Group Retelling Cards • Work with your table partners to create retelling cards about the story, Bringing the Rain to Kapiti Plain. • Use text-evidence from the story to guide your retelling. • When your cards are complete, we will have time to share. Why the cumulative story structure? These can be tedious to read for tired parents, especially if you’re reading at bedtime; in my experience I start yawning uncontrollably. However, a cumulative tale that builds on itself is a good narrative choice for an environmental story, because cumulative tales emphasise connections between things.

Culminating Activity • Students will complete a Story Map using text evidence from the story. • Students may use shoulder partners. The Nandi are an ethnic group in East Africa, living in the highlands of Kenya. This book is about a particular area called the Kapiti Plain and is a Nandi folktale about a drought and how one man was able to bring rain to the plain. Kipat has worked out how to make it rain. Honestly, I kind of wish this is how it worked. NEW SITUATION This book has much in common with "Why Mosquitoes Buzz..." such as the setting, the way the events are linked one to another, the overall tone and feel, the source of the narrative. In particular it seems as though the way these two books illustrate interconnectedness between events and cause/effect relationships could justify the claim that they carry the same motif.

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This book could be used with a variety of ages. For younger classes, it could be an engaging read aloud. For older classes, it could be used as part of a larger unit of mythology or poetry. I love books about myths and I'm always looking for resources for my students from different areas of Africa to connect to. I look forward to adding this book to my classroom library. Turn and Talk • What do we need to know about the story to do a retelling? • Who is the main character in the story? How would you describe him? • What is the setting? • What is the problem in the story? • Why is rain important to Kapiti Plain? • How did Ki-pat react when he saw how hungry and dry his cows were? • How does the character respond to the problem? • What is the result of his actions? • What is the solution in the story? • What is the central message of the story? What are the key details in the story that support your answer? Bringing the Rain to Kapiti Plain” is a folktale from the Nandi people in Kenya. It is about Ki-pat, a herdsman who tries to make it rain during a drought so the cattle will have grass to graze on. I don’t know how Kapiti is meant to be pronounced — semi-arid lands in Kenya with a 550mm average rainfall — but my pronunciation is influenced by the name of the south-western North Island of New Zealand, called Kapiti Coast, in which the first syllable is stressed. Day Two: Set a Purpose • What is a retelling? • What parts does a good retelling have? Turn and Talk

Vidal’s illustrations have a folktale vibe about them, partly due to those nice white outlines reminiscent of a woodcut. Like many old tales about young men who solve a problem and become successful, Kipat is rewarded with a wife. Woman as chattel, treated as about as important as the cows. How Nandi folklore thinks of cattle… and human mothers. EXTRAPOLATED ENDING Focusing on the main character, Kipat, his big problem is that a drought affects Kapiti Plain, and his cows can’t get enough to eat and drink. DESIRE

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A traditional tale filled with rhymes and repetitive texts which portrayed the Kapiti plain beautifully. The illustrations pinned out the exact drought situation and the tribes of Africa.