A cooperative reading activity: TolstoyGraham Thurgood (English 232) 94 A cooperative reading activity: Tolstoy Teaching tips Leo Tolstoy, the well-known Russian writer, worked as a teacher for a time and during this periodof his life he wrote stories for his students. Today, we will use one of these stories entitled "Shark" for a cooperative reading activity. The pre-class preparation for cooperative reading is simple: you divide a text up into five parts, re-order the parts, and set the conclusion aside for later use.The first stage involves dividing the class into four groups. One way of doing this is to have studentcount off: one, two, three, four. Students then form new groups from their numbers: The "ones" form onegroup, the "twos" form another, the "threes" form another, and "fours" form another. The number in eachgroup will depend on the number of students in the class.Then distributing one of the parts to each group, giving each student a copy. They do the task laiddown in Instruction 1 of the Student Worksheet.Since the members of each group know their own part of the story — but nothing else, new groupsneed to be formed out of the four original groups. You need to make sure that the new groups are formed insuch a way that all four parts of the story are present in each new group. Have the students count off in each of the four original groups: one, two, three, four, five, six, andso on. Students then form new groups from their new numbers. The "ones" form one group, the "twos" formanother group, and so on. Most groups will have four members, but if there may be groups that have three. Members ofgroups with only three members should join another group.The new groups then perform the task specified in Instruction 2 of the Student Worksheet. Remem-ber that they should not use the copy of their part of the story to do this activity.Finally, distribute the actual ending and have the students read it.Note that the contribution of each student is vital to the reconstruction of the total story. So as aconsequence each student's contribution is valuable. Thus, the stronger students are motivated to try to getthe details of the story out of even the weakest of their members. Student WorksheetInstruction 1 (to the members of each group) In a few minutes, each of you will be put into another group. In your new group, you will probablybe the only one who has read your part of the story. You will not be allowed to use your piece ofpaper in the next group.Read your part of the story and then discuss it with the other members of your group. Beprepared to tell the story to others outside your group:a. tell what happenedb. tell who the main characters arec. tell about the situation and setting Instruction 2 (to the members of the new groups) 1. You may not use your written copy of the story any longer.Graham Thurgood (English 232) 952. Discuss the story together until you think you understand it.3. Then, make up an ending to the story and write it out.4. Be prepared to read your ending to the class.Graham Thurgood (English 232) 96 "Shark" By Leo Tolstoy Translated by Ela Piatkowska Thurgood Our ship was anchored off the coast of Africa. The early partof the day was beautiful, with a fresh wind blowing in from the sea,but towards evening the wind direction changed: a hot breeze com-ing straight off the Sahara made it extremely hot and humid.Just before sunset, the captain came out on deck and calledout, “Time for a swim!” Within minutes, the sailors had jumped into the water, low-ered the canvas sail, put it into the water, and made it into a swim-ming pool. There were two young boys on the ship with us. The boysboth jumped into the water right away, but it was too crowded forthem in the canvas sail, and they decided to swim in the open sea,playing and chasing after each other. Like two young boys testing their strength and endurance,they began to swim to the barrel that was over the anchor. One ofthe boys was in the lead at first, but then he started to fall behind. The father of the boy, an old artilleryman, stood on the deck,delighted with his son. When his son started to fall behind, hisfather shouted to him, “Don't quit! Try harder!” Suddenly somebody shouted from the deck, “Shark!”. And all of us saw the shark fin, moving through the water.The shark was swimming straight toward the boys. “Back! Back! Get back! Shark!”, shouted the artilleryman. But the boys did not hear him. They kept on swimming, laugh-ing and shouting even more loudly and happily than before. The artilleryman, as white as a sheet, was standing motion-less, just staring at the children. The sailors lowered the boat, jumped into it, and rowedtowards the boys as fast as they could, but they were still far fromthe shark, and the shark was already only a few meters away fromthe boys.Graham Thurgood (English 232) 97 At first the boys did not hear what the people were shoutingto them, so they did not know the shark was there, but then one ofthem looked back and saw it. The other boy heard his terrifiedscream, and the two boys swam as fast as they could in differentdirections. This scream seemed to wake up the artilleryman. From wherehe had been standing, he rushed toward the cannons. He turned thebarrel of the cannon, and, laying down on it, he aimed it and lit thewick. Everyone, everyone on the ship anxiously waited, not movingat all. A shot was heard, and we all saw the artilleryman fall downbeside the cannon and cover his face with his hands. We couldn'tsee what had happened with the shark and the boys, because thesmoke was too thick.But as the smoke cleared, you could hear our quiet murmurgrow louder and louder until, in the end, it was a roar of happiness.The old artilleryman uncovered his face and looked out at the sea. The shark was floating on the waves, dead, its yellow belly up. In a few minutes the boat reached the boys and brought them backto the ship. Vocabulary Each of the six words below has the same meaning as either one word (1) or two words (2) in each of the sixsentences below. Read each of the