Stone Soup

By: Jon J. Muth

Multicultural/International Literature

Three monks, Hok, Lok, and Siew were traveling a mountain road trying to understand what makes one happy.  The three monks came upon a village, but this village had been through some hard times and they were no longer willing to help each other out.  When these villagers saw the monks coming they disappeared into their houses and closed their windows tight.  The three monks decided to show the villagers how to make stone soup.  As the monks started making the soup the villagers began to come out of their houses in curiosity.  They all ended up bringing items to help make the stone soup better and the villagers discovered how much they had to give to help one another out.

This book would be a good book to have a short mini lesson on, maybe at a morning meeting or at the end of the day.  I would read this book out loud to my students and discuss with them the importance of sharing and helping others out instead of keeping things all for themselves.  Then I would have the students write a short response in their writing journals about something that they have that they could share to help others.