Compare the 2 Sunflower Stories

4A,

We have completed Ruby's Sunflower. I had introduced another story....The Crow & the Sunflower.

In your opinion, how are the stories similar or different?

What about the characters?
Ruby, Saul in Ruby's Sunflower & Crawford & Cynthia the Crows.

Did all the characters do the right thing?
What moral values have you learnt from the 2 stories....

Post your thoughts over the weekend....

Composition 1

Dear 4A,

Your first Compo has been returned to you.
Our highest scorer is Mabel. Congratulations! You scored 17/20.
There were a handful of you who scored 16/20.

Those who fall into the 11-12 band need to improve on the usage of words.
Those who have scored between 13-14, can improve on the Content.

I hope I see better pieces of writing for the second composition!

Sunflower Seeds and Crows by Margo Fallis

Crawford, the crow, lived in a garden filled with giant yellow sunflowers with black centers. Some of the leaves were bigger than he was, which was good when it was very hot outside and he needed to find shade. Everywhere he looked in the garden, he saw bright yellow petals. The center of each of the sunflowers was filled with seeds.

Crawford tended to every flower, keeping them watered, weeded and free of bugs. At harvest time he picked each seed, examined them for perfection and then put them into a burlap sack to save for winter. He had a special place in his garden where he kept the burlap sacks. They were stacked on top of each other, reaching almost as high as the giant sunflowers. The imperfect seeds were put aside and eaten everyday for snacks.

Crawford lived happily in his garden. Some days he stood in the dirt, looking at the colors surrounding him. There were yellow petals, as bright as the sunshine, green leaves and stems and brown dirt under his feet. He also loved the blue color of the sky, the whites and grays of the clouds and he even loved the glossy black of his own feathers.

One day, as Crawford was weeding with his hoe, another crow flew down from the sky above and landed on top of the biggest of all his sunflowers. To his horror, it began to peck at the seeds in the center. "Caw! Caw!" Crawford cried out, dropping the hoe and running over to the flower. "My precious seeds! Leave them alone! Caw! Caw!"

The crow looked down at a frantic Crawford. It flew down to the ground next to him. "I’m sorry," she told him. "I didn’t know it was your garden," she apologized.
"Caw! Caw!" Crawford squawked again, trying to calm down. "It is my garden! I’d appreciate it if you left right now!"

"I’m Cynthia. I flew many miles and I’m tired and hungry. May I please rest here for just a little while? I’ll leave soon, I promise," she pleaded.

"No! You must go right now. I can’t risk my precious sunflowers being ruined, even on accident!" Crawford demanded, very worried about his garden.

Cynthia hung her head low. "I’ll leave then," she said, sadly. She walked away, leaving Crawford standing among his garden of sunflowers. She turned and looked back at him, sighed and then walked over to a nearby patch of dandelions. They were soft and fluffy and made her feel better just by touching them. She smiled, happy to have a place to rest. She lay down on the soft petals and fell asleep.

Crawford stood, watching Cynthia walk away and then went back to watering, hoeing and weeding. He had a hard time concentrating on his work. He kept picturing how sad she had looked. "Maybe I was a little bit mean to her," he said. He put his hoe and water can down and went looking for her. He found her sound asleep in the bed or dandelions. Crawford let her sleep and walked around to think. He came upon a patch of green striped watermelon, growing among thick and tangled vines and leaves. He thought they looked ready to eat, so he searched for a rock or stick to break one of them open. He picked up a big, speckled rock with his wing, walked over to the watermelon and began hitting it. It took only a few strikes before it burst open, exposing the juicy, reddish-pink flesh, full of little black seeds.

"What have we here?" he asked. "My, oh my. What a delicious looking melon." He took a deep breath. "Ahhhhhh. It smells even better than it looks." With his wing he scooped out a big chunk.
"Excuse me! What are you doing? This isn’t your watermelon patch too, is it?" Cynthia asked, surprising Crawford.

He turned and looked at her. She seemed to be very angry. Crawford dropped the chunk of watermelon on the ground. "I came looking for you. I found you asleep in the dandelions. I saw these watermelon over here and no, they aren’t mine." He continued, "Would you care to join me?" He scooped another chunk of the juicy melon out and handed it to her. "Here you go," he said.

The starving Cynthia gobbled it up, letting the juice drip all over her black feathers. Crawford joined her and the two of them ate the whole melon, right down to the rind. All that was left, besides the rind, was a pile of slippery black seeds. Both crows rubbed their fat little tummies and then sat down on one of the thick vines. "I think I need a nap now," suggested Crawford. He stood up, stretched his wings and yawned. His big yellow beak opened wide.

"Me too," giggled Cynthia.

Crawford said, "Cynthia, why don’t you come with me to my garden to stay. You can help me weed and tend to my beautiful sunflowers. We could do things like this every day."

Cynthia smiled and answered, "Thank you, Crawford. I’d like that."

The two of them flew back to Crawford’s garden, found some soft dirt under one of the giant sunflower leaves and took a short nap. As they slept, a gentle breeze blew the erupting dandelions, scattering their little white feathery helicopters through the air. Some landed on the pile of sticky watermelon seeds that Cynthia and Crawford had eaten earlier. Others floated across the deep blue sky, heading towards the horizon. The sun looked down on the two napping crows and began to follow the floating dandelion seeds into nighttime.

Funfacts About Sunflowers

Facts About Sunflower Plants for Kids
Sunflowers grow tall and have huge flowerheads.Bright and colorful, tall and unusual, sunflowers are fun and easy plants for kids to grow. All they require is a plot of well-drained soil, lots of water and full sunlight. The scientific name of a sunflower is Helianthus, deriving from "helius," which means sun, and "anthus," which means flower.

Sunflowers Grow Tall Fast
Sunflowers are one of the fastest growing plants and they grow tall. Once a seed is planted, an average sunflower plant can emerge and reach a height of up to 8 1/2 feet within six months. The tallest sunflower on record reached a height of 25 feet and 5.4 inches and is listed in the 2004 Guinness Book of World Records.

Sunflowers Follow the Sun
Sunflower leaves are phototropic, which means they follow the sun's rays throughout the day. This allows the sunflower plant to increase the amount of light it takes in, helping the process of photosynthesis, which is how plants convert the energy from sunlight into sugar to help them to grow. The movement of the sunflower plant is easily observable over the course of the day.

Sunflowers Have Large Flower Heads
The largest sunflower head on record grew to a diameter of 32 inches. The average sunflower produces a flowerhead that is 8 to 12 inches across, which is approximately the size of an adult human face. The flowerheads are often so large, they require a support to prevent the plant from breaking under the weight.

Sunflower Heads Are Made of Lots of Flowers
Sunflower plant flowerheads are not just one flower as the name suggests. They are actually comprised of 1,000 to 2,000 individual flowers joined together at a common receptacle (the part of the plant on the flower stalk where flowers attach).

Sunflower Growth in Time Lapse

Did you see how tall it can get? WoW.......

Ruby's Sunflower

Hi 4A,

Yap the preview of our next book is here.....

Here are some websites on Sunflowers
http://www.sunflowers.com/

Growing Giant Sunflowers
http://www.artknapp.com/giantsflwr.htm

Gardening with Children – Sunflowers
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/1465/sunflowers.html

This Sunflower is for your EFFORT from me...

Grammar - Revision on Conjunctions

What is a conjunction?


A conjunction is a word that joins two or more words, phrases, or clauses.
Think of them as glue words. They glue or join words, phrases, or clauses together.



Click here to see a list on other Conjunctions



Coordinatiing Conjunction Quiz

Subordinationg Conjunction Quiz

Correlative Conjunction Quiz