The Denver Post1

CK Reporter of the WeekEllory Boyd, Louisville

Superhero fi lm a thrill-rideTremendous, action-packed and fantas-

tic are the only three words that can be used to describe “Batman v Super-

man: Dawn of Justice.”This movie is incredible and defi nitely a

must-see. As most superhero fans know, and the title

of this movie tells us, this is a story about Superman and Batman.

It begins with the story of how Batman came to be who he is. Batman is played by well-known Golden Globe winner Ben Af-fl eck.

After moving past that emotional scene and learning why he is called Batman, we get to see Superman for the fi rst time.

Superman is played by the dashing Henry Cavill in a return from his earlier Superman days in the movie “Man of Steel.”

Both fi t their roles really well and their act-ing keeps you on edge throughout the entire movie.

Superman’s girlfriend, Lois Lane (Amy Ad-ams), ends up being an important part of this fi lm, but another woman, Diana Prince (Gal Gadot0), plays an even greater role, and most superhero fans know who she is.

At fi rst, Batman is out to get Superman be-cause somebody has framed Superman in the eyes of the public as a murderer.

They work to fi ght against each other, but Superman realizes that he truly needs Bat-man’s help.

He attempts to talk to Batman, but Batman refuses to listen.

This movie questions everything we know about the difference between right and wrong and makes you second-guess which superhe-ro you would support.

It also makes you ponder who the actual villain is in the story, making the suspense even greater, and the audience attention even higher.

While all the characters in this movie have strong roles, the women’s roles truly affected

me, making me shine with pride. Every single female character in this movie

is displayed as a strong and hard-working lady, especially Diana Prince.

Throughout this movie there were some gruesome scenes. That is expected consider-ing it is a superhero movie, but I can see why this movie was rated PG-13.

I loved this movie and it was defi nitely one of a kind, probably the best superhero movie I have ever seen.

The technology was so advanced in the movie that it completed the atmosphere. I expected nothing less and came away excited and hopeful for a Part Two.

I recommend “Batman v Superman: The

Dawn of Justice” to anybody above the age 12 whether you are a girl or a boy.

I am not that much of a superhero-movie loving type of person but, this is one that you should not miss.

Watch for it as it fl ies by in a movie theater near you!

March 29 , 2016

Beating writer’s block before it gets startedAlan Gratz, who appeared at this year’s

CCIRA conference, is the author of 10 books, with two more to be published

later this year. His fi rst novel was “Samurai Shortstop,”

about a boy trying to show that there is a place for tradition in the mod-ern world.

Out of all of Gratz’s books, “Prisoner B-3087” has sold the most copies. Although it is a novel, it is based on the true story of a boy named Jack Gruener’s survival of several Nazi concentration camps during World War II.

“The League of Seven,” Gratz said, is his favorite, a steampunk book as well as the fi rst book in one of Gratz’s two series. (His other series, “Horatio Wilkes Mysteries,” is for older teens.)

“Code of Honor” is Gratz’s most recent book. It is about a boy trying to prove that his older brother isn’t a terrorist.

As a young boy growing up in Knoxville, Tennessee, Gratz wrote a news-paper, which, he says, he delivered into his

neighbors’ mailboxes, whether they liked it or not.

When he was in fi fth grade, he tried to write a book.

Gratz went to the Universi-ty of Tennessee and studied

creative writing, but, before becoming an author, he worked as an eighth grade En-glish teach-er.

Gratz started writ-ing for a liv-ing to allow him to stay home with his newborn daughter.

He told his audience that he knows the basic outline of the book before he actu-ally writes it.

Then he works to develop the story further, by pinning note cards with details and char-

acters on a bulletin board. After that he fi nally writes

the book. This prevents writer’s

block while writing the book, Gratz said: He gets all his writer’s block done before actually writing the story.

Gratz advises young au-thors to read a lot. He also tells them to talk to a friend who also writes and to com-pare writing with them.

Gratz also suggests keeping a book of ideas, where you just write down things you might use some time.

To learn more about Alan Gratz and his books, visit http://alangratz.blogspot.com

YouthJournalism Day

for 4th-8th grade students

Thursday, July 21, 2016 7:30 AM to 5:00 PM

Metropolitan State University, Denver

Student Cost for the Day: $60 (includes breakfast & lunch). Spend the day with professionals learning about story writing, interviews, writing tips and photography.

Register today! Go to ColoradoNIE.com for a registration form. Call 303-954-3974 with questions.

By Sneha Muthe,13, a CK Reporter from Highlands Ranch

By Anya Mook,13, a CK Reporter from Northglenn

The Denver Post

The Robot Revolution exhibit at the Denver Museum of Nature and Sci-ence, which runs though August 7, is

incredible!Before I entered the exhibit, Brian

Hostetler, Museum Educator, asked me how much I know about robots.

I answered that I knew a lot. However, I quickly learned that I knew only

a little bit! Did you know that the difference between

a robot and a machine is that a robot senses the world around it and as such can kind of “think for itself” whereas a machine cannot?

This exhibit holds 40 robots that come from eight countries. They change over 300 batter-ies a day!

A couple of my favorite robots were Baxter, a robot that plays tic-tac-toe, which Aaron Goodwin, age 5, from Arvada, enjoyed playing and the soccer playing robots.

They even had an interactive ‘bee-bot’ table and costumes for the youngest kids to play with.

My favorite activity was creating cubelet robots. It was super hands-on and creative in that you get to build your own robot!

Cubelets are magnetic cubes that latch to-gether and each cube has a designated func-tion.

There is a sensor cube, which is like the brain and is required because it tells every-thing else what to do. As I said above, each robot must have a sensor, otherwise it is just a machine.

Examples of other cubes are the battery cube that provides power, the drive cube that has wheels in case you want the robot to move, the light cube if you want your robot to shine a light, and other cool cubes.

The most interesting cubelet robot that Brian Hostetler has seen was done by one kid who made a robot that was 4 feet long, had two or three lights on it, and had lots of rollers.

This exhibit came from Chicago and only took a week and a half to set up!

Approximately 1,500 - 2,000 kids a day will visit the exhibit, which is likely why you need

timed tickets, to even out the crowds. If you are interested, the museum will have

four community weekends, the third week-end of each month, where kids from local robotic clubs and school clubs will share about robots that they have recently created for competition.

All in all, I think that this exhibit is good for anyone 4 to 400!

2

Robots in a revolutionary exhibit

A day’s worth of sugar in smoothies and fruit drinks?As in the United States,

health experts in Great Britain are concerned with obesity and bad diets among children.

The government of the United Kingdom is putting a tax on soft drinks and other sugary beverages to help deal with the results of kids consuming too much sugar.

But fruit drinks like smoothies are not included in that tax, and it made some health experts wonder if those drinks really live up to their reputation as being healthy simply because they are full of fruit.

Nutritionists already know that there’s a problem with

fruit juices: Squeezing the juice out of a piece of fruit means that you’re only drinking the juice and not also eating the pulp.

Eating an orange will make you feel more full than just drinking its juice, and so you may end up drinking the juice -- and consuming the calories -- of several orang-es.

If you are grinding up all that pulp at home to make a smoothie, and not adding anything but plain, non-fat yoghurt to it, that might not be a very big problem.

But if you start adding sweetened yoghurt or put-ting in honey or sugar, that

healthy smoothie starts to be more like a liquid dessert.

Smoothies and fruit drinks sold in grocery stores don’t give you as much control as you would have making your own, so researchers checked out the types of fruit drinks kids might buy at stores in Great Britain.

They were not pleased with the results: Despite labels talking about healthy fruit, nearly half of these drinks had enough added sweeteners that one bottle gave kids as much sugar as they should consume all day.

Read the labels, they said, and try snacking on a piece of fruit instead.photo/KKnoefler247

Labels surround human beings, swirling in the atmosphere around each person’s thought process, incorrectly identifying

many: Perfect, Idiot, Jock, Nerd, Bully, Victim, the

list continues on. However, labels do not present the entire

truth; only a miniscule fraction. “I despise labels,” explains Mark Ludy, an

author and illustrator of children’s allegories who presented at this year’s Colorado Coun-cil International Reading Association conven-tion.

Having contributed to 13 books, his restless mind is well-respected now, but was most-ly unaccepted by the academic community when he was a child, because of his misbe-havior and reckless actions.

As a young boy, he detested school and per-formed terribly.

Teachers felt obligated to call his parents often due to his unruliness, and academics were a subject where he did not prosper.

Until he was about 18, he was led to believe that intelligence was not one of his strengths.

However, after graduating from high school, a thought came into his mind.

“I realized I wasn’t dumb,” says Ludy. “I just thought differently than others.”

He realized that people who don’t fit the mold that society has of a “perfect student” can still contribute to society.

In addition, he says, adults, especially teach-ers, need to acknowledge and encourage the gifts of every child.

And as someone who seemed to have an in-ability to pause his doodling, the passion and gift of Ludy’s art began to be utilized, though it wasn’t until much later that he decided to illustrate stories.

One of his most proud accomplishments is a story called “The Flower Man,” which pos-sesses a peculiar quality: Not a single word is written in it, only illustrations.

In response to a question about how this

possibly assisted reading skills, Ludy re-sponded, “If a picture’s worth a thousand words, then a thousand words are worth a picture.”

This story, though consisting only of imag-es, produces thousands of words in the mind, just as a novel would produce hundreds of mental pictures, for everyone creates their own story based on what is evoked by the pictures that lie before them.

And just as a picture is more than geometric symbols, a human being is more than a single role of teacher, student, or artist.

According to Ludy, “Every character has a different story to tell, and no one can tell your story quite like you can.”

Despite challenging pressures and beliefs, humans are complex and intriguing beings with numerous layers beneath their surface.

These layers should be cherished and helped to prosper, thrive and contribute.

As Mark Ludy asserts, “You are so much more than what people see.”

Without words, Mark Ludy rejects labels

By Jack Vanourek,10, a CK Reporter from Littleton

By Sanya Bhartiya,13, a CK Reporter from Centennial

Above, a young visitor watches the Bee Bots do their thing while, at left, Baxter the Robot chal-lenges young players to a game of Tic-Tac-Toe

(photos by Lori Vanourek)

The Denver Post3

One of the most fun things about science is the chance it gives you to satisfy your curiosity.

Jean-Nicolas Audet, a graduate student at McGill University in Montreal, noticed how bold the birds in Barbados were at outdoor restaurants, trying to snatch food from his plate while he was visiting the Caribbean island.

Since birds in the countryside are much more shy, he wondered if city birds were also smarter.

He and a team of researchers trapped bulfi nches from both rural and more urban areas of the island and tested their problem-solving skills in the lab.

It turned out that, indeed, the city birds were

much more clever than their country cousins in solving problems in which food was hidden in tiny drawers or put behind barriers.

Audet and his team also wondered if city life was bad for birds’ health, so they tested the birds’ im-mune systems, and discovered that the city birds were not only more clever, but also had developed more immunities against disease than rural birds.

Of course, one possible explanation is that birds who live in the city have to be smarter and more disease resistant than those in the country.

And that’s a new question for curious scientists to fi gure out.

City birds outperform their country cousins in problem-solving

Australia and New Zealand share some history: They were both settled by Great Britain in the late 18th and ear-

ly 19th century, and they are both on what, to Europeans and Americans, seems like the other side of the planet.

But they share only a little more than that, and Kiwis, as New Zealanders are affection-ately called, do not always like being lumped in with their Aussie neighbors.

That’s why their prime minister, John Key, worked for two years to fi nd a new fl ag for New Zealand, one that didn’t look so much like the fl ag of Australia.

Key said he was tired of going to interna-tional meetings and fi nding himself seated under the wrong fl ag, and it’s not hard to see how that might happen.

Both nation’s fl ags combine Britain’s Union Jack with the Southern Cross, the constellation that dominates the southern sky.

New Zealand’s fl ag only shows four stars, the fl ag of Australia shows fi ve, and Australia has an extra star that stands for the British Common-wealth, a group of semi-independent countries

that were once ruled by Great Britain.But both nations have been independent

since World War II, and Key is not the fi rst New Zealander to suggest that the country get a fl ag that seemed less like Australia’s.

People submitted ideas from the serious to the silly: One showed a kiwi bird with green lasers shooting from its eyes.

But 10,000 designs were fi nally narrowed down to one, combining the Southern Cross with a silver fern, a symbol important to the Maori, New Zealand’s fi rst people.

Last Thursday, however, Kiwis went to the polls and voted to keep the old fl ag by a margin of 56 percent to 43 percent.

After the results were announced, peo-ple had many explanations for why it had turned out the way it did.

Some people genuinely liked the old fl ag, but most agreed a change was not a bad idea.

However, many people disliked the design, say-ing it looked more like a beach towel than a fl ag.

Others simply disliked the prime minister.Whatever the reason, New Zealand’s fl ag is not

going to change. At least, not yet.

Kiwi voters reject chance to change their fl ag

Like many others who attended the Colo-rado Council International Reading As-sociation conference, Illya Kowalchuk

simply wants to change the way literature is taught to kids for the better and get kids excited about learning the literature being taught.

As a teacher himself, he is taking a unique approach to this goal.

In a speech, he gave a compelling case for

why comics should be given a chance in all classroom settings.

Rather than forcing the hard pieces of reading and writing at kids, he really tries to connect with kids, and make it fun for them.

He’s been doing that through comics and pop culture in his own nonprofit organi-zation, Pop Culture Classroom, made up of teachers, artists, and students.

He works in league with Mile High Comics and Denver Comic Con to promote his cause and get the word out to teachers.

Most teachers are a little timid about brin-ing in this style of teacher because it’s so different, but Kowalchuk says that by taking the risk, the kids get huge benefits, especial-ly those who aren’t as keen to write the big essay or read the long book.

The whole idea behind using comics is that kids with all different reading levels will take something different away from the experi-ence, whether it’s seeing a new side of cul-ture, comprehending literature, understand-ing the elements of a story, seeing real-world issues, understanding themes, getting a histo-

ry lesson, or inspiring change in the world.

“There’s just a power about com-ics that connects to everybody,” says Kow-alchuk.

He goes on to ex-plain the logistics of comics in a classroom and the importance they can bring to

learners. Even if you don’t love comics by nature, you

should give them a shot and just see where they take you.

Some of his recommendations are “Maus,” by Art Spiegelman, “Yummy,” by G. Neri, and “Smile,” by Raina Telgemeier.

Better education through graphic novels

photo/mikesbirds

Rules: Every row across, every column down and each of the six smaller boxes must contain numerals 1,2,3,4,5 and 6, one time and one time only.

The solution to this week’s puzzle is on Page 4.

On this day in 1886, Dr. John Pemberton made the fi rst batch of Coca-Cola, so our answers this week will each begin with the letter “C.”

1. The state fl ower of the Centennial State

2. This word can mean a waterfall or it can mean a cloudiness in the lens of the eye that makes it hard to see clearly.

3. A single piece of garlic

4. An animal whose diet is mostly made up of meat

5. The largest city in Illinois

6. Some types of this plant are barrel, saguaro and prickly pear.

7. Author and illustrator of “The Very Hungry Caterpillar,” “The Very Busy Spider” and “Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?”

8. Salida is the seat of this Western Slope county, which is named for Colorado’s fi rst US Senator. It’s also where you’ll fi nd Buena Vista.

9. Famous for not saying very much, this former Vermont governor went from vice-president to president when Warren G. Harding died.

10. Type of fruit that includes lemons, limes, oranges and grapefruit.

(answers on Page Four)

By Kaitlyn Pierce,14, a CK Reporter from Arvada

Photo/Kenna Haverkamp

The Denver Post4

is produced by Denver Post Educational Services

Executive Editor: Dana Plewkadplewka@denverpost.comCK Editor: Mike Peterson

coloradokidseditor@gmail.comWe welcome your comments.

For tools to extend the learning in this feature, look under “Youth Content” at:

www.ColoradoNIE.com

eEditions of the Post arefree of charge for classroom use.Contact us for information on all

our programs.

Denver Post Educational Services101 W. Colfax Ave.Denver CO 80202

(303) 954-3974(800) 336-7678

Stories without bylines were written by the editor.

(see Page Three)

10 right - Wow!

7 right - Great!

5 right - Good

3 right - See you next time!

1. columbine 2. cataract 3. clove 4. carnivore 5. Chicago 6. cactus 7. (Eric) Carle 8. Chaffee 9. (John Calvin) Coolidge

10. citrus

Hot Links to Cool Sites!

NASA’s Space Placehttp://tinyurl.com/ckspace

NIE Special Reporthttp://tinyurl.com/ckniereport

Headline Geographyhttp://tinyurl.com/ckgeography

Pulse of the Planethttp://tinyurl.com/ckpulseplanet

How to become a NextGen Reporter!http://tinyurl.com/colokidsreporter

To read the sources for these stories

Fruit drinks and sugar

New Zealand’s fl ag

City bird, country bird

go to http://www.tinyurl.com/ckstorylinks

Chapter Two: A Best-Selling Nature Writer

John Burroughs loved to write, and he loved the outdoors.

He was born on his fami-ly’s farm near the small town of Roxbury in New York’s Catskills, those low, green mountains where, in Wash-ington Irving’s story, “Rip Van Winkle,” the ghosts of Henry Hudson’s men bowled to make the thunder.

But Burroughs was more interested in the non-fiction writing of Henry David Tho-reau, who had gone out into the wilderness to live a sim-ple life among nature, and of Thoreau’s friend, Ralph Waldo Emerson, who wrote about the importance of strong character.

He also liked the poetry of William Wordsworth, whose ideas were fancy but who used everyday words so that people could understand his poems.

When Burroughs began to write about nature, he used everyday words, too. His essays in magazines were loved by readers who enjoyed sharing his warm feelings about the birds, the flowers and the small animals he came across on his walks in the fields and forests.

Burroughs said he wasn’t trying to be a scientist, and he wasn’t using his es-says to tell people how to live. “I paint the bird, or the trout, or the scene for its own sake,” he explained.

He did more than simply paint pictures with words, however. He also described a way of life that he had learned as a young boy growing up in the country.

For instance, he wrote about being patient and about paying attention to the things around you: “In the fields and woods more than anything else all things come to those who wait, because all things are on the move, and are sure sooner or later to come your way,” he said.

Often, he simply wrote about the joy of making nature part of his daily life: “Trout streams coursed through every valley my boyhood knew,” he re-

membered as an old man. “I crossed them, and was often lured and detained by them, on my way to and from school. We bathed in them during the long summer noons, and felt for the trout under their banks. A holiday was a holi-day indeed that brought permission to go fishing over on Rose’s Brook, or up Hardscrabble, or in Meeker’s Hollow; all-day trips, from morning till night, through meadows and pastures and beechen woods, wherever the shy, limpid stream led.”

For his readers, that style of writing was just right: In their world, before television or movies, reading the essays of John Burroughs was a way that they, too, could see beautiful things, even though they lived far from the countryside.

As a young writer, Burroughs also lived far from his home in the Catskills. He first had to leave to get more than the plain country education of a farm boy. Then, after teaching school for several years, he moved to Washington, DC, and took a job at the United States Treasury. Like most writers, it would be years before he could make a living just from his writing.

But Washington in the 1860s was not the huge city it is today. Even there, Burroughs found nature.

“The Capitol grounds, with their fine large trees of many varieties, draw many kinds of birds,” he wrote in 1868. “Here in early spring I go to hear the robins, cat-birds, blackbirds, wrens, etc. In March the white-throated and white-crowned sparrows may be seen, hopping about on the flower-beds or peering slyly from the evergreens. The robin hops about freely upon the grass, notwithstanding the keeper’s large-lettered warning, and at intervals, and especially at sunset, carols from the tree-tops his loud hearty strain.”

Once he could afford it, however, Burroughs returned to New York and built a country home above the Hudson River, where he grew grapes to make extra money while he wrote essays and collected them into books.

Later, he built a small cabin in the woods nearby, that he called “Slabsides” because it was made of the bark-covered slabs the sawmill sliced off logs be-fore sawing them into lumber. He often stayed at Slabsides for days to enjoy the quiet forest and to write without distractions.

Although he often traveled, John Burroughs was always happy to come home again. He wrote about that as well, reminding readers that it wasn’t necessary to tour the world to find the things that matter in life.

“The lure of the distant and the difficult is deceptive,” he wrote. “The great opportunity is where you are. Do not despise your own place and hour. Ev-ery place is under the stars, every place is the center of the world.”

Besides, what need is there to travel when the President of the United States is willing to come to your home for a visit? Not only did Theodore and Edith Roosevelt come for an overnight visit, but Burroughs had visits from other famous friends, including Henry Ford and Thomas Edison.

Henry Ford even gave him an automobile. Burroughs used it to bring visi-tors from the railroad station up the hill to his home. It was one of the first automobiles in the community.

But when his friend the President offered him the chance to go out West and see elk, bison, cougars and mountain sheep, he quickly agreed, he wrote. “I knew nothing about big game, but I knew there was no man in the country with whom I should so like to see it as Roosevelt.”

NEXT: The Nature-loving City Boy

by Mike Peterson, c. 2014 - illustrated by Christopher Baldwin, c. 2014

For a teaching guide, go to http://tinyurl.com/ckserial

The Trip That Saved Nature