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Vale Middle School Reading Article

A tortured choice in famine: Which child lives?

Instructions: COMPLETE ALL QUESTIONS AND MARGIN NOTES

Questions: Answer in COMPLETE SENTENCES unless otherwise instructed. Lists and charts are the

exception and may be answered in phrases.

Read the following article carefully and make notes in the margin as you read.

Your notes should include:

o Comments that show that you understand the article. (A summary or statement of the main

idea of important sections may serve this purpose.)

o Questions you have that show what you are wondering about as you read.

o Notes that differentiate between fact and opinion.

o Observations about how the writer’s strategies (organization, word choice, perspective,

support) and choices affect the article.

Your margin notes are part of your score for this assessment.

Student _________________________________Class Period______________________

DADAAB, Kenya (AP) — Wardo Mohamud Yusuf walked for two weeks with her 1-

Notes on my thoughts,

reactions and questions as I

year-old daughter on her back and her 4-year-old son at her side to flee Somalia's

read:

drought and famine. When the boy collapsed near the end of the journey, she poured

some of the little water she had on his head to cool him, but he was unconscious and

could not drink. She asked other families traveling with them for help, but none

stopped, fearful for their own survival.

Then the 29-year-old mother had to make a choice that no parent should have to make.

"Finally, I decided to leave him behind to his God on the road," Yusuf said days later in

an interview at a teeming refugee camp in Dadaab, Kenya. "I am sure that he was alive,

and that is my heartbreak."

Parents fleeing the devastating famine on foot — sometimes with as many as seven

children in tow — are having to make unimaginably cruel choices: Which children have

the best chance to survive when food and water run low? Who should be left behind?

"I have never faced such a dilemma in my life," Yusuf told The Associated Press. "Now

I'm reliving the pain of abandoning my child. I wake up at night to think about him. I

feel terrified whenever I see a son of his age."

Dr. John Kivelenge, a mental health officer for the International Rescue Committee at

Dadaab emphasizes the extreme duress Somali mothers and fathers are facing.

"It is a normal reaction to an abnormal situation. They can't sit down and wait to die

together," he said. "But after a month, they will suffer post-traumatic stress disorder,

which means they will have flashbacks and nightmares.

"The picture of the children they abandoned behind will come back to them and haunt

them," he said. "They will also have poor sleep and social problems."

A Tortured Choice In Famine: Which Child Lives - Middle School Reading Article Worksheet