Buddy Hot Seat

Check out Episode 2 of our Character Hot Seat series!
Buddy Hot Seat from Kieren Moriarty on Vimeo.

Here is the transcript that the Droids reading group created on Google docs:

BUDDY AND CHANTAL HOT SEAT Q’S 

Josh: Brody

Chantal: Casey

Presenter: Felicity

Presenter: Welcome ladies and gentlemen to the one and only Character Hot seat. Tonight we have Chantal and Josh from the fabulous novel Buddy.
Applause

Chantal’s Q’s

Felicity:  Hi Chantal my name is Felicity, my question for you (Chantal) is what made you adore Splash the cute little kitten?

ANSWER: Well she is full of mischief and excitement and she is very cute.

Katherine: Hi Chantal my name is Katherine and I have a question for you. Why does your dad not let you have pets?

ANSWER: Because since we move around every now and then it is too hard to take a pet on the move.

Brody:  My question for you today Chantal is were you hooked to Josh when you first met or did you need to get to know him?

ANSWER: I got to know him.     

Sami: Hi Chantal I’m Sami My question for you is Why did you like music so much?

Answer: Because it is exciting to learn different songs and things.

Natasha: Hello Chantal, I'm Natasha and my question for you today is, did you ever like Shane?

Answer: No I did not because he did not think I could carry my own bag to the bike shed.   

Josh’s Questions

Flossie: Hi Josh I’m Felicity and my question for you ( Josh ) is how was it like running with Jake in the wheelchair?

ANSWER: It was exhilarating, I loved every bit of it.

Natasha: Hi Josh, I’m Natasha and my question for you today is how did you feel when Suzanne was talking to you about her life.

ANSWER: It was awkward.

Casey: Hi Josh, my question for you is did you like it when Chantal kissed you?

ANSWER: I don’t know, she kind of just did it.

Sami: Hi Josh, I’m Sami. My question for you is why did you want to keep Jake a secret?

Answer: Because he will get picked on, he was already a secret so I thought it should stay that way. Obviously until the triathlon came around.      

Kazzie : How did you feel when you were pushing Jake to the finish line at the triathlon and you were coming first, then Shane bet you?

Answer: I didn’t really mind because all I cared about was Buddy.   

V.M. Jones Answers Our Questions!

Today we received an email from the author V.M. Jones answering questions we had asked her about the book Buddy. Read her wonderful response below!

Hello there to all you wonderful readers and writers!
 
I'm sorry it has taken me so long to reply to your lovely letters. I'm also sorry I can't reply to every one of them individually, but my life is so busy at the moment that answering just a few questions was the best I could promise to do.
 
I am so thrilled that you have been reading Buddy as a class, and have enjoyed it so much. Let me tell you a little about how I came to write it, and some other bits and pieces I hope you will find interesting. Hopefully I will answer some of your questions in the process!
 

Writing has always been a hugely important part of my life. When I was at school English and particularly Creative Writing were by far my favourite subjects, and since then all my jobs have involved some kind of writing, to a greater of lesser extent. For some reason it never occurred to me to actually become an author until a few years ago ... but thinking back I believe it was always in my destiny. I think that for me it was important to live first ... certainly I could never have written the books I have without having had my two boys, watched them grow up, and learn all over again what it means to be a child (and to learn for the first time what it means to be a boy!)

You ask what inspires me to write. The answer is simple: life! I believe that ideas for stories are floating in the air all round us, like those dandelion seeds my sons used to call ‘fairies’ when they were younger – things that happen, remarks you overhear, people’s interesting faces, stories your kids tell you about what happened at school – and sometimes one of those seeds taken root and grows into a book. Though all my stories are imaginary, they do have a seed of reality at their heart - even if it's just the reality of an idea or concept I find interesting or believe in passionately.

 

The plot of Buddy was mostly made up, though I do remember my grandmother telling us about a friend of hers with one ‘normal’ child and one disabled one who lived in a special home … that was years and years ago, when I was about 6 or so. As an author, you find lots of ideas unexpectedly resurfacing from your past – things you thought you’d forgotten completely. Maybe the seed for Buddy came from that. More immediately, though, when I decided to write a book I thought I’d write about an apparently very ordinary boy who had a hidden secret he’d do anything to prevent anyone from finding out. I gave Josh not one secret, but two – Buddy, and his fear of water. Finding a link between them, and exploring what happened next, led to the plot of the book.

I think part of what inspired me was wondering how it would feel to be Josh and have a brother like Buddy, and how I personally would respond. That is fortunately impossible to answer; all I do know is that the emotions involved would be very complex.

I'm often asked whether Buddy has a moral to it. I think in many ways it’s important to write books that make people think about difficult issues, and whose characters grow and develop – hopefully in a positive way. Travelling through a book with the characters makes the reader learn and grow too, and I guess that’s what is meant by a ‘moral’. If you think about all that Josh learns about himself and various aspects of life – such as the importance of family, honesty, courage, love, and what it really means to win – you will be getting pretty close to what I regard as the heart of the novel. Shane also grows and develops in much the same way - he is a different person at the end of the book than at the beginning, but that is partly because Josh has matured and sees him differently. Maybe Shane was really nice all along!

No, there won’t be a sequel to Buddy. Some books, like another of my books, Juggling with Mandarins, almost demand to be explored further – as the writer, you have a compelling sense that there is more to be told. With Buddy, I felt that the characters had reached a stage where they were ready to be left in peace to get on with their lives without my intervention!

Chantal reminds  me a little of myself when I was a little girl, so perhaps parts of her are based on me!

Buddy as a nickname came from an imaginary game one of my sisters and I played when we were children. We pretended we were two friends at a boarding school who had all sorts of adventures together. We could never decide on names for ourselves, so we called each other 'Friend'. The name of the game was 'Friends'. The idea of twins who called each other Budddy came from that.

Lastly, what do I like best about my story 'Buddy'? The answer is the characters, who came alive for me while I was writing the book and who I like to think come alive in their own way for every single person who reads it. And my favourite character, of course, is Josh.

Thank you again for reading and enjoying Buddy, and for taking the time to write to me. Read lots, write lots, and above all: have fun!

Lots of love

Vicky Jones

What we want to find out about the Olympics

Yesterday Room 20 posted these questions on a Wallwisher I created for our class. I am impressed by how the class asked effective questions. This is a skill we have been practising in reading.

Click on image to make it bigger

Challenge: research and answer any of these questions. Put your answer and a possible link in as a comment.

Olympic Torch

The Olympic torch sure is special. One of our writing choices is to imagine you are chosen to carry the Olympic flame! Describe your feelings as you run... ...carrying the Olympic torch.

Today we tried a quick Draw - Label - Caption plan to develop ideas, details and sequencing for our writing. We will use these to create effective sentences which are grouped into paragraphs.

Check out these examples from year fives in our class:

Rhys

Sam

Zeb

Alexandra

Bianca

Daniel

Kharn

Fabo Story 3

This email appeared in my inbox today, from Kathy White, the author of Buddy. I think we should give it a go! What do you think?

"Calling all teachers and children who are interested in creating a new interactive online story with a team of children's authors.

I'm sending this email on behalf of the FaBo team, who are limbering up for the next round of FaBo Story. FaBo Story 3 launched this morning at http://fabostory3.blogspot.co.nz/ and we'd LOVE you to write with us. 

Go to http://fabostory3.blogspot.co.nz/ to read the letter that kickstarts our children's story about the Titanic Games."

Letter Screenshot

"FABO STORY 3 begins with a letter posted on the blog on Monday 16 July - a letter that threatens to disrupt the biggest sporting event in world history - the TITANIC GAMES.

Who wrote the letter and to whom? Why would they make threats? It's your job to write a follow-on chapter. YOU decide what the story is about, who the characters are, and what happens to them next. Write the next chapter in the story (up to 1000 words) and send it to fabostory@gmail.com in the body of your email (not as an attachment) by 5pm on Friday 27 July. The winning chapter will appear on Monday 30 July at the same time as a chapter by one of the children's authors. From then on, every week is another episode in a big, dark writing adventure.

By the end, you will have used your imagination and sleuthing skills to figure out who the villain is and how to stop him or her from destroying the Titanic Games. Are you ready to compete? Let the Titanic Games begin!"

Sleuthing Screenshot

"There will be prizes, so start working on your medal count now.

As it's the beginning of the term and you're all busy, we're giving you a bit longer to write your first chapter and email it to us (deadline 27 July). From then on, the competition is a weekly event.

GOOD LUCK. : ) Start reading, and start writing."

London 2012 Olympics

Term three is about to begin and the Team Five teachers are excited! We are going to base our learning at the beginning of the term around the Olympics. Check out the trailer above to build your anticipation for the London Olympics.

Here is a great timeline about the Olympics from Timetoast:



Extra: Try playing this fun flag game that Room 5 Kidd-li-winks have on their blog. See if you can beat Mrs H's score!

ABC Treasure Hunt

ABC in Te Puke from Kieren Moriarty on Vimeo.

My girls quickly went on an ABC treasure hunt and took photos of what they found. They came back and then we edited it into a video using Movie Maker. Loads of fun! Hope you enjoy our video.

Maybe you could do this as a holiday challenge!

Place Value VoiceThread

We have been enjoying solving open-ended problems in maths. Here are two place value examples. We have created a VoiceThread to discuss and share our learning. Sign up and make a comment!

Interview With Jax

Character Hot Seat Episode 1 from Kieren Moriarty on Vimeo.

The Stormtroopers have been learning to ask effective questions to gain a deeper understanding of what they are reading. As part of this learning they created a Character Hot Seat for the character Jax who narrates the story "Going after Humbug" by Viktor Allen. It's a good story in the School Journal Level 3, April 2012.

Character Hot Seats from my old blog:

• Madam Spry
• Dracula
• Howard Carter

Decimals on a Number Line

Look at how Tash, Flossie, Jake and Sami answered this problem. Their answers are different. Are they right. Why?

Also, check out the problem solving and thinking on these posts by Bianca and Natasha.