Freewater - Literature Kit Gr. 5-6

Students will become immediately engaged with this resource due to the fun and educational activities. Explain the reason behind the appearance of the “tree people”. Dissect key characters from the story to learn the meanings behind their actions. Determine why it is ironic that Sanzi set the cornfields on fire. Explore Sanzi’s initial reaction to the Southerland Plantation. Complete a timeline showing the historical events related to the resistance and triumph over slavery. Create a character cube to understand their motivations. Aligned to your State Standards and written to Bloom's Taxonomy, our worksheets incorporate a variety of scaffolding strategies along with additional crossword, word search, comprehension quiz and answer key.

About the Novel:
Freewater follows the journey of a young boy and girl as they find refuge with a hidden society of escaped slaves living in the swamp. Homer and his younger sister Ada have escaped the Southerland Plantation. Now they are alone and lost in the swamp. Ada wants to wait for their mother, who also escaped with them. Homer feels guilty as he’s the reason their mother went back to find his friend. Now they don’t know where their mother is, and the overseer from the Plantation is looking for them. Found by a man named Suleman, the two siblings escape the reaches of the overseer and venture further into the thick swamp. Eventually, Suleman lead the pair to Freewater—an established community of escaped slaves. Here, Homer and Ada experience a life of freedom and kinship. However, Homer can’t shake his guilt over losing their mother, and determines to make a plan to go back to Southerland to rescue her.