Sunday 23 November 2008

Save the Elephants! (essay)

The African elephant is classified as a member of the order Proboscidea and family Elephantidae. 

It is the largest land mammal. It has a heavy, grey body, four legs and a short tail. Its head is large with two huge ears, two small eyes, a trunk and two teeth called tusks. These animals are herbivore. 

The elephant's eyesight is not very good and it uses its big ears for ventilation and communication. It can weigh up to six tons. The trunk is used for breathing, smelling, drinking water, picking food, breaking branches and fighting. 

Elephants are ready to mate at the age of 15 or 16. The mating pair will often separate from the herd for a few weeks. After 21 to 22 months, one calf is born.

The African elephants live in Africa, south of the Sahara desert, in tropical forests, savannah areas, deserts and river valleys. They are endangered, because poachers kill them for their ivory tusks. 

In the prehistory, there were about 300 species of elephants, and now there are only two! We must do something to save them. We can put them in game parks with cameras around their necks. The law can also help by preventing poaching. We can ban the selling of ivory. 

If we prevent the elephants from becoming extinct, we will save many other animals, too. That is how the nature works!

Dunja Ilić, VIII2, November 2008

Wednesday 12 November 2008

Sing a Rainbow (song)

This song has always been fun to sing, and here's how my 7-year-olds performed it in November 2008.
Here are the lyrics to sing along:

Red and yellow and pink and green
Purple and orange and blue
I can sing a rainbow,
sing a rainbow,
sing a rainbow too.

I1

I2
 
I3

Wednesday 5 November 2008

Deadlock by Sara Paretsky (book review)

This is a murder mystery and the main hero is Vic I. Warshawski. She is a private investigator in Chicago, USA.

People imagine private detectives to be tired-looking men in raincoats, but Vic is a female. She is tough, beautiful, carries a gun - and goes on asking questions until she gets answers.

When Boom Boom, a former ice-hockey star, dies in an accident by falling under a ship, the city mourns. Nobody suspects murder. But, Boom Boom was Vic's cousin and she was very fond of him. She wants to know how and why the accidents happened, because she does not understand how a strong young man can just slip and fall into the water like that. 

Then she finds Boom Boom's girlfriend going through his personal papers in his apartment. And, Vic did not even know that Boom Boom had a girlfriend!

Soon Vic realises that she is conducting a murder investigation. Somebody else knows it too, because another murder quickly follows, and some rather strange accidents as well. But, Vic has a very personal interest in the case. Nothing is going to stop her!

If you want to know what happens next, if Vic finds a murderer, you have to read the book. 

I enjoyed reading the book because it is a murder mystery and I like mysteries.


Ivana Grubišić, VIII2, 2 November 2008