Children's Experience: Being A Hero Or 'Long Way Home'?

April is a special month in so many ways, one of them is the fact that the children had their holiday activities at the book club and especially that April 23rd is World Book Day.  

While the younger class read about the Xmen as heroes, the older class of children reviewed LONG WAY HOME by Michael Morpurgo and this resonated very well with our IDP camp visit earlier in the week  

Long Way Home by Michael' Morpugo' tells the story of a jaded orphan who found a family in unexpected places. George had been placed in different foster homes and been described as weird so much so no one wanted to adopt him, also found a new family his social worker Mrs Thomas was taking him to, quite overrated.

Mr and Mrs Dyer were looking to foster George for the holidays as usual at their farm where they lived with their two kids, Tom and Storme, and they spent time convincing Tom to be nice and less sceptical with the orphan.

Spending the holidays with the Dyers took a new turn for George. On his first night, he helped Tom rescue the Dyers calves from a storm and nearly drowned. It made his bonding with Tom easier from there on. And then he took a walk at the Moor with Storme and got lost with her in a mist.  

She broke her ankle and had to be carried from home. The weight of carrying Storme up the stairs took its toll on Mrs Dyer's back and she was hospitalized, and then keeping George became harder so Mr Dyer arranged for Mrs Thomas to come back and take him. Tom and Storme who had bonded with George didn't want him to go so they tried to convince their father to let him stay.

Eventually, he was taken back by Mrs Thomas, and he ran away to visit Mrs Dyer in the hospital. He didn't find her there, so he went back to the Dyers and found them waiting for him with intentions to adopt him permanently.

At the end, George gets to become part of the family getting a home like he always wanted.

This book shines light on the state of mind many orphans have as well as the families who try to adopt them.

With strong themes like brotherhood and the role of a family in character building, the children shared the opinion that though life seems very unfair to some people, it can be fairly fixed by other people. 

This also felt thematically relevant as the children recently visited an IDP camp and felt they could relate with the concept of orphanhood as they met many children who had no one that day.

Our members who went on the excursion reminisced on how the children in the camp struggled for the items they brought along, they found it weird but it was explained to them just how important those items where to the less privileged.

We agreed that making the world a better place starts from being better people. So we promised to be tolerant, understanding that some people have had really crazy experiences and know how to deal peacefully all the time.

We also learned creative writing formats, Ist person and 3rd person points of views and why the 2nd person format is mainly used for poetry.



Meanwhile, the yoounger class also had exciting and engaging outing. 

The little ones talked about how they spent their holiday which included going to the zoo, sleep overs and time spent with family for the kids.

We also met the X-Men in a well written novel for children. Taking turns reading about Professor X, Cyclops, Beast, Jean, Hank, Iceman, Rogue, Nightcrawler and Wolverine all heroes that make their world a better place, learning to manage their abilities and using it to help and not harm others. 

They learned that being good is a choice and you don't need super powers to be a hero. 

Be kind to those around you and help where you can. That's what makes us heroes. Choose to be a hero.

Our heroes this week as always have been THE THOUGHT PYRAMID ART GALLERY. 

See y'all at the next meeting, Saturday MAY 5TH 2018