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I’m not really convinced that Granny Grommet and Me is among the best books eligible for the 2014 CBCA shortlist, but, well, there it is, and so I’m reading it to my junior students next week.
So I need a purposeful activity to go with this book, but although I usually find the series really useful, this year’s edition of Activities for Early Childhood by Mary O’Toole and Ruth Moodie hasn’t got an activity for Granny Grommet that I particularly want to do.
So instead, my Year 1 & 2 students are going to browse my collection of books about life underwater, and they’re going to use this research to complete a sunshine wheel about what can be seen underwater with a snorkel. They’ll need to differentiate between what can be seen in the shallows and rock pools and what can be seen in the open sea. They’ll then draw and label what they add to the sunshine wheel.
It would be more fun to make a snorkel-eye view with shoeboxes and blue cellophane but alas I don’t have enough time in my library lessons for time intensive activities like that. And I do like my students to use thinking tools as much as I can.
For copyright reasons I can’t include an image of the book cover on this worksheet.
This week I’m working with my colleagues to develop our units for Even Years Term 3. Today I worked with the Junior team to develop a history unit, and you can download it from the Goodies to Share menu:
Last term I developed and trialled a new unit of work about Indigenous War Service for years 5 & 6. It’s based on a resource called Indigenous Service, A Resource for Primary Schools, published by the Department of Veterans’ Affairs and the Shrine of Remembrance, but I adapted it quite a bit. You can download the unit, and all the supplementary resources from the Goodies to Share menu, Australian Curriculum Literature & Research units for Years 5 & 6
This unit forms part of our whole school plan for the ANZAC Commemorations for 2014-5 (which you can download from the same page).
This year’s NAIDOC theme honours all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander men and women who have fought in defence of country.
From our warriors in the Frontier Wars to our warriors who have served with honour and pride in Australia’s military conflicts and engagements across the globe.
We proudly highlight and recognise the role they have played in shaping our identity and pause to reflect on their sacrifice. We celebrate and honour their priceless contribution to our nation.
I would be rapt to get some feedback from teachers who download and try out the unit. Please use the comments box below.
“How many Australians know that Matthias Ulungura, a young Tiwi Islander, captured – and disarmed – the first Japanese serviceman taken as a POW on Australian soil in 1942?”
It’s NAIDOC Week: Visit this link to learn more about the contribution of our indigenous people to the defence of Australia
It’s been so long since I’ve read any SF, I’ve almost forgotten how to read it. Rift Breaker, by award-winning indigenous author Tristan Michael Savage, is a high action space adventure that will appeal to fans of Doctor Who and similar types of fantasy. The book won the 2013 Black&Write award for YA writing, but I think that adolescent boys of any age will like it. I’m not so sure about girls…
The main characters are Milton Lance, a human, and his simian mate Tazman. Although Tazman is unreliable and his party-animal ways often get the pair into trouble, there is never any doubt that they are the Good Guys. Inexperienced, sometimes naive and often impulsive, these two are recognisable as the antithesis of Evil because they show compassion for the suffering of others. With their sidekick Luyulla, it’s not so clear where her loyalties lie…
This is also true of the other significant characters. Fleet Commander Viceon Raegar works for the Tranquillian Composite, which is a ‘fusion of worlds dedicated to preserve cohabitation’. Sent to discover how the space colony Orisurrection was annihilated, he sees Luyulla’s spacecraft and assuming that the trio are responsible, circulates a Wanted notice throughout space.
From here on the trio have all kinds of trouble. Clearly there are Bad Guys, but all kinds of confusion keeps the reader guessing about who’s double-crossing whom. Milton finds himself the object of interest from both sides because the Good Guys think he’s on the wrong side and the Bad Guys somehow know that he has acquired a powerful gift that facilitates their Evil Quest.
There are so many twists and turns in the plot that I could not quite keep track, but in SF I think that hardly matters. It’s a Battle between Good and Evil, framed by a quest. The hero is double-crossed by someone, and there is a sexy female of considerable power (though she behaves in a rather incompetent way with her weaponry). In this respect it’s a rather ‘male’ book: the male characters dominate, the female has moments of being ruled by heart not head, and problems are all solved by fighting.
On the other hand, while the Bad Guys are motivated by lust for power, Milton saves himself with thoughts of home, family and friends. While there is the usual impressive range of weaponry that’s familiar from Doctor Who, the really dastardly stuff is created by evil scientists with a medical bent. Milton ends up with his mind under control through a Xoeloid implant in his brain, but the message seems to be that human love will prevail if people remain strong.
Milton is in some ways a symbol of Aboriginal resilience and reconciliation. He is a lone human in a world of other creatures, and he was raised by adoptive parents. He enjoys new experiences and he puts up with Tazman’s crazy behaviour because he craves adventure – but his heart belongs to his quiet home in an isolated rural environment. His sense of justice is outraged by colonisers who destroy space colonies for their own purposes, and he is determined to survive in order to resist their domination because he doesn’t share their values.
At 350-odd pages it looks like a long book but the font is well-spaced and it’s a quick and easy read. For fans of high action space adventure, it has plenty of techno-babble, weird creatures and snappy dialogue. I’m confident that boys will like it, and I’ll be interested to see if teenage girls like it too.
I’m going to kick off Indigenous Literature Week 2014 with a review of a delightful picture book called Tracker Tjugingji, by Bob Randall of the Yankunytjatjara desert people from Central Australia and a listed custodian of Uluru. The book blurb tells us that the author was taken from his family when he was 8 or 9 years old, and sent from Alice Springs to Minjala (Croker Island) off the north coast of Arnhem Land. A well-known story-teller and songwriter, he used this childhood experience to write the award-winning song Brown Skin Baby.
Tracker Tjugingji, however, is not a sad story of the Stolen Generations, it is a celebration of traditional Aboriginal family life. Tjugingji is a little fellow who lives in the desert with his parents, camping in little windbreak shelters and sleeping by the fire. One day his parents let him know that he’s not to play too late that night because they are moving on in the morning, to a big lake, a long way east of where they were camped. Of coursekids will be kids, and by the time he gets back from playing his parents (and the dogs) are all fast asleep, so he lies down beside his father and goes to sleep.
But…
When Tjugingji’s parents woke up there was a glow in the sky – the sun was rising. But Tracker Tjugingji was still fast asleep. ‘Oh well, let’s leave him,’ they said. ‘He can catch up later.’
That’s the Aboriginal way – you don’t wake your children when they are fast asleep.
I expect this will raise a few eyebrows today when so many children are raised to be fearful of stepping outside their own front gate by themselves. But Tjugingji is not the least little bit alarmed, because he knows he can follow their tracks. He has his little spear and boomerang with him, and by walking around in a circle he soon picks up his parents’ tracks and sets off.
Before long he picks up other tracks as well: he meets an assortment of wildlife who tell him that yes, they’ve seen his parents, and what’s more, they’ve been chased by the family dog. The snake, the perentie, the malu (kangaroo), the papa (dingo) and the emu all follow him to make sure that he doesn’t lose his way, and they all end up having an inma (dance to celebrate. The song they sing is included on a CD at the back of the book. (There is also a glossary and a pronunciation guide).
The pictures, by Kunyi June-Anne McInerney, of Yankunytjatjara descent are gorgeous. A stunning sky blue contrasts with the rich red of the desert landscape, and as you can see from the front cover Tjugingji is a really cute kid with unruly curls and an infectious grin.
In the classroom, I would use this book to talk about how Tjugingji managed to find his parents, eliciting that Aboriginal families in traditional communities teach their children the skills they need to know to manage in a desert or bush environment, in the same way that city children are taught to manage traffic in an urban environment. I think it would also make a superb stimulus for artwork with pastels or crayons, and art teachers could take the opportunity to talk about the Aboriginal mining of ochre, discussing the traditional routes and the trading that went on.
(I would do this because I think the best way to counter the insulting ignorance of anyone who thinks that Australia wasn’t already ‘settled’ in 1788, is to teach children about the thriving culture that was here in Australian for 40,000 years or more, and survives to this day).
If you have enjoyed a book by an indigenous author this week, please drop in at the ANZ LitLovers reviews page, and either leave a comment or a link to your review on your blog, at Goodreads or at Library Thing.
Update 14/7/14
I’ve been working on including Aboriginal Perspectives (aka the AC Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures priority) in our new Year 1 & 2 unit on Past and Present Family Life (ACHHK030), and have included this title in one of the activities.
Author: Bob Randall
Illustrator: Kunyi June-Anne McInerney
Title: Tracker Tjugingji,
Publisher: Jukurrpa Books, an imprint of IAD Press, 2012
ISBN: 9781864651263
Source: Review copy courtesy of Dennis Jones and Associates
It’s been so long since I’ve read any SF, I’ve almost forgotten how to read it. Rift Breaker, by award-winning indigenous author Tristan Michael Savage, is a high action space adventure that will appeal to fans of Doctor Who and similar types of fantasy. The book won the 2013 Black&Write award for YA writing, but I think that adolescent boys of any age will like it. I’m not so sure about girls…
I’m going to kick off 
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