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

 

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

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/