The Peacock

The Peacock
by Ellie Woods

"Open the box!" Princess Jahanara ordered, masking her brimming anticipation with her unemotional words.

Her father's guard rushed over to the teen princess, his size twelve feet clanking on the marble floor. When he got there, they young monarch was tapping her pink silk slipper impatiently.

"Hurry up!" she mumbled. The guard took his shark tooth spear and stabbed the top of the container, careful not to shish kabob whatever was inside. He pulled off the top of the sea-worn mahogany crate. An azure head slinked out, the top of which was dappled with silvery green and blue feathers.

His yellow eyes twitched and darted around, drinking in his new surroundings. He looked at the two people standing in front of him and cocked his head in exasperation. They seemed to be frozen, wondering where this strange beauty of a bird had come from, what distant land it called home.

The peacock slowly stood up and winced, his thin legs sore from the trip. Suddenly, the uniquely clad girl reached out and stroked his pride and joy, his marvelous train of tail feathers. Very distraught, he squawked in warning and flew up to a long silver pole with a yellow flag on it.

"Oh great! How are we going to get him now?" she said in exasperation.

The guard strolled out of the small villa where the bird had been delivered and shouted some orders to the servants working there. The poor servants, hoping to get a raise for fast service, shot to the king's villa, about a mile away. Soon, they arrived, all carrying large bags. The king's daughter raised an eyebrow when the items were laid out in front of her. A golden cage, a gargantuan watermelon, and a bowl of grapes.

The guard grinned slyly. "Do I have my lady's permission to catch the bird?"

The princess waved her hand carelessly as a signal to go. The watchman took the bowl of grapes and held it out to the bird. The peacock looked wistfully at the sweet fruit but restrained the ominous offer of enchanting food. The sentry grabbed the cage and grunted with its enormous weight. he placed it by a small window, where the princess sat every night and watched the sunset slowly fade into night. With his iron sword that never left his side, he sliced the watermelon in two. Its sticky juice ran down the table, like blood.

Jahanara slowly smiled, catching on to her guard's plan. While she placed a trail of grapes to the flagpole, he put a half of the watermelon in the cage. The both sat and waited, stock-still, until the bird was tempted to follow the trail. When the king of birds got to the watermelon, he rejoiced for so much food in one day! The guard and the monarch locked the cage and left the bird to adjust and eat his fill.

Review: Startwrite

I have bright, intelligent children. They are ahead in many subjects.

One of the areas that they are definitely behind in is handwriting though.

I suppose it's my own fault. I have to admit that I don't particularly have the patience to stand and watch my 5 year old write her letters out one at a time. I tend to walk away and do something else. And they get sloppy and careless.

I have decided that we need to tackle this problem this next quarter. I have ordered a great program called Startwrite. I can make my own handwriting worksheets (in cursive, manuscript, or italic) and print them out as I need them.

The cool thing is that I can have them write what I want - poetry, their names, addresses, etc. as opposed to what is written in a generic workbook. You can even add clip art to make the pages pretty.

You also have the option to print dotted letters or letters with arrows telling which direction to write. I am hoping that this will help out a bit while I'm not looking over their shoulders.

I have already printed out a couple of practice pages and Kate was very excited to be my guinea pig and try it out. She has been begging to start learning cursive and so she devoured her first worksheet.

I think that this is going to be a great addition to our school day! They have a free trial, so check it out for yourself!

Review: WriteShop

This is our first year using WriteShop and 5 weeks into it, I'm very pleased and impressed.

Last year, our writing program left something to be desired. That's because we had no writing program. I foolishly thought that I had the time to make up my own assignments and figure out how to grade them. I didn't. Our end result was that there wasn't much writing done last year - except for some fun poems and some wonderful journal writing assignments at Small World (Thank you by the way!!)

So, this year I decided that I had to have a writing program for me to follow - for my own sanity and the sake of Ellie's education. :) I ordered WriteShop in hopes that it would be the answer. I think it has been!

What I like:
1. It is very structured with a checklist for Ellie to check off for the first revision of her assignment. She now knows to skip lines, where to add her name and date, how to leave space in the margins, etc. Little things that I was not thinking about last year. The first few lessons, she was having a hard time remembering all of this little things and thought it quite tedious having to go through the checklist. Now that she has finished lesson 5, I have noticed that the correct format of her paper is becoming a habit and she is able to whiz through the checklist. Yeah!

2. Not only is there a checklist for her, but I have 2 checklists!! One is for me to give her specific feedback on her first revision. The other is a grading checklist with points for mechanics, style, and content. This has made it a breeze for me to grade her papers!!!

3. I like the content and assignments. For WriteShop 1, the assignments are as follows:
* Describing an Object
* Describing a Pet
* Describing a Person
* Describing a Circus Performer
*Describing a Food
* Describing a Season
* Describing a Place
* Explaining a Process
* Writing a Factual Paragraph (Focus on Informative Reports and Avoiding Plagiarism)
* Writing a Concise Biography
* Introducing Journalism (Focus on Writing a News Article)
* Writing a Narrative of an Emotional Event
* Writing a Narrative of Another Person's Experience (Focus on Conducting an Interview)
* First-Person Point of View (Focus on Point of View/Personification)
* First-Person Point of View (Focus on Limited Ominiscience/Tenses)
* Third Person Point of View


The program says it is made for grades 6-10 (for the first level.) Ellie is technically in the 5th grade, but I really feel like she is going to be able to finish both Writeshop 1 and 2 this year school year. Her strengths are definitely in reading and writing. It's what she enjoys and what she excels at.

Here is an example from her last writing assignments:

Lesson 5: Describing a Food

Precious Ruby

A ripe, ruby pomegranate, its luscious skin hard but smooth to the touch, seems to glow. As I cut it open, thick pulp dyes my fingers blood red. Its small juicy morsels melt in my mouth. I scoop out some more, my hands dripping with sweet, sticky juice. I grab a spoon, its enchanting bubbles of juice robbing my train of thought. I look sadly down, seeing that my bowl of goodness is gone.

Lesson 3: Describing a Person

Video Game

My little sister Lexie squints her chocolate colored eyes in concentration as she plays a video game. She brushes muddy brown high-cut bangs out of her face and moves the nunchuck expertly with her small, clean hands. Chipped green nail polish covers her nails and shines in the dim light. Lexie's red t-shirt makes her look happier. Her tight jeans stretch over her skinny legs. Her usually talkative face is hardened with thought. "New high score!" she yells at the top of her lungs. Squealing with triumph, she finishes her game.

I am so happy to have found this program! I think it is going to both challenge Ellie and keep me sane. :)

Click here to try a sample lesson.

Ellie's poem about Tori

Here is a poem that Ellie wrote about her little sister:

Beautiful Words

I have been so impressed with Ellie's way with words. She is starting to get more and more comfortable with her writing.

Today, she sat down and decided to write - on her own.
Here is her work of art: (Yes, I'm her mom and I'm biased)

The salty green sea spray slowly crashes against my feet.
I bend down and pick up a small, spiral sea shell.
It gleams in the warm sun.
Small fish tickle my feet, all different colors.
My mom calls "Time to go!"
I sigh and slip the shell in my pocket, a reminder of that wonderful day.

"Using Your Senses" Poetry

Today we used Giant Write Every Day: Daily Writing Prompts by Evan Moore for our journal writing (pg. 94). I couldn't get the girls to quit writing!! I expected them to each write a poem, but they just couldn't help themselves. Kate wrote 5 and Ellie wrote 9 poems using the model from the book.

Here was the model:

Choose an emotion/feeling etc. and describe it with:
Color
Taste
Smell
Feel
Sound
Sight

Here are some of the examples of their work:

Anger is black
Dark, bitter chocolate
A dragon's breath
As sharp as a dark knight's sword
The yelling of a lady's voice
Anger is a dark cloud. (Kate)

Beauty is red
The taste of a marischino cherry
The smell of lavender
As soft as a cute kitten
The singing of a girl
Beauty is love and kindness. (Kate)

Boredom is white
Rice, Cleaning Fluid, Empty Brain, Mute
Boredom is a blank page. (Ellie)

Jealousy is a bright green
A green sour lime
Lemon juice
A slap to the head
Teeth grinding
Jealousy is a frog in the throat (Ellie)

Hope is a light pink
Honey
A pine tree
A held breath
A slow mountain breeze
Hope is a great laurel. (Ellie)

Dreamy is a light purple
Vanilla ice cream
Lavender
Eternal Sleep
Lullaby
Dreamy is a soft pillow (Ellie)

Small World's Wordsmithery #3

We've enjoyed yet another week of Small World's Wordsmithery Creative Writing Lessons. What fun they have been! The kids are more than happy to share what they have written in their journals so far.

Here are some examples of their work this week:

Day 1
Pick 3 foods. For each one, write a sentence that describes the food in such a way that it sounds awful:
1. The mushy brown banana slowly glooped off my fork. (Ellie)
2. The chocolate-covered bee stung my mouth as I chewed.(Ellie)
3. The blood-like pomegranate juice seemed to slush around.(Ellie)
4. The mushy greasy mushroom made me throw up. (Kate)

Day 2
Write a mouth watering description of your favorite dessert.
1. Thick, creamy chocolate frosting covers a heavy, heavenly double chocolate chip cake.(Ellie)

Day 3
Write the menu for your ideal meal. Use at least one adjective for each food.
1. Breakfast: Light, fluffy pancakes drizzled in sticky, sweet syrup. Lunch: Fresh turkey sandwiches with juicy orange slices and fizzy root beer. Dinner: Tomatoey spaghetti with sugary lemonade. (Ellie)

Day 4
Write a recipe for crocodile pie.
1. Ingredients: 5 cups diced crocodile, 1 cup cooked cabbage, 1 box jambalaya dough, 1 coconut, 1 stick butter. Chop up coconut and mix with melted butter, croc, and cabbage in a mixer bowl on high, until creamy. Pour mixture into a 9X6X3 pie pan. Put in an oven for one day on 400 degrees. (Ellie)

Our favorite exercise was sentence stretching (changing simple sentences into more descriptive ones).

We started with: The man went to the big city.
And we came up with:
The young fisherman waddled to the big snowy city of Fairbanks.(together)
The handsome gardener skipped to the big city of roses. (Ellie)
Mr. John drove to the fishing place in Fairbanks. (Kate)

We started with: The woman ate lunch.
And came up with:
Jany enthusiastically gobbled down her turkey wrap. (Ellie)
The kind woman ate lunch at Pioneer Park. (Kate)

Small World's Wordsmithery #1 and 2

We are getting excited about creative writing, thanks to Sarah at Small World.

She is posting weekly creative writing lessons to follow along with and I highly recommend joining in :)

We got our journals (Assignment 1) and dove right in.

Here are a couple of Ellie's journal entries from Assignment 2:

Ellie's list of words she likes the sound of:
polka dot, robot, banana, peach, mushroom, mimicking, vanilla, follicle, raspberry, potassium, bubble, chime, lavender, butterfly, shampoo

Ellie's list of words that might make someone feel cold:
chilly, igloo, snowflake, Eskimo, frosty, frigid, frozen, arctic, ice

Writing

Writing is one of the subjects that I have the hardest time teaching and grading. Math, grammar, spelling - they are all so cut and dry. I never quite know what I should expect from the girls for their age/grade level.

Whenever I give Ellie a writing assignment, she usually groans and says that it's too hard or that it's no fun. I am hoping to make this subject more exciting and to instill in her a love of writing.

Here is a story that Ellie wrote during our school break. It is a rough draft and I have typed it - mistakes and all (and no paragraphs!) - to show her work before proofreading/editing. I was impressed with her choice of descriptive words in her writing. I am hoping that I can encourage her to keep at it!

Ballet Slippers

Pointe by Ellie Woods (age 9)
Chapter One

Sakari sighed as she slowly dragged herself out of bed and onto her feet. She was very excited but tired. It was summer break and today she was going to try out for the summer ballet show. Even though she was almost at the highest rank of ballet, she still was nervous. She walked over to her dresser, put her tights and leotard on and her street clothes on top. She threw her water bottle, pointe shoes, and her hair kit in her flower-embroidered bag. She walked out her door and into the kitchen. Her mom was there making bacon and pancakes. Her dad was at his last day of work. "What's wrong honey?" her mom said in a worried tone. "I'm just nervous" she mumbled as she plopped down some pancakes and bacon and started out the door. "Bye honey!" her mom yelled as Sakari ran down the street. She waved to Sarah her best friend who ran up to her. "You're trying out too?" Sakari panted. "No, I'm trying out for the butterfly - not the sun princess" Sarah panted back. Finally, they reached the dance theatre. There was already a small line forming for the tryouts. "Hi" a sarcasticly sweet voice said. "Oh brother!" groaned Sarah and Sakari together. They spun around and there was the snotty and stuck-up Mikenzie. "good luck losing" she said in a snotty voice. Sarah glared at her and Sakari stamped on her toe and pulled Sarah to the line. "All Sun princess tryouts line up in front of me" said a loud squeaky voice. Sakari waved goodbye to Sarah and got into thelong line. Sakari looked at who was talking. Suddenly, she gasped. It was Miss Manel, her old ballet teacher. She lead them over to a fancy dressing room door. "go in and change". You have 10 minutes said miss Manel. When Sakari walked in the room she snorted. there were 15 cubbies one overflowing trash can and a single toilet. "Why does the dressing room look so small?" said Mikenzie looking disgusted. "Well maybe this was all they could afford" said a beautiful little girl around the age of 11. "you don't even have pointe shoes yet, so stop talking" "actually I do and I won't stop" she snapped back. Sakari walked over and said "What's your name?" "Jamie" she replied in a freindly tone. the girls hastily changed and did their hair. They scamper out into a line. "Exellent. Follow me." said Miss Manel. She lead them to a huge red door. She opend it and they walked in. It was a slightly large theatre. Jamie and Sakari jogged down to the front row while Mikenzie sniffed to herself about how ugly the theatre was. By the time Mikenzie got down, Miss Manel wheezed "When I call your name you will come up and perform your routine your teacher taught you." "Jamie Glider" she said. Jamie breathed a slow calming breath and walked on stage. Smiling, she performed her dance. At the end only Miss Manel and Sakari clapped and Mikenzie snorted. "Mikenzie Zilech" she said again. Mikenzie hopped up and started doing her dance but she couldn't balance long enough on her arabasque and toppled on the floor. She got up and sniffed and screamed "I'm outta here!" and ran up slamming the door behind her. "Sakari Anderson" she said. Sakari ran up and started her dance. She held her arabasque for 20 seconds instead of her usual ten. She almost flew off stage with pride. "Good job!" exclamed Jamie "and the part goes to....Sakari Anderson" said Miss Manel. "and the role of moon princess goes to Jamie Glider". Sakari and Jamie with exitement and triumph hugged and laughed.

Chapter Two

The next few days were tiring. Sakari, Jamie and the other cast worked every day on the play and got what it seemed like to Sakari, a jazillion corrections. "all this practicing is so hard" groaned Sakari rubbing her extremly sore feet. "Well practice makes perfect" said Sarah and Jamie at the same time. "Oh, stop being like Miss Manel" Sakari said, although grinning. Sarah pulled out a green apple and started munching. "Girls" said miss Manel "you need to got to the costume room and try your costumes" "Cmthing" said Sarah still eating. Sakari and Jamie rolled on the floor with laugheder. A couple of minuets later the girls were in their coustumes. Jamie's was a silver tutu with a matching crown and shoes. Sarah's was a hot pink and electric green tutu with wings and oen pink shoe one green shoe. Sakari's was like Jamie's exept it waas pure gold. After they admired one anothers coustumes from every inch the girls went upstairs changed and went into town for some ice cream. They walked into Breandes ice cream parlor. They ordered cones and sat down. They looked around and gasped. Mikenzie was sitting behind them with her gang of girls. "Sakari is so mean" she wined. "I need that part! My mom says I need to be in 5 plays before I turn 16 but I've only been in 4 and I'll let down my mom" she droned on and on for minutes untill finally they left. "Wow! Mikenzie's mom is harsh!" said Sarah "Yeah" said Sakari. They said bye and went home, thinking of the show tomorrow.

Chapter 3

Sakari woke up the next morning feeling scared to death. She got out of bed put on some clothes and slowely walked into the kitchen. her mom and dad were busy. She ate a bit of toast and said " bye mom and dad" "Bye honey! Break a leg!" She zoomed as fast as she could into the theatre, upstairs into the dressing room and sunk to the floor. "I'm so tired!" Sakari gasped as Jamie and Sarah were rushing over with worried looks. "I'm fine" said Sakari in a firmer voice. "I've just never run that fast." She pulled herself up and started putting on her costume. The orchestra began to play. the play was starting. Jamie went down a secret staircase to the wings on the side of the stage. She gracefully lept out of the sides and started dancing. Suddenly Sakari got a swoop in her stomach. What if she fell in front of all those people? "What's wrong?" said Sarah in a soothing voice. "Stage fright" said Sakari. Sakari heard clapping now, it was Sarah's turn. She went down. Now Sakari's dance was almost starting. Sarah rushed up and Sakari ran down. She took a calming breath and walked on stage and started. She dance for what seemed like forever then with the most beautiful arabasque. Sarah and Jamie grasped one of Sakari's hands and took a deep bow and a huge burst of applase followed they were each presented with a boquet. As Sakari looked at the crowd she felt like she could jump up to the sky.