Tassai is a Pueblo Indian girl who lives on top of a mesa. She secretly makes a beautiful clay jar to enter in a competition to show what the Indians can make. On the day of the competition, Tassai accidentally brings a corncob doll instead of her jar. She runs home but follows a little white girl who had been watching. Tassai saves the girl from a rattlesnake by throwing and breaking her jar. Impressed, the white man agrees the Indians can learn from each other in a new school, allowing Tassai and the others to stay in their village.

1. Presented by:
• Jordan Rey Infante
• Queenie Bombase
• Annalyn Escobia
The Jar of Tassai • Joebert Casunuran
• Adrian Paul Conoza
• Dominique Casacop
• Miccaela Diaz
• Chelsea Inton
• Elaine Venus Elepaño

2. About the Author
Grace Purdie Moon (1877-1947)

3. Grace P. Moon
 Grace P. Moon had a deep interest in native
American Indian Culture. Together with her
husband, Carl, she lived on reservations in
the Southwest. The Moons spent many years
among the Hopi and Navajo tribes, where
they gathered much interesting information
for her books. Grace Moon won a Newbery
Medal in 1929 for “Runaway Papoose”.

4.  Change takes place in many ways. Some
changes are seen in the physical appearance
of a person; some changes cannot be seen
but can be perceived. Some changes occur in
people’s attitude and behaviour. After every
change, everything falls into its rightful
place.

5. Definition of Terms
 Mesa- high, steep-sided rock
plateau
 Beaded moccasins- a sturdy slipper-
shaped type of shoe sewn from
tanned leather
 Ears of corn- cob of corn
 Smooth as honey- pleasant to touch
 Corncob doll- a doll made out of
corn

6. The Jar of Tassai
By Grace P. Moon

7. 1
 Tassai lived on the top of a mesa that looked far out
over the Painted Desert. The air was clear as thin
ice. It made even the farthest mountains and blue
hills look nearer than they really were. Tassai was
an Pueblo Indian girl, brown as a nut that has dried
in the sun. She liked to lie on the edge of the mesa
and look over the desert and dream long dreams.

8. 2
 But Tassai did not often have time for dreams.
There was too much work for her to do. It was not
hard work, and it had magic in it. It had the magic
of watching green things spring up out of the
ground where only brown earth had been before.
For Tassai worked with her mother in the little
fields at the foot of the mesa.

9. 3
 Tassai brought water, too, from the spring at
the foot of the mesa, carrying it up the steep trail in
jars. For hours each day, she grounfd the red blue
and yew grains of corn. She cooked when her
mother needed her help, she knew where to find the
grasses that her mother wove into baskets.

10. 4
 There was one thing Tassai did that no one knew
about, for she did it only at times when no eyes
were watching. She was making a jar from clay that
she has found in a secret place, where the earth was
smooth as honey to the touch and rich and dark in
color. Not even her mother knew that Tassai was
working at this jar. She had a very special reason for
making it.

11. 5
 She shaped and smoothed it just as she had seen her
mother do, until one day the most beautiful jar all
seemed to form itself in her hands. She could hardly
believe her own eyes, it was so beautiful. And when
she added a design of little black lines and baked it
golden brown, she thought again that never had a
jar been so lovely as this one. She wrapped it in a
piece of blanket and hid it away carefully until the
time should come for her to show it.

12. 6
All through the hours when she worked in the fields, Tassai
thought of her jar. In her thoughts a little song sang itself
over and over again for her feet danced to the music of it:
It is so beautiful,
My big, round jar!
So round and beautiful!
Only the moon,
When it walks on the edge of the world

13. At harvest time
Is like my Jar.
Round and smooth it is,
And has a shine that sings!
Maybe the Moon has come to me
To be my jar! (repeat 7625948x)

14. 7
 Not long before Tassai made her jar, the Governor
of the Pueblo called the people of the town in the
little open place where meetings were held. He told
them that the people of three towns were going to
meet for a time of dancing and feasting. He asked
that each man, woman, and child bring to feast
something he or she had made. This was because a
great white man visited the Indian towns had said
that the Indians could not make anything. The
white man had also said that, since this was so, the
Indian children would have to go away to the white
man’s school to learn the white man’s ways.

15. 8
 The Indians did not want their children to be sent
away. They planned to show all the finest things
that they could make so that the white man would
change his mind. Prizes would be given for the best
things brought to the feast.

16. 9
 There was much excitement at the governor’s news
and much talking and planning of what should be
done. Tassai was excited from the first. She could
hardly wait for the time to come.

18. 10
 The day itself was wonderful. There was a feel in
the air that was different. Tassai felt that she could
not walk or even breathe as she did on other days.
The open place in the town was bright with color. It
was like a fair.

19. 11
 There were good smell and different sounds
everywhere. There were baskets and pottery and
woven things of leather and wood. There were great
pumpkins and squashes and ears of corn that were
bigger than any Tassai had ever seen before.There
were beaded moccasins and sandals for the feet and
nets for carrying things. There were fruits piled high
in baskets and little cake made of pine nuts and
seeds. There was good food cooking.

20. 12
 Tassai was one of the very last to come into the
open place on that big day. She had been busy since
dawn, helping her mother make their home ready
for stangers to see. When at last she was free, she
picked up the blanket in which her jar was wrapped
and ran to the open place. There she stood, holding
tightly to her bundle.

21. 13
 The old Governor of the Pueblo, with two white
men from the big white school, moved from place to
place. The looked long and closely at each of the
many things that had been brought. These three
men were to say which were the best of all and to
give the prizes.

22. 14
 A little white girl, daughter of one of the men,
danced ahead of them as they walked. She looked at
everything with bright, eager eyes. Her father
looked at her proudly as often as he looked at the
shining things the Indians had made.

23. 15
When the men had seen everything else, Tassai came
closer with her bundle and touched the blanket with
trembling fingers. She was frightened now. Perhaps
they would not think her jar was beautiful. Others
crowded close. They had not known that Tassai would
have anything to show.

24. 16
 “Maybe it is not very good,” she said in a voice that
was so slow that no one heard her. “Maybe it –”
Then her words would not come at all, for when she
opened her bundle the beautiful jar was not there.
She had not noticed that there were two bundles of
blankets in the room of her home. Then one she had
picked up in her excitement held only an old
corncob doll.

25. 17
 There was a big laugh from those who stood near.
The words of Tassai, explaining her mistake, were
lost. Quickly she pushed her way through the
laughing crowd and ran home. She did not know
that the little girl, eager to see again that strange
doll, was following close behind her.

26. 18
 The house of Tassai was the last one in the little
town, on the very edge of the mesa top. She ran into
the door and did not notice that the little white girl
who had followed her had stopped suddenly just
outside the doorway. The child was watching, with
wide, frightened eyes, a snake that lifted its head
from beside a big stone. It was a rattlesnake, and it
moved its flat, ugly head closer to the little girl. She
gave one sharp cry as Tassai came out the door with
the jar in her arms. Tassai had thrown aside the
blanket and held the jar unwrapped in her arms.

27. 19
 There was no time to think. There was no time
to call for help. Tassai did the only thing she could
do. With all her strength she threw the jar at the
snake. It broke into many pieces on the rock, and
the snake lay flat and still.

28. 20
For the first moment Tassai thought only that the
snake was dead. The she thought of her jar. No one
would call it beautiful now. She picked up a little
broken piece. One of the white men took it from her
hand.
“It must have been a mighty pretty jar,” he said. “Did
you make it?”
Tassai nodded. The father of the white girl looked at
the piece of the jar, too, and then at Tassai.

29. 21
 “That was a beautiful jar,” he said slowly. His voice
shook a little so that he had to clear his throat. “I am
sorry that we cannot give the prize for a broken jar-
but-” He cleared his voice again. “For what you
have done for me I will give you anything else you
ask.” He closed his arms more tightly around his
little girl.

30. 22
 At first Tassai could not answer. In her surprise
the words would not come. Then she said, there is
nothing I wish but to stay here in the pueblo. Could
it be that we need not go far to learn the ways of
white men?”

31. 23
 The man smiled. “You will not have to go away,” he
assured Tassai. “The white teachers are coming here
to learn from the Indians instead. Today your
people have shown what beautiful things they can
make- like your jar. There will be a school here
where the Indians and the white teachers will work
together.”

32. 24
 Tassai was very happy now. It did not matter that
her jar was broken. She could make another, even
more beautiful.

33. May you have a great day!
To God be the Glory!