And the dictionary does it again!

If you don’t know why the image is of a spider, I’m going to tell you why. I’m doing a review of the movie and book called Charlotte’s Web by E. B. White and illustrated by Garth Williams. I read the book and watched the movie in my classroom and I thought the book was better (of course).

Book Review

I have to say the drawings were really detailed so make way for illustrator Garth Williams. There was this one picture where a farmer named Lurvy was trying to tackle a pig who got out of his pen and accidentally tacked his cocker spaniel and the pig goes through Lurvy’s legs.

One of the things I like about E. B. White is that he uses a lot of good vocabulary. My teacher had us write new and interesting words on a post-it in the front of the book. One day I went home and my brother was eating all of my food and I said, “Stop being a glutton.” And my mom was really surprised that I used that word. She said, “Where did you learn that word?” My response: “Charlotte’s Web.” These vocabulary words below were from Charlotte’s Web just so you know why perspiration is there.

glut·ton

1.  one given habitually to greedy and voracious eating and drinking
2. one that has a great capacity for accepting or enduring something <a glutton for punishment>

per·spi·ra·tion

1.  the action or process of perspiring
2. a saline fluid secreted by the sweat glands: sweat

SPOILER ALERT

If you want to read this book stop reading NOW!!

Charlotte has a really clever plan to save Wilbur, the pig. Chalotte is saving Wilbur from getting killed and eaten at Christmas time. One day in school my teacher asked us to write in our journal about if you could save Wilbur how? A lot of people wanted to get him out of his pen, including me. But Charlotte’s plan involved him not getting out of his pen and into the world because Wilbur doesn’t want to go out of his pen. I am going to tell Charlotte’s plan in steps.

1. Charlotte spins the following words in her web: SOME PIG, TERRIFIC, RADIANT, HUMBLE
2. Mr. Zuckerman, Wilbur’s owner, will think that Wilbur is some pig, terrific, etc.
3. Mr. Zuckerman will then take Wilbur to the county fair and win prize money and an award.
4. When it is Christmas time Wilbur will not get killed because he won prize money for Mr. Zuckerman.

I don’t want to tell you too much information in case you are reading the book. But I would recommend you reading this book.

Movie Review

Let me just tell you…I have a lot of differences from the movie and the book and I don’t want to have to list them all because parental controls are going to shut down my computer in ten minutes so I don’t have a lot of time. To make a long story short you can totally tell Charlotte the spider was animated. My mom just said I have to explain but I only have nine more minutes to explain.

On another note, they left out Chapter Three, Escape, in the movie. I only have eight more minutes left so I’m going to save my post now. This is Robo signing off.

Oh, I have one more thing, these are references from where I got the definitions and the picture:

Definitions come from Merriam-Webster dictionary: http://www.merriam-webster.com/

photo credit: Aleš Smrdel via photopin.com

 

Rick Riordan Unlimited

One of my readers, Susan, asked me these questions and I told her I would answer in a blog post so here it is.

“I don’t know much about Rick Riordan. Can you tell me why you like his books? Can you recommend a favorite?”

Well Susan, I don’t have a favorite yet because I haven’t read all of his books but I can tell you why I like his books.

Here is my top five list for Rick Riordan:

1) In the Kane Chronicles, he puts words in brackets that are jokes because two characters are recording their voice on a tape and sometimes the other character says something while the other is recording. Here is an example from page 7 of chapter 1 (Fun with Spontaneous Combustion) :

Jaz was holding Walt’s hands. That surprised me, but it surprised Sadie even more. She made a squeaking sound like a mouse getting stepped on.

[Oh yes, you did. I was there.]

Carter is narrating this chapter. The part in brackets is Carter talking to Sadie in real life. This technique is on my top five list because it shows you that they are really recording it on a tape. It is funny.

2) I like Rick Riordan’s writing because he understands humor for kids. He know what kids will like or won’t like. See these other blog posts to learn about his funny chapter titles: Rick Riordan, New Series! and Scoop the Poop

3) In the Percy Jackson series I learned about a bunch of Greek Gods. Here are some examples:

• Zeus, God of the Gods
• Poseidon, God of the Sea
• Hades, God of the Underworld
• Athena, Goddess of Wisdom
• Artemis, Goddess of the Hunt
• Apollo, God of Music
• Diyonesius, God of Wine
• Demeter, Goddess of the Crops
• Gaia, Goddess of the Earth
• Hefastus, God of Fire

There are many more Greek Gods but my mom says I have to stop.

4) I also like that he doesn’t keep continuing the same series so you don’t have to wait for the next book to come out. He just write a bunch of series.

5) In the chapters each chapter gets better and better until the end it’s the final battle against any Egyptian or Greek or Roman God.

I know what I said in the beginning that I can’t tell you my favorite book but I take that back. I can tell you my favorite book but it is only going to have to be in the Percy Jackson series because I finished that series. My favorite book (drum roll please) is The Titan’s Curse, book number three. This is my favorite because there is a lot of action going on.

 

Scoop the Poop!

Sorry for the inconvenience. I wanted to add this list of funny chapters to the other post I wrote about Rick Riordan books but I want to have as many blog posts as possible so I’m writing a new post.

OK. Here are the chapters for book #4 of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series, The Battle of the Labyrinth. I didn’t add these funny chapters before because I just finished the book last night.

• I Battle the Cheerleading Squad
• Nico Buys Happy Meals for the Dead
• We Visit the Demon Dude Ranch
• I Scoop Poop
• We Play the Game Show of Death
• My Brother Duels Me to the Death
• Grover Causes a Stampede
• My Birthday Party Takes a Dark Turn

This book was my second favorite. My favorite book in the series so far is the Titan’s Curse, number 3.

Image from:  pakec via Compfight cc

Great Books for Kids

I’m going to tell you some books for kids that you can read. So parents listen up!

5-7 years old

Magic Tree House series by Mary Pope Osborne

• One day I read six books straight in one day. I learned a lot about places and people around the world because the characters time travel.

A to Z Mysteries by Ron Roy

• Every title of the book had to start with a certain letter. Like A, B, C, etc. The first book in the series was called The Absent Author.

6-8 years old

The Spiderwick Chronicles by Tony DiTerlizzi & Holly Black

• I liked this series because there was a lot of mystery and suspense in the books. 

7-12 years old

The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick

• I read this book in one night and I stayed up until 2 in the morning at my grandma’s house. That book was different from other books because it had mostly pictures and the pictures were really detailed.

The Chronicles of Harris Burdick by 14 different authors

• Here is a video about the mystery of Harris Burdick: 

Percy Jackson and the Olympians by Rick Riordan

• I’ve already told you enough information about this series in other blog posts.

The Kane Chronicles series also by Rick Riordan

• I got this series for Christmas and my grandma gave it to me because she knows I love to read. I haven’t read the series yet because I’m going to finish the Percy Jackson series before I start reading this series.

So folks this is all I have for today. – Robo

Movie Review: Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief (2010)

 I’ve been reading a series called Percy Jackson & The Olympians by Rick Riordan. I’m really liking the books. The book I’m current reading is called The Battle of the Labyrinth.

I just saw the movie called Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief last night but it was horrible because they skipped so many good parts. There were too many bad parts on my list that I couldn’t fit all of them in this post so here are the basics:

1. We didn’t see Ares, God of War.
2. They don’t fight the hydra until book two but in the movie Grover beat the hydra with the Medusa head in Nashville. It created one heck of a statue!
3. Luke isn’t revealed as a bad person until book two but in the movie he revealed himself as a servant of Kronos the Titan Lord.
4. In the book, Percy, Annabeth and Grover don’t look for the pearls to help them get out of the underworld. Instead, Poseidon gives Percy the pearls.
5. They don’t see Hades, the God of the Dead, until they get to the underworld. That was a big mistake by the movie makers. In the movie he just popped out of the fire in Camp Half-Blood.
6. They don’t go to the Lotus Casino on purpose in the book.
7. We don’t get to see Cerberus, the three-headed dog, in the movie.
8. The Medusa head was supposed to be in a meat loaf surprise to turn Gabe Ugliano into a statue. Instead, they put it in a refrigerator with a lock and a note that said, “Do not open this refrigerator under any circumstances.

There were only two things that I like about the movie:

1. I liked the scene where Percy, Annabeth and Grover were traveling in the underworld to see Hades. I liked it because there was a bunch of garbage floating in the air beside them as they were riding in the boat to Hades’ castle.
2. I liked Grover’s actor. I like him because the actor really acted like I expected him in the book to.

As you can tell, the movie makers got the whole plot of the story all wrong. I’ll bet that the author of these books gets so mad when he watches the movie because they skipped a bunch of parts. So for future reference do not watch this movie. I give this movie 0 out of 5 stars.

Picture of Poseidon by http://www.flickr.com/photos/h-k-d/

The Great Orchestra for Kids

On  December 8, 2012 I went to a performance for kids at Symphony Hall in downtown Chicago. The title of the performance was It’s Time to Play.

It was different from other concerts because Edwin Outwater, the conductor, talked to us about the music he was conducting instead of just playing the music.

My favorite piece was Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5, Mvt. 1. I liked it because I’ve heard it before and the conductor said that you should picture a stormy night sky in your head because that is what Beethoven is intending to do. One of the things that the conductor talked to the audience about it that Beethoven wanted to make his music suspencful so that audience would be like, “I wonder what is going to happen next?”

You can listen to this piece here (this is a different orchestra playing the song):

Also, there were members of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra playing the instruments and they had a lot of instruments. Some of the instruments were oboes, trombones, bassoons, timpani, violins, violas, cellos, french horns, tubas, and a computer. In the last piece called Mothership by Mason Bates there was a computer that made sound effects and each key had a different sound effect on the computer.

I think that they did this performance to entertain and inform. I think that they wrote this to inform because the conductor he told us what the composers meant for us to think while the music was playing in your head. Like in one of the pieces Beethoven wanted you to think of a thunder storm at night. Charles Ives wanted to make you laugh when you heard his Symphony No. 2, Mvt. 4. It was entertaining because in the piece that Charles Ives wrote he would take a wrong note and stick it at the end of the song and it wouldn’t sound right. Before the performance the conductor asked us to sing Row, Row, Row Your Boat and then make the most obnoxious sound at the last note. It was really funny.

Some of the other pieces that they played that I didn’t tell you about in the other paragraphs were Symphony No. 6, Mvt. 1 by Franz Joseph Haydn and Symphony No. 94 (Surprise), Mvt. 2 by Franz Joseph Haydn also. There was also Symphony No. 4, Mvt. 4 by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky and also Symphony No. 9, Mvt. 3 by Antonin Dvorak. And the last one was Symphony No. 6, Mvt. 4 by Ludwig van Beethoven.

If you have a child I would recommend going to this next concert that they have on Friday, May 3, 2013 at 10:15am and 12:00pm. It is called Get Up and Dance. They also have another performance on March 15, 2013 at 10:15am and 12:00pm called Now Let’s Sing. I would recommend you take your child because the conductor talks to you instead of just playing the music. If he just played the music you wouldn’t know what was going on. This is the website to find out information  http://cso.org/Institute/ChildrenAndFamilies/FamilyMatinee.aspx

Picture from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/alsal/6536633865/lightbox/