understand need for diversity
Chapters Thirteen to Eighteen
1. Why are plantation owners a danger to natives on Borneo?
• Take their habitat so they cannot live as their culture has in
the past
• Low paying jobs with no provision for disability or
pensions
2. How would a wall or fence around the primary release forest be beneficial?
• Provide a boundary, protect Orangutans from poachers, protect natural habitat, and keep farmers from "squatting" on land and endangering Orangutans
3. What ideas can you think of to raise money to save Orangutans from extinction?
• Answers will vary
4. What is Marco’s idea about human beings and why?
• We are aliens - no other species spoils their home and habitat
5. Do you agree or disagree with Marco’s ideas? Support your response with reasons.
• Answers will vary
6. What reasons can you give that Orangutans are in danger of extinction?
• Poaching for pets and souvenirs, loss of habitat from fires and planters, few offspring, disease, and beliefs of local farmers
The author has included a glossary in the back of the book of "Not So Common Words". Using these words, complete the following activities:
a. Use your dictionary or thesaurus to find the following items for each word:
1. Phonetic pronunciation
2. A synonym and antonym for each word
b. Make up sentences for each word, but leave the word out. Trade papers and have your partner fill in the blanks correctly.
c. Have small groups of students write short stories or skits using assigned vocabulary words. Share these stories with the rest of the class.
d. Create a crossword puzzle or word search using specific vocabulary words. The author has used extensive descriptive writing techniques in this book. As you read, keep a log of words, phrases, or passages the author has used that create vivid images for you and/or go on a Simile or Metaphor hunt through the book and draw pictures to illustrate them.
As students or the teacher reads through the book, have students assemble in groups of four or five to discuss the reading. Each one can be assigned a particular element (setting, summary, vocabulary, connections, or discussion questions) and share their written record during the discussion with their group. Another possibility is to have each student write about all of the elements and share their ideas equally. A sample Literature Circle Form for this method is included in this guide.
Follow-up Activities
Class,
partner and individual projects
Literary Elements
1. Character Study and Conflict:
a. Describe a conflict between two characters in the book and explain
how it was resolved.
b. Compare and contrast two characters from
the book or compare yourself to a main character. Point out
similarities and differences.
c. Write a letter to a main
character listing your solutions to a problem that he/she faced. In
your opinion, did he or she do the right thing? Be sure to include
your reasons for your solutions.
d. Describe one problem or
situation faced by a character in this book. Explain the situation
and the outcome.
e. Write ten open-ended interview questions for
any character from the book (Anne, Nik, Jude, Alice, etc.) asking
information you would like to know.
f. Write a diary entry from
one of the main character’s point of view. Explain an important
incident as well as the character’s feelings about this event.
2. Setting
a. Draw a map showing the settings for the book. Label all of the
important places.
b. Create postcards like the ones that Shane
and Alice discussed, that show the settings of the story.
c.
Compare the setting of the story to your hometown. How is the setting
alike and different from yours? Would you prefer to live in your
present surroundings or in the setting of the book? Why?
3. Summary
a. Write a newspaper article about the most exciting or interesting
part of the book. (Be sure to include the who, what, where, when and
how). Remember also to include a headline and a picture.
b. Using
good descriptive language, describe the strangest or most
unbelievable event in the story.
4. From your point of view:
a. Write a letter to the author, Dale Smith. Share what you learned
or thought about after reading his book. Ask him questions and tell
him what you liked and disliked about the book. Mail it to him or
send an e-mail. There is a good chance he will answer your letter.
b. Write an epilogue and explain what will happen to the
characters in the story in five years. How will they change and what
new adventures will they have?
c. Write a review of this book.
Describe what the book is about and tell what you liked and did not
like about it. Explain why other students should or should not read
this book.
d. Write a persuasive letter to one of the
organizations listed in the back of the book convincing them to make
more careful decisions about the rain forest in the future.
e.
Suppose that Alice and Shane invited you to join them in their
adventures in Borneo. Make a list of the things (tangible and
intangible) you would need to pack for your journey. Then make a
similar list of items you would bring back from your adventures that
you did not have when you left.
1. Create a mural of the rainforest. Include plants and animals from the story.
2. Design a Board Game that follows the story line of one or more of the main characters. Play the game with your friends.
3. Make a puppet or stuffed animal of a character from the book. Perform a puppet show from a scene in the book.
4. Design a poster to advertise a movie made from this book. Include pertinent information about the book.
5. Make a sculpture of a character from the book. Use clay, soap, etc.
6. Design and color a scene of the rainforest with 10 items well hidden in your picture. Make a list of the hidden items on the back.
7. Design a bookmark to fit the book’s personality.
8. Design an award for this book. Explain what the award is for and why this book deserves to receive it.
9. Shane acted as a photojournalist in this book taking pictures of his adventures. Use your camera to show an adventure of your own.
1. Research answers to the following topics about Orangutans.
a. Class and/or species of the animal
b. Characteristics of this
class/species
c. Part of the world or climate of habitat
d.
Gestation period for this species
e. Usual number of offspring
born at one time and frequency of births
f. Diet
g. Pet
possibility? Why or why not?
h. Use or harm to humans
2. Choose any letter in the alphabet. Research and find the names of plants and animals in the rain forest that begin with that letter. Make as long a list as you can.
3. Research and draw a web of the earth’s ecosystem showing links between man, animals and plants
What the Parrot
Told Alice
ISBN (Printed paperback edition) 0-9651452-7-1
ISBN (eBook edition) 978-1-935841-64-7
Book in progress
What the Tortoise Told Alice
CONTACT DALE SMITH OR DEER CREEK PUBLISHING
P.O. Box 2594
Nevada City, CA 95959
• Telephone: 530
913 1758
• Email: dalesmith@dale-smith.com
• Web site: www.deercreekpublishing.com
(coming soon)