Start of Term Feast

We gather for our first meeting this Thursday. Dinner, inspired by Harry's first meal at Hogwarts~ a Start-of-Term Feast, if you will~ will be served at 6pm and the official start time for meeting is at 6:30 pm, prompt. Time will fly fast, and an hour and a half isn't much anyway, so discussion and activities will follow a schedule.  This is our first meeting, so expect it to be a bit rough around the edges, but we'll get it moving like a twig trimmed broomstick in no time.

I will be handing out personal blank dictionaries to each child at this meeting and asking them to put any newly learned word(s) from the book into it. SOOOOO, if there have been any words that the kids have asked about, that you may have chatted about, or that you even remember now...or later...we'll enter them in our books. This will be an on-going activity throughout our meetings. Some members will get more into this "word keeping" than others...That's just fine. In our house, the girls asked about "meringues" and "sallow". I asked about "codswallop". Bring a clipboard if you have one- I have a few...


For one area of discussion, I'd like the kids to arrive with two or three adjectives that they feel describe themselves. We're looking for positives like "imaginative". For the younger children, it may be helpful to them if these words are written down. If it was me, I might use the descriptives: "creative", "celebrative" and "hopeful"- I know "celebrative" isn't a word, but I like it better than "joyful". I might also use "slightly mad", "noisy" and "eclectic".

Point of thinking~ Each child should think a little about favorites thus far and why? Favorite scene, quote, character, setting...I'm somewhat disposed, right now, to Ron refurrring to Fluffy with the quote, "If any dog needs exercise, that one does!"

So, the three things to do before Thursday are:

1. Think of a few words that cropped up in the book that stumped or entertained you and/or the kids. Clipboards???
2. Have kids come up with positive words that describe themselves- help them be honest and choose good words.
3. Point of thinking- everyone's favorites so far and why?