Creative Writing for English

During the past few days of lockdown, 10M has been working on developing their creating writing, using sentence starters to prompt our stories. After completing the first part of our story, we swapped with someone else, completing their story. I swapped with Lia and our final results where as follows: 

WHAT HAPPENED AT THE TALENT SHOW

Lia - I admit I was jealous, but what happened at the talent show was not entirely my fault….

Let me explain...It all started two weeks ago when an abundance of school students tried out for the annual school talent show, one of those students being my nemesis. I happened to be really grumpy that day as I spilt my cereal all over my laptop. I stumbled across Lilith (yes that’s her dreadfully ugly name) while waiting in line. I was holding my props tightly in my hands, knuckles turning white. She sashayed over to where I was standing, looked me up and down as if saying ‘what are you doing here?.”

  “What do you want, you snide beast?,” I sneered at her.

  “I could ask you the same thing, fainting goat,” she quickly snapped back at me.

I know, the typical rivalry converse between two that despise each other. I just can’t help myself. Really. I turned my back to the atrocious beast, minimising her existence within my consciousness to a nominal, giving her the wonderful cold hand.

Later, when I filed onto the stage to give the judges my entry performance, something horrible happened. As I was implementing a magic performance, I had many props tucked away here and there. As I was going about my magical performance everything seemed just fine, to start with. As I pulled my magician's wand out to start performing an additional trick, the stage speakers crackled, then blasted a voice recording of myself - I recognised it immediately. The voice recording was of a younger me talking about a crush I had on this boy earlier on in my life, I turned the colour of my Grandma’s lipstick in a matter of seconds. My brain was already hectically putting together a list of possible suspects of this vicious violation of my privacy. But only one person could be the prime suspect, yes you guessed it, Lilith. I saw her laughing hysterically out of the corner of my eye. Reality came crashing back down on me in no time. I was standing in the literal middle of the stage stark red in the face. One of the judges was politely asking me to leave the stage.

  “Can I try again please?,” I stuttered.

Someone laughed.

  “I’m not sure that this voice recording illustrates what exactly talent is, darling,” said another judge.

  “Y-You don’t understand,” I pleaded. “I didn-”

  “I am very sure we understand; please take your leave,” said the same judge.

I stood there for a second utterly gobsmacked at what had just occurred. I floated off the stage, as if I weren’t alive. Lilith, was all I thought as I walked home at the end of the day, I will get her back. Two weeks later: the night of the talent show.

To be continued... 

Lilly- The air was tinged with anticipation as people milled around backstage waiting for their calls. People were doing the final checks on their props, eradicating even the tiniest mistakes that could cause horrific damage to their acts. I stood there clutching the microphone in my hand, repeatedly going over my cue cards. 

  “Too bad we never got to see your entry audition,” came the voice of the dreaded creature from behind me, “I would have loved to see your immeasurable talent put on show.” 

I turned around, bracing my eyes against her hellish appearance. Summoning as much sarcasm into my voice as physically possible, I said,

“Lilith, thank you so much for contributing your unique point of view, and I feel so much better knowing I have your support.” 

I followed this statement up with a theatrical hair flip, practically sending my glasses flying off my face, and marched further into the throng of people roaming around backstage. My face was flaming by the time I reached the changing rooms, and barely contained tears of humiliation stung my eyes, begging to be released. I wrenched open the door of one cubicle and stumbled in, slamming it shut behind me. Why, oh why must this woe befall me? I wondered to myself. I don't quite know what possessed me then, it was as if I was detached from my body, conscious of what was occurring but no longer in control. I saw myself ascending the steps up to the stage, Lilith's horror struck face as she saw me come onto the raised platform, right in front of where she was performing. I heard her pause mid rendition of the song “Firework”, her voice screeching to a stop as she shouted at me to get off the stage. I saw myself floating over to her and wrenching the microphone from her grasp. I started to stomp my feet, clap my hands, and like the wild things, I gnashed my terrible teeth, and roared my terrible roar. What happened next was very unexpected. I started to sing, a loud pure song bursting forth from my chest, like a tidal wave of anger directed at the person standing in front of me. This song was the result of hours spent sobbing in toilets, of late nights spent worrying what tortures the next day would bring- this song was from the darkest depths of my heart. I opened my mouth and let the words flow from me:

Bullies are people you cannot forget,

Bullies are people who do not regret.

Bullies are people who thrive on your fear, 

Well I have a question for you bullie dear. 

Why, why do you treat us this way? 

Does it make you feel better, does it make you feel sane? 

I wonder, does it take away your pain?

To see me stranded here this way? 

On and on, stomping my feet, clapping my hands, letting these words flow through me. Then suddenly I was back in my body and everything became too much- the lights, beat, music, shouting. And then I was brought back to reality with a sharp smack. My hand flew to my cheek and I looked at Lilith with murder in my eyes. I started towards her but was wrenched back by a security guard and hauled off stage. 

Like I said, it wasn’t entirely my fault that the talent show was canceled.

THE WAVE

The rickety old fishing boat drifted aimlessly out in the open sea, sending ripples dancing across the otherwise opalescent surface. The boat carried two people, one as old as the boat itself, the other as young as new fishing rods they both held outstretched over the water. The two were startlingly similar in appearance, with dark skin the colour of crushed coffee beans, and molten honey coloured eyes. The old man's eyes displayed childish mischief and cunning, their honey golden depths twinkling with unspoken humour. The young girl's eyes seemed to display an outward wisdom her grandfathers lacked, and looking into their amber expanse was like trying to find the bottom of the sea. 

They sat there gazing at the ocean, the old man with the young eyes and the young girl with the old eyes, neither speaking to the other, both content to be drifting out to nowhere. A breeze ruffled their hair and the young girl glanced worriedly into the wind, her gaze flying around in search of… something. The old man had fallen asleep so she shook him awake, pointing at the dark cloud that had begun to gather on the horizon. The breeze had transformed into a full blown gale, wind howling over the small boat, galloping over the two shaking passengers who clutched each other in an effort to stay afloat. They were in the heart of the raging storm, only able to watch as a mammoth wave rose over them, yawning towards them like the jaws of a howling beast. It tore their boat apart, plunging the old man and the girl into the heart of Davy Jones Locker. Sinking was like flying, the girl thought for the last time before she fell into the all consuming embrace of darkness. 

to be continued…

Lia- Waves crashed over her head as she struggled to keep her head over the water. White foam clouded her vision as she went under anew. She grappled on for a good while until she began to feel the merciless wrath of exhaustion. Is this really how I die? she thought, is this really the end? She tried everything within her power to keep fighting, to fight the endless yawning jaws of the dark beast that was feeding tirelessly on her strength. So she gave up. She had come to the conclusion that this was the best way to bring an end to it all. So she let the darkness take her. So she thought…

She was like a sponge full of water. Her organs and tissues were damp and soggy from being in the water for such a long duration of time. She was brushing death, the dark, engrossing and exhausting edges of what she very well knew to be the end. Everything she was able to see - whether she had her eyes open or not - was either black, grey or some other shade in between. She felt as if her body as a whole was paralysed; she was unable to move, detect where exactly she was, much less what state she was in. Her mind floated endlessly along the brinks of death, neither conscious, nor unconscious. As she floated in her head space, she became aware of two things; one, she was exceedingly cold; two, she was alone. How she was aware of these things without being completely conscious, she did not know. Intuition, perhaps. Her mind was elsewhere, in a different world full of the bleak colour grey. Endless, endless abyss. Nothing. Nowhere. 

A strong hand latched onto her arm, a second one seizing her other arm, hauling her out of wherever rabbit hole she happened to be in. She was dragged over the edge of something hard and rugged, pieces of brittle wood piercing into her water weathered skin. She was gently laid onto the floor of something hard and uncomfortable. She heard a gruff, but kind voice;

  “It’ll be ok, don’t you worry.”

Social Studies: Significant Natural Areas

Significant Natural Areas, otherwise known as SNA, are areas of land that have been identified to have a high ecological value. In other words: there are special plants and animals residing on that land. This is an initiative brought in by the Resource Management Act and implemented by the Far North District Council, with the aim to put a lid on habitat loss and land development. To do this, the FNDC (Far North District Council) is bringing in specific rules and regulations which will have a massive impact on property owners. Land owners will no longer be authorised to clear, develop or subdivide their property, unless they apply for resource consent from the council, plus an additional fee. You are allowed to plant native species within the SNA, but bringing in exotic vegetation is no longer allowed. Finally, land owners are under no obligation to introduce fencing onto their property to actively protect the SNA areas, but you are not compensated for having SNA land on your property.  

Under no obligation... Land owners can no longer develop, subdivide or clear their land without consent from the council, an extra fee, and building management- but landowners are under no obligation to protect the SNA. This new initiative removes a land owner's freedom to dictate what occurs on their land- land that is rightfully theirs, land they have already paid for. It might be argued that the FNDC is simply trying to protect the land, not take it away from people, but the rules and regulations that would be put in place should this action go ahead would restrict landowners in such a way that they essentially no longer own the land. 

Firstly, property owners own their respective areas of land- they have already paid for it, meaning that legally, they have the right to use the land as they so wish- within reason. Introducing the SNA initiative would mean that landowners must apply for a resource consent from the council before developing their land- the council then needs to approve the application, leaving the overall decision of what the owner can do with their land to the council. How can land owners be expected to cooperate with the new initiative, if it means that land they own is essentially going to be placed in the possession of the council- maybe not intentionally, but that is what will happen under the rules and regulations the action brings in. 

Secondly, the import and planting of exotic vegetation within land that is SNA is strictly prohibited without consent from the council. To put this in perspective, if a house you own is already on SNA land and you want to put a hedge in place to conceal the house slightly, you are not allowed to do this, or you must pay the council the additional fees. Again, this initiative is dictating what you can and cannot do on your property- yes, they are trying to slow habitat loss to introduced species, but they are doing it at land owners expense, they are doing it at the communities expense. This initiative is simply looking at areas of land that have native bush on them and saying, "yes that is protected," or "no you can't use that any more," etc, etc- instead of isolating the areas of land that can easily be protected, they are looking at every scrap of land in the far north, not taking into consideration: land owners, property and areas that are already covenanted. They are trying to protect all the land, when that is not realistically possible. Then there is also the question of whether they are attempting to protect the land or are doing what has been described as a "modern land grab." I believe that this initiative does not consider land and property owners in the far north, it does not consider the people of Te Tai Tokerau, and as a result is most accurately described as a modern land grab. Oh, by the way, gorse is considered SNA...  

Thirdly, you still have to pay land rates and you are not compensated for having SNA on your property. So despite the fact that you have already paid for the property, are paying land rates for land that you currently can use, you are not going to be compensated for having SNA on your land- meaning that should the action go through, that land containing SNA and will essentially be unusable by owners, who have already paid for that land with the intention of using it in some way. And land owners are still required to pay for that land that they are unable to use. So, you have to pay for land you can't use, and are not compensated for not being able to use that land. Out of the three main regulations listed above, this one strikes me as the one that causes people to describe this SNA initiative as a land grab. The FNDC is responsible for the execution of this action, but they need to take into consideration the members of the Northland community, modifying the initiative to better suit our current environment.  

Taking away people's freedom to decide removes their willingness to cooperate. Taking away people's ability to freely make a decision only makes people more strongly oppose the decision in the first place. The council is trying to protect our precious habitat and land, yes, but the way they are going about it is driving people to attack, disagree and protest the introduction of this initiative. The FNDC needs to see that completely halting the development and usage of land is not going to solve the major issue of habitat loss. I believe that our country is panicking, trying to make up for the land we have already lost to pasture and paddock, factory and farm- shutting down property owners' ability to develop their land will not solve the problem in the long run, I believe it will make it worse. We can neither continue to destroy the sparse natural habitat that remains in Northland- but neither can we completely stop the development of the forty two percent of land that has been identified as SNA. Maori or commercial land, this new SNA policy will affect both, and the people of the Northland community and the FNDC need to come to a constructive solution to help tackle the habitat issue our country is facing. 

Below is a map that shows areas of land that have been identified as SNA. Please comment if your property or areas of land you own fall under an SNA area.  

WHAT IS MEDIA???

Phone beeping, postie driving into the driveway, radio blasting from the kitchen, billboards on the side of the road. We are constantly immersed in media throughout our everyday lives, listening to the never ending flow of advertisements, messages, radio broadcasts and ideas. Media reaches everybody, everywhere and is used by different people for multiple different purposes. Media is essentially any method of communication used to reach a large number of people. Like Instagram, Google Drive, the radio or TV. There are various different categories that these forms of media are classified under. There is Print media, which refers to media shown on paper via magazines, billboards or newspapers. There is social media, which refers to platforms such as Tiktok, Facebook or Instagram. There is also Broadcast media, which refers to methods of mass communication such as the radio or TV. These fall into another two main categories, print and electronic. Their names are quite indicative, but for people who find this a bit hard to understand, electronic media is any form of media transferred by using technology, and print media is anything written or printed. We all come in contact with all of these at least once a day, whether it's listening to the radio in the morning or commenting on a friends post on the way to school. Personally, I prefer broadcast media, the radio, and print media such as National Geographic or cooking magazines. Toodles, Bye, Cheerio, Adios.

 

Your Turn: Descriptive writing

During English for the past few weeks, we have been working on descriptive writing. Our task was to take a sentence from the descriptive writing we had been doing and create a google drawing with an image that would depict that particular phrase. I chose to do two because I couldn't figure out which one I preferred. 

Showing not Telling writing: My Friend

Pixie hair the colour of hot toffee dances across olive toned skin splattered with brown paint. Her toffee hair frames owlish eyes, deep pools of new bark, set deeply on the olive canvas like gemstones in the ground, glinting with unprecedented mischief. Her blunt wide nose is situated smack bang in the middle of her face, with nostrils that flare with the waves of her emotions. Under her wide nose, her cherry coloured mouth is most often painted in a smile, unconsciously lighting up the world. She is lithe and strong, with a colourful personality that is rivalled only by the clothes she wears. Flames on her pants, the sea on her shirt and the clouds hanging on her headband. Quirky and bright, she looks like she is wearing a rainbow. 

Her general angelic facade barely conceals a personality brimming with mischief, mostly brought out by chocolate. She has an evil twin that feeds on this substance, hiding in the depths of her soul, and will emerge when there has been excessive consumption of rubbish food. She is a bit like a coin, one side of her is stubborn and determined, the other making her one of the kindest most sentimental people in the world. In fact, at prize giving last year she was crying rivers when it came to saying goodbye. Rivers, plural. The flip side of the coin is like a wall that will not budge, and will stand tall even through waves of insults or ridicule. Like a wall she protects those she stands in front of, simply because she can and wants to help. However, over time, sections of the wall can become worn and fragile like the petals of a daisy, shattering in a gentle breeze. We are her wall through these times, by her all the time no matter what. The wall may look blunt and staunch in the daylight, but under the stars and with her friends, the wall shines the same silver as the moon. 

Friendship is like a wrought iron chain, it can be bent, pulled, tugged, broken, but there are still more links, and the broken ones can be forged back together. She values friendship and treats it like you would a growing plant. Nurturing it with words, maintaining it with actions, and keeping it alive just by being herself. She is like an open book that is written in a secret language only we can understand. Her secrets spill from these pages, her thoughts, her moods, her feelings. Trust is another important thing in a relationship like this, where pretty much nothing is hidden away. Trust is the first flower that grows on the vine of friendship, keeping things locked away in plain sight, such as secrets. Trust waters friendship, keeping it alive. Fun is the laughter that follows an exceptionally bad joke, or the giggles of mirth that echo through the night at a sleepover. Fun is the second flower on her friendship vine, keeping relationships alive with a giggle, a laugh, a chuckle. So friendship, trust, and fun. The three sides of the dice, and the flowers on her plant of friendship.

About Me 😁

Hi my name is Lilly and I am a student currently attending Bay of Islands College. I was originally born in Spain but my parents decided to buy a boat and we are now living in Aotearoa (NZ), after having sailed halfway around the world. There are four people in my immediate family; my Mum, Dad and little brother, and we all get on fairly well… most of the time. 

I really enjoy sport and therefore tend to put it before doing other things, i.e homework. I mostly prefer swimming and running sports. I love animals, ice cream and swimming, as well as running, reading, netball and art. I also really enjoy school. I like answering questions, preferably correctly, and am quite competitive, which is technically my parents fault since they are both very competitive as well. 

Not that I’m saying it's a bad thing. 

As for my goals… well I have quite a few. I would like to be a good student and an athlete. There are also multiple sports and academic awards available at Bay of Islands College, which I hope to be able to achieve at some point in time. And, well, that's me. 

Nau mai, haere mai ki tēnei taonga

Welcome to your very own blog for learning. We look forward to seeing you share your learning with your teachers, your school, your family and friends anywhere.