Writing - Two Word Sentences

For this week in writing, we have been learning about two word sentences. We came up with a list of two word sentences then used them to create a compound sentence and a complex sentence. The two word sentences I decided to use are: I'm sorry, stay inside and that's absurd.

Capitalisation

During writing today, we were learning about capitals. Our challenge was to fix these sentences by putting capitals where they should be. All of the letters in blue were what I changed, as they had lower case letters instead of capitals.

Apostrophes

For writing today, we learned how to use apostrophes properly. There are two different ways to use them. If you are talking about one person, you write it like this: The shopkeeper's chocolate is amazing. If you are talking about more than one person, you write it like this: The doctors' performed surgery.  

Writing

 

Today, I finished a writing task about hyperboles. Hyperbole is a extreme exaggerated statement or claim which aren't meant to be taken seriously. We had to write a short story about our unfortunate walk home. In our story, we had to include five examples of hyperbole.

Language Feature

For writing, our language feature is Metaphors. The sentences in the table were slip in half, and we had to match them together. Then, we had to highlight the metaphors in some sentences. I enjoyed this task because I don't use metaphors often and it was kind of challenging. 

Similes

Today for writing, my group was learning about similes. Similes are used to compare words using like or as. First we had to match up a bunch of different similes and then we had to choose one to illustrate. This is the similes that I choose to illustrate: as good as gold.

Similes - Language Features

This is a DLO about a simile (It's as slippery as an Eel). A simile is a sentence that compares two things with as or like. A Eel is very slippery and in this simile, something is as slippery as an Eel. Here are some other similes:

I’m busy as a Bee

It’s as slippery as an Eel

She’s as quick as a Bunny

He’s as blind as a Bat

She’s as wise as an Owl

She’s as happy as a Lark

It’s as slow as a Snail

He’s as stubborn as a Mule

He’s as gentle as a Lamb

You are quiet as a Mouse

He’s as strong as an Ox

I’m as sick as a Dog

Comparative and Superlative

Today for writing, we were learning the comparative and superlative words. We did a few words, but I decided to use the word angry. The comparative word for angry, is angrier and the superlative word for angry is angriest. I found some pictures to show those three words. 

Dialogue

Here is my DLO on dialogue that I made. In this DLO it shows you how to use dialogue properly and it shows examples.

Five Minutes Of...

This is my five minute story that I made with AJ. We had to write this story back to back and we weren't allowed to speak. It was very interesting because we weren't allowed to communicate with each other.

Operation Rescue

I shivered in the early morning cold, standing there on the beach, in my togs. I decided to have a good morning swim. I leaped off the wharf and started swimming, the water was freezing! I continued to swim further and further until I couldn’t reach the bottom of the sea. Then, I noticed something out of the corner of my eye, a humongous wave was heading straight for me, and with no time to swim away, I braced myself for the impact. As the huge waves crashed down on me, I struggled to breathe.

I managed to get above the water and breathe in some fresh air, then I saw more waves coming at me, each as big as the others. The wind howled - as if it was laughing at my fate. I tried to put my arm up, desperately wanted to be rescued. It was at that moment, I saw it. The Westpac helicopter saw me in trouble, and attempted to save me. Then the winch came down, with a man on it, he put a safety harness around me and we went slowly back up into the helicopter. “Thank you for saving my life” I said gratefully.

“Next time you should decide carefully when you go swimming, especially in this awful weather” the medic told me.

Hyperbole

Today for writing, LS2 was learning what hyperbole means. Hyperbole is a exaggeration. A example is: I've had millions of interruptions in this classroom today. You probably wouldn't have had millions. Maybe heaps of interruptions, but certainty not millions.

Recounts

Today Mrs Anderson's writing group looked at some recounts written by people in different schools. We went on the blogs of people who were in the Manaiakalani cluster. Next, we put the link to the blog post with the recount onto a drawing and a reason why we thought it was good. Next we had a recount quiz. I scored 10 out of 10.

Owl Narrative

This is my narrative that I wrote. I had to write a story about a baby owl who is taking his/her first flight.

Leap Of Faith

This is it. My big day, Ralph thought to himself as the wind howled outside like a owl in pain. Ralph is a Barn Owl who just turned nine weeks old. Today was a test to see if he could fly. He really wanted to make his mother proud (His dad died in a storm). Ralph lived in a tree, with the rest of his parliament (A group of owls), though he had his own hole with his mother. The parliament are all Barn owls. The more important owls lived up near the top of the tree while the less important owls were further down. Normally, on a windy day like this he would be in one of his friends homes playing a fun game called I Spy with them.

“Ralph, come and have your breakfast!” his mother called.

“Coming” was the reply, which was muffled because he was lying face down in his nest which was made out of bits of grass and leaves.

Ralph didn’t eat much because he thought he might puke with nervousness. Suddenly, a loud hoot was heard from near the top of the tree. All of the owls who were nine to ten weeks old were being called up for their test.

“You will fly from this tree all the way to that apple tree across from here” said one of the older owls. He was in charge because he was really wise and fair. Ralph fixed his eyes on his target and took a deep breath.

“When I call, fly for the tree” the elder spoke again.

“GO!”

All of the birds took off and launched themselves from the branch that they clung tightly on. Ralph started flapping his wings but he was forgetting one important thing: He wasn’t supposed to flap just up and down, he had to move his wings forward too . By the time he realized his mistake, it was too late. At that moment, Ralph started panicking as the ground rushed up to meet him…

“Are you alright?” Ralph could hear his mother's familiar voice as he opened his eyes.

“Yeah, i’m fine” he replied.

He got out of his bed and walked out of his house.

“Where are you going?” his mother asked from somewhere behind him.

“I got to try again mum, or I’ll never get to fly”

“Be careful” was the worried reply.

On the way to the top of the tree, Ralph found some other owls his age, they were bullies and had a big ego. They thought they were cool and always got what they wanted, like more food, for they created far too much trouble if they didn’t it.

“Here is the failure!” one of them called, as the others sniggered.

“Everyone else made it apart from you!” another one exclaimed.

“I’m going to go and try again” replied Ralph.

“What, so you can fail again?” that was the first one again.

Ralph then decided to ignore them as he marched to his destination.

When he got back to the top area of the tree he found the elder owl of the parliament.

“I knew you would try again” the elder said.

“How did you know?” Ralph asked, puzzled.  

“Your father failed on his first flight as well, but he came back and tried”

“Did he succeed?”

“Yes, just remember, you must concentrate and focus”

“Yeah, I got it”

Ralph looked down at the grassy ground way below him, and the at the tree with delicious red apples. He put out one foot, to test how strong the air was. Once he was prepared, he leaped and glided through the air. He flapped his wings in the way he was supposed to, in fact, he did everything correct so soon he found himself soaring through the air chuckling in delight. It was a wonderful feeling, to be flying, with the air going past his face. Once he landed on his target, the apple tree, he flew back to his home, where his mum watched him land. She had a big smile on her face.

“Well done” she said happily.

Quick Writes

Today for writing, LS2 did some quick writes. They are six sentence story's that can be written quickly. The first sentence that we write is a starter (Like once a upon a time). The first sentence also introduces the main character. The second sentence describes the place where the character lives. The third sentence describes the characters special talent. The fourth sentence describes the character's problem. The fifth tell why the character feels that way, and the final sentence tells how the character solved the problem. Here are some examples that Cyrus and I made. We worked hard as a team to complete these. We had to be creative and imaginative to make these short narrative's. We used the Harris Burdick pictures to prompt our writing.

Pourquoi Story

This is my Pourquoi story about how Ngatu (Tapa cloth) came to Tonga because last week was Tongan language week. After I wrote my story, I had to work with a critical friend who used DRAFT (A writing framework) to make my story better.

How Ngatu Came To Tonga

Somewhere, some place, beyond the Seven Seas lived a small village. Now, they were not an ordinary village, they were fierce and known around the country to be undefeated and bloodthirsty. In this particular village, there was a boy who did not want to follow the way of his male ancestors or other men in the village. He did not want to be a warrior. He was quiet and peaceful, unlike the other boys in his tribe. His father, who was the battle commander of the village tried to train him to be like him, but gave up quickly.

The boy was lonely, he had no friends. The other boys were either wrestling or practising with their spears. Usually, he wandered around in the beach throwing rocks and shells or he strolled through the forest. The whole tribe thought he was a coward because he refused to even touch a weapon.

He liked to muck around with clay and bits of tree bark. He found out that the clay could be used to draw pictures on the tree bark. The boy used the paper mulberry tree most of the time because it mixed well with the clay. He mostly lay quiet, spying and stalking the birds and other creatures, drawing them till the sun went down and dusk approached.  

One day, he stayed late and worked with the moon shining down on him. Meanwhile, his father went looking for him and found him. Soon the whole village knew what the boy did when he disappeared for long periods of time. The boy was locked in his room and the door only opened when someone brought him food. After awhile, another village declared war, and this time there was no escape for the boy. He found himself walking with other men and boys his age, with a spear in his hand. The raid was bloody and awful, with men shouting war cries and screaming in pain. Men fell left and right with blood pouring from their wounds. Still, the warriors kept charging at their foes. Of course the boy’s village won, being the best fighters in the valley.

After the raid, the boy ran away to his secret hiding place a drew for what seemed like days and nights. He drew so much that his fingers bleed and were very sore. He drew flowers, fish swimming in a ocean, his village and himself. He put all of his effort into creating this extravagant piece of what is now called art. He used lots of clay and a whole tree to make this painting, which was meters long.  

When the boy finished, he took his piece of art and showed the villagers, who were awestruck in amazement. They were all thinking things like: how could this useless and cowardly boy, create something that looked as pretty as that.

After that, the villages learnt three things: that everyone had a skill that they were good at, that they could not expect people to do the same as others and the villagers learnt how to make their very own drawing. They called the drawing Ngatu after the boy that created it.

Sketch notes

This week LS2 has been learning how to use sketch notes. They are basically notes that help you understand the learning in your own words/pictures. Sketch notes don't matter if they are messy and don't look interesting, they just have to make sense to you. Sketch notes are meant to be more pictures and less words. They help you make connections and tell a learning story in your words. I liked doing sketch notes because you can be really creative and draw what ever you like (As long as it is in the topic, of course). We looked at some examples and then we made our own. First, we started with a topic we knew, which was questions. Next we did athletics and yesterday we did Rio De Janeiro and the Olympics. 

Here is the questions sketch note:

Here is my athletics sketch note:

Here is my Olympics sketch note:

Finally, here is my Rio De Janeiro sketch note

Magic Box Poem

For this task I had to write a poem about what I would put in a magic box. I worked with Lyndon on this task. We came up with twelve things that we would put in our magic box. We then wrote what we wanted our box to be made out of. It was very fun because we used our creativity skills to complete this task. 

I will put into the box

A soft, delicate leaf from the tallest tree, which lives by

itself on a island at the end of the world.

A unbreakable shard of ice taken from the core of the Earth.

I will put into the box

All of the four elements, air, fire, water and earth

Dusty dinosaur bones from 66 million years ago

The clicking sound of a computer mouse

I will put into the box

Silver shiny shoes, polished till they sparkled

The loud noise of lego crashing together

The fiery flame burning in the fireplace.

I will put into the box

The specter of a long gone King

The sour and tangy taste of a orange

A shredded piece of fabric from a traveler's cloak

My box is fashioned panes of glass and crystal clear diamonds and pure gold, with brass on the lid and gems in the corners.

Its hinges are made out of saber-tooth tiger bones

I shall wander in my box

For it is like a black hole,

With plenty of space for many things to put in it,

Endless and never ending,

Going on and on and on…

Olympic Comparison

We have been learning to consider both sides of a provocation so that we can make so that we can make a informed opinion. Mrs Anderson asked us to think about the two different points of view (Or opinions) and not just one (Our two points of view are yes, countries should spend money on the olympics and no, they shouldn't). To make our informed opinion we also had to think about how else Rio could use the $1.2 billion they spent. My DLO shows what I thought, a picture of what the 1984 Sarajevo olympic ski jump event used to look like and what it looks like in 2011.

Advertising DLO

For this task I had to do make a DLO about advertising a hover bike. I worked with Harry and Shannon on this task. We added things that would persuade people like special offer and 50% off. We also added a picture of a hover bike so people could see what it is.  

Story Starters

This is my story that I made on a website called story starters. I had to write a birthday invitation to a devious gorilla who solves crimes. I like story starters because I chooses what your topic us randomly. Also, there are four formats (Letter, postcard, newspaper and notebook).