What is important?

The other morning on the way to school, my mother had a question for me. "What do you think is important in life?". She's working on an idea for a book about importance and sometimes she likes asking me questions because it helps her think about things. After thinking about it a bit I came up with three things: 

1.  Games. Well, fun in general. Having fun.
2. Communication. If we couldn’t communicate with each other we’d all be going around from one place to another without being able to tell each other what we think. If we couldn’t communicate, nothing would ever change.
3. Personality. That we all have different personalities. It’s important that we are all different. If we were all the same, we’d all just be part of something bigger and what each of us is would not be important. I think it’s important for our world that we are all different.

Then she asked me: 

'What did you think were the three most important things when you were three years old?' And my answers were:

1. Playing.
2. Eating and drinking.
3. Mummy and Daddy. 

And then she asked me what I would focus on if I were President? These were my answers: 

1. Hooligans (bad behaviour in general)
2. Clean streets. 
3. Believing in children more (giving them a bit more credit).  

What do you think are three very very important things? Please leave your answers in the comments! 

Being nice and growing

Here's my question for tonight:

If you're nice and you grow, do you get even nicer, because there's more of you?

Is the boy on the right nicer than the one on the left? (Illustration by Quentin Blake)

Eggs: why are some white and some brown?

I was having breakfast this morning and I asked my mother: 'Where are these eggs from?'. She told me they were from fruit and vegetable shop on the corner. But this egg is white! (our eggs are normally brown). And so I asked 'Why are some eggs white and some eggs brown?', 'What makes them the colour they are?' Do they taste different? (We don't think they do but maybe a beefeater could tell the difference).

And here's what we found out! It's the colour of the hens! White hens have white-ish eggs and brown-reddish hens have brown-ish eggs!

We also did a bit of research to see if there was any difference inside the eggs (some people think brown eggs are healthier than white eggs) but found out this was a myth (or an idea that people think is true but actually isn't).

I'm off to school now but if you have any interesting eggy information, please do leave a comment!

Why can't animals speak?

You might think these bears look like they are telling each other a joke,
but they can't be, can they?  

This morning on my way to school, I was talking with my mother about school and asked her if there were any different ways of learning.

She suggested a good way was to think of things I'd like to know more about and explore, like I sometimes do on this blog. So I thought of a question I would like to explore and here it goes:

Why can't animals speak?

I'll be investigating this and will let you know what I've found out about it here in a few days.

In the meantime, if you have any interesting ideas or things to share, please leave a comment!

If you could only say one sentence again and again for the rest of your life, what sentence would you choose and why?

From Dominic, by William Steig.
Dominic is not like most dogs, he can say lots of sentences
and think lots of interesting thoughts. 

Every morning I walk to school with my mother. It takes about half an hour and we meet lots of dogs. I don't like dogs at all.

Especially small nervous dogs make me very nervous. When we see a dog in the distance, I try to relax my body, make it go floppy. That way I don't get so tense and don't get so frightened when we pass by it.

This morning a few dogs were barking in the distance. I started wondering what they were saying. And then I realised something quite funny about dogs.

I said to my mother: "Have you realised, Mummy, that dogs have only one sentence? It's like they repeat the same lyric again and again. Their conversations can't be very interesting at all. Woof. Woof. Woof. Woof."

We imagined a conversation between five dogs, stuck with one sentence each.

Dog 1: 'Hello, how are you today?'
Dog 2: 'Midget!'
Dog 3: 'I don't know about you but I'm feeling a bit hungry'.
Dog 4: 'Eeeew'.
Dog 5: 'How dare you?'

And we practiced the conversation until we couldn't stop laughing.

Then we tried to imagine what our conversations would be like if we only had one sentence to say and we thought about what sentence we would choose if we knew we were going to be stuck with just one sentence for the rest of our lives.

We decided that the best sentence would probably be something friendly like: "Hello, hope you are well today". That way nobody would be frightened of us and they'd probably not attack us either. 

What sentence would you choose if you could only say one sentence again and again for the rest of your life?

Please leave your answers in the comments. I'm sure we'll find them interesting and funny too.

Have a good day. Iain.

A review of Mio's Kingdom

Title: Mio's Kingdom
Author: Astrid Lindgren

First reading out loud: Gustavo Iglesias (my father), last year (I was 5)

Second reading out loud: Ellen Duthie (my mother), January 2015 (I was still 5).

This review is dedicated to my grandfather Pa (heart of ice, claw of chicken).

What it's about: It's about fear. A little boy called Mio lives with his aunt and uncle, who are not very nice to him. In fact, they are horrible. For example, they don't let him play, they don't let him invite friends to his house and they want him to go to other people's houses as much as possible to get rid of him. One day at the grocer's the grocer gives him an apple and asks him to post a letter. Mio reads it and it is addressed to the King of Farawayland.

Shortly after he finds a bottle and he sees a genie inside, but the way out is blocked with a stick. The genie says 'I will do anything for you if you free me from this bottle'. So Mio takes him out and asks to go to Farawayland. The genie tells him only one person can go to Farawayland, a boy with a golden apple. Mio holds up the apple from the grocer and the genie says: 'Oh! it is you.'
So that's how Mio's life changes. In Farawayland he meets his father, the King of Farawayland, and a friend, Pompoo. Together, they will fight Sir Kato the baddie of Farawayland. He's not just a baddie, he's the worst baddie ever. He's mean, and cold, with a claw of iron and a heart of stone. There are many dangers, but in the end Sir Kato dies because Mio has a sword that can cut through stone.

What I like about it: It's very poetic with beautiful language and beautiful words. I like everything about it. Sir Kato is a very good character. It's got one of the most gripping beginnings ever:

"Did you listen to the radio on October 15th last year? Did you hear the news about a boy who disappeared?"

I recommend it for people aged four and more. (4+)

My First Book Review: The Hobbit

Title: The Hobbit.
Author: J.R.R. Tolkien

First reading: July 2015 (my age: 6)
Reader out loud: Gustavo Iglesias (my father)

Second reading: August 2015  (my age: 6)
Reader out loud: Ellen Duthie (my mother)

What it's about: It's about a little hobbit* called Bilbo Baggins who doesn't have a lot of power. Suddenly he has to face a great danger. It is the story of how a Baggins got into an adventure doing and saying unusual things.

What I like about it: Gollum. Even though he is a baddie, I'm quite interested in him because he is mean. I also like that Bilbo gets a sword. It's very interesting, even though some reviewers I've read on the Internet say it's very boring because the explanations are very long, I don't really agree with that because that way you understand it better and you have to be patient. I like that the main character doesn't defeat Smaug (the dragon in the lonely mountain guarding the treasure that Thorin wants). That's different from other books, because the goodie doesn't beat the baddie.
The coolest part of the story is the adventure with Gollum and riddles in the dark.

It's good for the reader who is reading out loud to have a good voice for the characters.

I'd recommend it for everybody in the world, except for newborn babies and babies in general, who might not follow it.

* Hobbit: a little person, normally a bit chubby. A grown-up hobbit is only as tall as me. By the way, I am six.

Added on 2nd of October, 2015:
A few weeks ago, we did a very fun thing with The Hobbit. We looked up all the descriptions of the different characters in the book and drew them based on that description (instead of based on the film, or on other images we have seen). They look much better in person than in the photos, but they now keep me company next to my desk when I'm doing my school homework.