Diary of a Wombat

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An activity for the children will be writing a week journal themselves, monitor what they have done during the week even though it might be simple words. The wombat hasn’t been given a name. Often this is because a character stands in for a group. In this case, she stands for your typical wombat, doing typical wombatty things.

Herald-Sun Sunday , 18 August 2007 ; Abstract Short piece reporting the gifting of Australian children's books to Princess Isabella of Denmark. Wizards, Vampires and Elbow Grease Susanne Gervay, The human family are in opposition to the wombat not because the humans are trying to get rid of her, but because they have different goals which cannot coexist: In small groups students can read aloud their diary entries and select the best one (peer assessment) to go forward to the class competition, based on the agreed criteria above. Whole class sharing - the selected student from each group can read aloud and share their diary writing. Activity 7. Guided Reading - read the story a second time. This time pausing at various points to ask questions. Q. What is Mothball describing as a ‘flat, hairy creature?’ Response: The doormat. (Text participant)Evening: Have decided that humans are easily trained and make quite good pets. Night: Dug new hole to be closer to them. Slept” Wombat learns that if she makes a big enough nuisance of herself then the humans will give her exactly what she wants. Explain Task: Students are going to imagine they were a family pet. (of their choice) and write a diary account of one day in the life of this pet. We can extrapolate that things will continue as they did before, but this time the wombat’s life is even more convenient as she doesn’t even have to walk up the garden path to get fed. COMPARE AND CONTRAST Q. What do you notice about diary writing? Reponses: days of the week and moments in time like ‘Monday’ and ‘Morning’.

This article explores the findings from the first “diversity count” of Australian children’s picture books, conducted in 2019 in partnership with advocacy group Voices from the Intersection (VFTI). Specifically, this article explores the eighty-three percent of 2018 Australian children’s picture books that did not feature a marginalized protagonist: namely, those that featured human characters who could not be identified as marginalized in any way, animals, and inhuman protagonists. We propose that the Australian publishing industry, rather than suffering from a “diversity deficit,” instead overrepresents a narrow demographic of human experiences and non-human protagonists. We suggest that the oversaturation of the local children’s picture book market with such similar stories disadvantages all children, who are denied a rich and diverse reading experience, as well as the opportunity to see themselves and their peers depicted. This article provides greater insight into the current debates about diversity and inclusion in children’s media.'(Publication abstract) What I’m Reading (Aloud) Sarah Burnside, The diary-writing wombat’s life revolves around sleeping (lots of), eating, scratching and digging holes. Then, new neighbours appear – a human family – whom, within a short number of days, are convinced to provide the wombat with repeated gifts of carrots and oats. The book ends with: They will research their pet (animal) andfind out about it's daily activities and habits,(what it likes to do), it's diet (what it eats) and how it lives with humans. Notes: Books and information about domestic animals are available in the classroom for students to use in their research. They can choose whatever pet they like, andmust refer to the criteria sheet when completing their diary writing. (see below) The family’s plan is to work around the mischief of the wombat, filling in holes once they’re dug, buying more carrots once the home store is depleted. BIG STRUGGLE Okay, so until now I’ve been saying the same things, which are general rules but rules can be broken. So far I’ve told you that in a story with mythic structure the big struggles increase in intensity until one massive life-and-death big struggle. This is seen clearly in the Solla Sollew picture book by Dr. Seuss, which is why I included it in this series.

Teaching about the latest events?

By the way, comic characters often have insatiable appetites. In a comedy ensemble you’ll usually get one who is obsessed with food. Activity9 - Explicit teaching/Joint Construction (The 'colon' and 'lists') Reviewthe use of punctuation in the story, i.e.capital letters, colons and full-stops.

With a lazy, roly-poly character like this wombat, you aren’t going to get a complicated plan. The plan is simple: to walk to the family’s front door and make a nuisance of oneself until food is provided. In this mythic journey the wombat finds a new home, even closer to the humans than before, burrowed under the house.In Diary of a Wombat, the gag doesn’t rely on the accumulation plot, so it’s much more subtle. You can see it in the line, ‘Demanded oats AND carrots’. Oats and carrots have been the important twin desire lines throughout the story and they come together at the end. WHAT DOES THE CHARACTER LEARN? Interview with my 4 year old (who won the book by scratching her ear with her toe, just like a wombat)**