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Reading and writing

Intentions

I don’t want to add to the bombardment of information people are getting at the moment. I’ll work on this and other pages for you in the coming weeks. I’ll build the pages slowly, a bit at a time, and we’ll announce new additions on our Facebook page so if you want to get updates please find the page (p4c.com) and ‘like’ it. Otherwise, check in to this website from time to time.

Steve Williams, Editor, P4C.COM

All these resources will also appear under the heading of ‘Website Samples’. I’ve subgrouped them here and under the other headings.

Tuck Everlasting: A great read for enjoyment and philosophising

This novel by Natalie Babbit is a wonderful book, wonderfully written. The language is beautiful so it’s great literature to study.

The book will stimulate many questions that are likely to lead to interesting and valuable philosophical dialogue. It’s also great to read aloud with friends and family.

This is a summary of the plot:

Is eternal life a blessing or a curse? That is what young Winnie Foster must decide when she discovers a spring on her family’s property whose waters grant immortality. Members of the Tuck family, having drunk from the spring, tell Winnie of their experiences watching life go by and never growing older. But then Winnie must decide whether or not to keep the family’s secret—and whether or not to join them on their never-ending journey.

It’s available in several formats.

AND there is a FREE AUDIOBOOK of the story available from an excellent website called Mr. Allen’s Classroom. It is read by Mr Allen himself.

P4C book guide: A P4C teacher called Gayle Hubble wrote a CHAPTER-BY-CHAPTER RESOURCE for this book with sample questions and talking points. It was published in a Journal: ANALYTIC TEACHING Vol. 18, No 1. When I read the notes and questions, many of them seem so appropriate at the moment.

It was freely available as a download but I can’t find the page again. I downloaded it at the time and make it available here. If anyone finds a link for it, please let me know ([email protected]). If Gayle or the editors of Analytic Teaching object and want me to take it down, please let me know.

What else is there to say in favour of the book?

After I read the first three sentences I know I am in good hands:

“The first week of August hangs at the very top of summer, the top of the live-long year, like the highest seat of a Ferris wheel when it pauses in its turning. The weeks that come before are only a climb from balmy spring, and those that follow a drop to the chill of autumn, but the first week of August is motionless, and hot. It is curiously silent, too, with blank white dawns and glaring noons, and sunsets smeared with too much color.”

Then there are plenty of sentences to ponder right through the book, touching on themes such as freedom, conscience, loyalty, ownership and life itself:

“Life’s got to be lived, no matter how long or short. You got to take what comes.”

“Everything’s a wheel, turning and turning, never stopping. The frogs is part of it, and the bugs, and the fish, and the wood thrush, too. And people. But never the same ones. Always coming in new, always growing and changing, and always moving on. That’s the way it’s supposed to be. That’s the way it is.”

“The ownership of land is an odd thing when you come to think of it. How deep, after all, can it go? If a person owns a piece of land, does he own it all the way down, in ever narrowing dimensions, till it meets all other pieces at the center of the earth?”

Mr Gumpy’s Outing

A resource by James Nottingham on the picture book by John Bulingham

If you don’t have a copy of the book, you can follow a reading YouTube. Here is an example:

Story Summary

One fine morning Mr. Gumpy decides it’s a perfect day for an outing in his little boat. Apparently, plenty of others think so, too. First some children ask to join him, then a rabbit, a cat, a dog, a pig, a sheep … Soon, Mr. Gumpy’s boat is precariously full and the animals break all the rules he has set. There’s nowhere for anyone else to go but overboard but this mild mariner takes everything in his stride.

Concepts include: Rules, fighting, consequences, risk, safety, responsibility, blame

View resource