Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Pages 1-484

by Stargirl on May 17, 2012

This week I read up to page 484 of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by JK Rowling. Here is briefly of what it is about so far: Harry Potter is turning 17, so the trace will come off him. He leaves and the Death Eaters (Voldemort’s “assisstants”) find him somehow. Harry, Hermione and Ron leave home and go out to do what Dumbledore asked them to do before he died: find all the Horcruxes (parts of your soul broken up in to pieces, in this case Voldemort’s Horcruxes) and destroy them. The part I’ve read up to is basically them looking for the parts, their research (about a particular symbol), what they find out and destroying one of the Horcruxes.

One weird part was when Ron was about to destroy the locket (one of the Horcruxes), but suddenly a voice came out of it and it spoke to R0n about his dreams, his doubts, and a fake Harry and Hermione came out, and they were really rude, Ron hesitated for a while but he finally destroyed it. The soul inside the locket screamed like ____ (the opposite of heaven) and just died. There aren’t any parts that I like yet, though I think that I might have one when I finish the book.  I can’t wait to finish this book because you basically find out a lot of things that you didn’t understand before.

I would recommend this book to boys and girls ages 9-12.

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The Tales of Beedle the Bard

by Stargirl on May 10, 2012

These few days I have been reading a book called The Tales of Beedle the Bard (translated from the original runes by Hermione Granger). It is a book that is kind of part of the Harry Potter series, with 5 stories in it, and it is basically the fairytales of the wizarding world. The stories are: The Wizard and the Hopping Pot, The Fountain of Fair Fortune, The Warlock’s Hairy Heart, Babbitty Rabbitty and her Cackling Stump, and The Tale of the Three Brothers. At the end of each story there are notes from Professer Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, talking about the story. My favourite one is The Fountain of Fair Fortune because there are riddles, like: “Pay me the proof of your pain”, “Pay me the fruit of your labors” and “Pay me the treasure of your past”. It’s pretty funny in the end because you figure out the fountain’s waters have no enchantment at all! The one that I dislike the most is The Warlock’s Hairy Heart because the Warlock’s heart gets all shriveled up and hairy, and in the end the Warlock kills the lady and takes her heart out, but then he dies too, because he’s crazy.

Overall, it’s a pretty good book, and I would recommend it to people who like Harry Potter ages 9-12. For students of CDNIS, if you would like to read it you can find it in the library.

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My Summative PSA

by Stargirl on May 4, 2012

This unit (Sharing the Planet) was all about childrens rights. We learned about different child heroes such as Iqbal, and we did a lot of different activities. One of our summative assessments was to do a PSA (Public Service Announcement) about one of the UN Rights of the Child. I did mine on Article 32, which is that children shouldn’t work but if they do, they should be safe and paid fairly. The PSA is approximately 1 minute, hope you enjoy!

YouTube Preview Image

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Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince Page 1-343

by Stargirl on May 3, 2012

This week I started reading a book called Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. It’s Harry’s sixth year at Hogwarts, and he is already 15. Here’s what’s happened so far: Dumbledore comes to fetch Harry and he goes to his old colleague Slughorn’s house to persuade him to teach at Hogwarts again. He finally agrees, and then Harry and Dumbledore leave to go to Hogwarts. On the Hogwarts Express, Malfoy does horrible things to him, and he can’t move, so he is stuck there. Someone finally comes to rescue him, but he is very late. Dumbledore asks Harry to take lessons with him, and he does. In the lessons, he goes into the Pensieve (which lets you go into someone elses memory) to learn more about Lord Voldemort. Professor Slughorn has parties with students that either have successful/famous parents or are clever (Harry and Hermione are some of them). He also becomes the Quidditch captain.

One part that I find confusing is at the beginning. 2 women go to Snape’s house and the Snape there seems like he’s on the Dark side, though he told Dumbledore that he was on his side. He talks and talks about him being on Dumbledore’s side was a lie, that he is a spy. So whose side is he on? I am really confused right now! I think Draco is a really mean person, on the Hogwarts Express he paralysed Harry and then stepped on his face (which made his nose bleed) and his fingers. Who knew there were these kinds of people in the world? One part that’s quite mysterious is when Katie Bell carries a package from the Three Broomsticks (something like a cafe), and when the package breaks, she floats up 6 feet in the air, starts screaming, then drops down on the floor unconcious. I wonder who gave her the package and why that will happen when you touch it. It’s a really good book so far, and I’m enjoying the Harry Potter series. If you haven’t read them yet, I think you should. If you have, then that’s great!

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Goddess Girls Book 7: Artemis the Loyal

by Stargirl on April 26, 2012

This week I have been reading a book called Artemis the Loyal by Joan Holub and Suzanne Williams, a book from the Goddess Girls series.

It’s the Annual Olympic Games at Mount Olympus Academy and Artemis and her friends are not happy-especially her. Even though she’s better at sports than most of the godboys, she won’t have a chance of winning anything because the Games are boys only. No fair! Artemis tries to persuade Zeus to let the girls in to, but he won’t agree. Even worse, some of the competitors are annoying giants, she starts to feel something about a mortal boy named Actaeon, and her twin brother Apollo thinks she’s really annoying and acts like she’s his mom. In the end, though, things turn out better.

I thought that this was a really good book, it was interesting, and I really like reading about greek myths/gods and goddesses. My favourite character is Athena, because she’s the smart one and she’s Zeus’ daughter! I also like Aphrodite, because she looks really pretty. One of my favourite parts of the book was when Apollo was challenging with Python, who will ask 2 questions and you have to answer them correctly, if you do, then you win! Apollo researched about paradoxes, which is likea verbal puzzle. A statement that seems true, yet wen you try and reason it out, it no longer makes sense. Apollo did that to the snake, and the snake got very dizzy and gave up. It went like this:

Python: I know your weakness. You’re the boy who can never tell a lie.

Apollo: Then maybe you should think about this before you ask your next question: What I am saying now is a lie.

Python: It does not make sense! If what you just said is true, and I know you to be the godboy of truth, then you were lying, even though your statement was true. But if your words were a lie, then you were not actually lying, even though your statement was a lie. Thus, if you were lying, you were telling the truth, anf if you were telling the truth, you were lying!

After that, the snake finally gave up and Apollo won a temple!

It’s a really interesting book and it’s sometimes funny. I have read another book in this series, called Aphrodite the Diva, it was a really good book too! I reccomend this book to girls ages 10-12.

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One Perfect Pirouette

by Stargirl on April 19, 2012

This week I read a book called One Perfect Pirouette by Sherryl Clark. It was about a girl (Brynna) whose dream was to enter the National Ballet School, but to do that she had to move to Melbourne and learn ballet at a different school. She makes new friends and makes new enemies, and everything goes through well…..except when her father gets hit by a forklift and is close to dying..Brynna goes to visit her dad a lot, and slowly he gets better. In between all that, her brother, Tam, goes back to where they came from because he doesn’t like Melbourne. Also, Brynna practises ballet everyday so that she can learn at the NBS, and sometimes she even practises in the Youth Center with a boy named Ricky! Things turn out fine in the end, her father gets better and she is very close to being accepted in the NBS!

I think this is a great book, it tells people that even if there are a lot of things that aren’t going well, we still have to keep on going and follow your heart and follow your dreams. I wish I could be as good as Brynna, practicing her ballet everyday and never giving up. I can NEVER practise my ballet at home or anywhere else other than the classes because I just don’t have time. I feel very sorry for her family because they all had to go through what happened with Brynna’s father. If that happened to someone in my family, I would feel very sad and give up all my hope of doing anything. But Brynna didn’t do this. She didn’t give up, she kept on going and she finally reached her goal!

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The Student Led Learning Review

by Stargirl on April 18, 2012

Today (April 18, 2012) was the SLLR (Student Led Learning Review). It is a day where you come with your parents to school and you talk about your learning and your work, this time we were preparing it all by ourselves. I prepared it for about 1-2 weeks, deciding what I was going to do, preparing the things that I was going to show and making the menu. We had to do activities for French, Art, Math, Literacy, Technology, Unit of Inquiry, Chinese, PE and Performing Arts.

I wasn’t so nervous when I went in because I had done this before for 2 years. I thought that it was quite good because my parents can see how I’m doing and what I’m doing at school. I’m quite proud of what I did because I prepared for this all by myself and I put a lot of effort in it. I wouldn’t mind doing this again, it was a good experience. I kind of thought it wouldn’t be so good but now it is over and I feel fine.

Here is what my mom thinks: I am very impressed about how much my daughter has learnt from school and the effort she has put it. The video of her speeches are very useful as a training tool. The way her teacher taught her persuasive writing skills is good. Composition of song using the computer application Finale is cool (I like our song)!  French is interesting.

Please keep up the good work!

Now back to me!

So overall I thought that the SLLR was pretty good and even if you are nervous, it’ll turn out fine.


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Texploration: Sound Cloud

by Stargirl on March 29, 2012

I have been looking at something called Sound Cloud. In Sound Cloud you can follow people, people can follow you, listen to people’s music, upload music, download people’s music and there is a chance that you can become famous! I think this is quite cool, because you can listen to other people’s music and comment on it.

Here are some pictures of Sound Cloud:

People who you follow

Your Dashboard

I think Sound Cloud is pretty cool, though I don’t post things often. Hope you can join Sound Cloud too!

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Iqbal Masih

by Stargirl on March 27, 2012

“I’m not afraid,” he said. “I’m not afraid of anybody.”
These few weeks, our class has been reading a book called Iqbal by Francesco D’ Adamo, translated by Ann Leonori. It is about a boy called Iqbal who joins the Bonded Labor Liberation Front of Pakistan, helps and frees all the child slaves who are working in Pakistan, closes a lot of factories which uses child labor and changes people’s lives. He is a hero. But he is only 1 of the main characters, there is: Fatima (who’s telling the story), Maria, Salman, Hussain Khan, Karim, Eshan Khan and others.

I think that this book is really good, it makes me want to read more. I think it’s really sad that the children have to work at such a young age, I can’t imagine myself in a small room making carpets, getting blisters on my hands and being away from my family for such a long time, or in a brick kiln making bricks, soles of my feet covered in black callus. It’s bad that all those children have to go to work just to pay off their family debt, but they’re actually not even paying the debt(because of Hussain Khan’s greed), so they are just working there forever! In the carpet factory there is a place called the Tomb, it is a small room that is dark, and you are not given food and water at all. I don’t think people should throw children in there because they might get sick or die there and they are not given anything to eat or drink, that’s against his/her rights. I think people should stop child labor, it is bad and it is against children’s rights. This is happening because of greed, because of wants. I think we should all try and help the children who are working around the world, it would help a lot.

Iqbal was a brave person, he saved lives, changed them, freed children and stood up for his companions. Unfortunately, he was murdered on Easter Sunday in 1995 in Pakistan, whose murderers have never been discovered. He was only 13. I think we should learn from him, he helped a lot of kids, and he wasn’t afraid to stand up to child labor.

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Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

by Stargirl on March 22, 2012

This week I read a book called Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K.Rowling. I haven’t finished it yet, right now I’m only up to page 550(there are 796 pages) , where they have just completed the 2nd task. Here’s what happened so far: Harry stays at Ron Weasley’s place with Hermione before he has to go to school again, and they go watch the finals of the Quidditch World Cup, and they see the Dark Mark (Voldemort’s symbol). After that, Harry goes to school, Harry is in his 4th year at Hogwarts, and for the first time in a long time the Triwizard Tournament is going to happen. The Triwizard Tournament is where Hogwarts and 2 other wizarding schools (Beauxbatons and Durmstrang) compete against each other, only 1 person from each school can compete. If they want to enter, they have to be over 17 and they have to put their name into the Goblet of Fire, which will decide the champion of the school who will represent that school. There are 3 tasks in which they have to compete in. But for some reason, on the day which the school champions were anounced, the Goblet of Fire shot out a piece of paper that said “Harry Potter”. The rest is about the tasks that they have to do, and what happened in between was: Hermione doesn’t like how house-elves are treated and sets up a campaign type of thing called S.P.E.W. (Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare), and a lot of other things. I am interested in finding out what happens next: I can’t stop reading it.

I really think J.K.Rowling is a good author, because when I put the book down, I really want to pick it up again and continue reading it. I wonder who put Harry’s name into the Goblet of Fire, because there is an age line, and if someone who is younger than 17 crosses it, they will grow a beard, so it can’t be one of Harry’s classmates. I have some guesses: it could be someone who hates Harry and wants him to die, because some people have died when they were competing, or it could be someone who’s a nice person, and wants to give Harry an opportunity to compete. I think the Triwizard Tournament is interesting because the tasks are really cool, here are the first two (there are 3):

1) Get the golden egg that is under the dragon

2) Go under the lake to get the thing that you will dearly miss

One of the few parts that I liked the best was when they did the tasks, because it’s kind of interesting to see what actions they will do. I also liked when Harry was trying to figure out the clue for the second task, because the egg kept on wailing whenever he opened it. My favourite character in the Harry Potter series would either be Hermione Granger, Cho Chang or Fleur Delacour, I like them because of their style, their smartness (Hermione) and others. I really think you should read this book, although I don’t know which book is best in the series: I can’t pick! Here is a link to my friend Alpha-Adventurer 20′s post about the 2nd book in the series (Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets), and a link to my post about the 3rd book (Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban). I would like to go to the actual Hogwarts one day and see how it is like, I wonder how doing magic feels like.

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