And Still The Turtle Watched
From Reading Rainbow · 1993
28 min2nd3rd4thReading & Writing (ELA)Social Studies
Summary
Sheila MacGill-Callahan's lyrical picture book follows a stone turtle carved by a Delaware tribe, who watches the river change over centuries — the land transformed by settlement, pollution, and eventually hope for restoration.
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All ages
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Teaching resources
Discussion questions
Discussion
A stone turtle carved by a Delaware tribe watches the world change for hundreds of years.
- How does the land around the turtle change from the time it is carved to the present?
- What does the turtle represent for the Delaware people who carved it?
- What does this story teach about the long-term effects of how we treat the land?
- What do you think the turtle would say if it could speak to us today?
Quick work-a-long
Vocabulary: Delaware tribe, sacred, erosion, pollution, restoration.
Try it: Draw a "before and after" picture showing one way that a natural place has changed over time. Write one sentence describing what caused the change.