The Bee Tree

[Cindy]

Sunday, July 12, 2009 Rainy

The Bee Tree

How often do you struggle to find honey?   I read my two sons the book of ‘The Bee Tree’ written by Patricia Polacco in this afternoon.  The summary of the book is as follows.

In the living room, there were a grandfather and a granddaughter.  The granddaughter said she didn’t want to read books and wanted to play outside.  The grandfather said that it’s time to look for a bee tree and he described the bee tree.

According to him, bees build their hives in the bee tree and store the sweetest honey in the world in the bee tree.

When they got out of their house, the grandfather captured several bees and put them into a bottle.  And then, they let go of a bee and they followed the bee to search its hives.  When they followed the bee, they met their neighbors.  Lots of neighbors joined exploring the bee tree.  The scenery looked like the other storybooks’ scenery such as The Gingerbread Man’s and The Enormous Turnip’s.  The trail was packed with long lines of the neighbors.

They passed a path, a field, a hill and a forest to search the bee tree.  When the bee disappeared, the grandfather released another from the bottle and the neighbors kept following the bee.  At long last, they found a bee tree.  They took out the hives from the bee tree and brought the hives to the house.  When the neighbors were eating the honey, the grandfather brought his granddaughter to a room.  He showed her a book, dropped a spoon of honey on the book and let her taste the honey.  When she tasted the honey on the book, he said there was honey in the book as well, such as adventure, knowledge and wisdom and he added that the honey could not be gained of itself.  To sum up, we have to look for those things for ourselves flipping through books as they followed the bee to look for the bee tree. 

After reading that book, I asked my sons what kinds of messages they got.  Of course, it’s very difficult for my seven-year-old son to understand the messages.  He said there was honey in the book.  It was natural and pure of him to say like that.  On the contrary, my nine-year-old son added those things such as adventure, knowledge and wisdom could not be gained of themselves.  I doubted whether they understood the meaning of those or not.  So, I had to explain the meaning of those to my sons briefly and easily.   And I asked myself how many times I tasted honey by reading books.

[carah]

I'd like to read a story book to my boys as like you.^^:: (What am i saying?? ㅋ)

[Cindy]

I'm an adult, but I was touched by that book. Carah, you can try to read your lovely sons that book.^^