Author's Purpose

 Outside my open classroom windows, an early spring day unfolded, leaves poised to burst with verdant effort. Inside, my third-graders settle into the afternoon session, following recess. They’re still drowsy from their immersion in fresh air when I ask them to get out their reading books.

When I discovered the novel unit for The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe in our whole language curriculum, I fell on it like rain in April. Instead of having them read with their groups as we’ve been doing, today I want them to enjoy following along as I take advantage of a captive audience. I love reading to my class.

We’re at the climax of Lewis’s chronicle, and my students sit enraptured as the fictional day breaks when Lucy finds her beloved, untamed lion come back from the dead. I pause in my reading. Seventeen nine-year-old faces look up from their paperbacks, wondering why Mrs. Cutts has a catch in her voice.

“Turn and talk to your neighbors about what just happened. In two minutes, we’ll collect all our ideas on the chalkboard.” That directive will give me time to collect myself and continue.

Once the little timer on my desk empties its sands, I pull a popsicle stick with a child’s name from a jar and we begin our discussion.

“Maybe Aslan was asleep.”

“He might have been faking to fool the White Witch.”

“Was he really stabbed, or did he have a secret pocket for the knife to slip into? Lucy and Susan didn’t see it happen.”

“His magic might have kept him from dying.”

I record these ideas in my best chalkboard cursive and turn back to notice Paul’s face. His eyes narrow and fix on a point down and to his left. After a moment, his brows crinkle, then he looks at me anew, Lucy’s dawn on his face, and up flies his arm, despite the rule that during popsicle picking we don’t raise our hands.

“Yes, Paul?”

“Mrs. Cutts, I think Aslan was really dead, and he came back just like Jesus.” He lets out a sound of astonishment. “It’s just like the Easter story.”

“Hmmm. What an interesting idea.” I nod, remembering my curriculum supervisor’s admonition not to discuss the religious symbolism of the story. Out of the mouths of babes, after all. I wonder who is paying attention and ask, “Do you think the author meant for us to notice that?” What may be the most teachable moment of my career cannot be wasted.

My students don’t seem at all shocked by Paul’s realization. Some of them agree; they see the similarity and think Lewis meant for them to, some think the connection a coincidence, others are more concerned about sharing what the bunny brought them after they hear the word “Easter.”  

“Okay. Let’s open our reading logs to make predictions about what will happen next.” I’m anxious to read their comments.

Lewis wrote in an essay, “Sometimes Fairy Stories May Say Best What’s to Be Said,” “It certainly is my opinion that a book worth reading only in childhood is not worth reading even then.” Since his Narnia stories animate my adult mind, I give him a nod and agree. As my students scribble away, I imagine Lewis leaning toward the Lion of Judah. In his refined British accent he comments, “I trust the point wasn’t entirely lost on them.”

And the Lion replies, “I’ve said it before, ‘The kingdom belongs to such as these,’ my friend.”