For Thailand’s young people,being rebels is

not a ‘Game’

Last week’s opening of “Mockingjay Part 1” was big news all around the world, but it made a particular splash in Thailand, where young people

who oppose the government were arrested for throwing up the movie’s three-fi nger salute at a speech being given by the Prime Minister.

Thailand’s army forcefully took over the government earlier this year and the move has not been popular with everyone. Apparently, supporters of the old government have noticed a connection between the dystopia of the Hunger Games and the way they see their nation’s situation.

Students attending the movie’s premiere also gave the salute and at least one theater cancelled a showing and refunded ticket money because of requests from local government offi cials who feared similar political protests. AP photo/Sakchai Lalit

2013

ColoradoKids CK ReporterZoe Zizzo

Highlands Ranch

dark side of the triloGy arriVes

Fans or not, audiences will agree “Mocking-jay” brings out an even

darker side of the “Hunger Games” trilogy.

The fi lm version, “Mocking-jay Part 1” again stars Jennifer Lawrence as Katniss, Josh Hutcherson as Peeta, Liam Hemsworth as Gale and Eliza-beth Banks as Effi e. They all do a magnifi cent job depict-ing their characters and their characters’ states of mind.

Covering only the fi rst half of the fi nal book in the trilogy, “Part 1” is a disturbing story that will leave you on the edge of your seat the entire time.

The movie does an okay job of following the book, but puts some quotes in other charac-ters’ mouths and both leaves out some characters and adds new ones.

And, at two hours and three minutes long, it extends some scenes longer than needed.

They leave out the kidnapping of Effi e’s stylists and add Effi e into the story sooner instead.

Despite the darkness of the war, this movie manages to be more humorous than the other two movies.

“Mockingjay Part 1” is a good movie but not as good as the fi rst two.

And, compared to the fi rst two movies, it makes them look like Disney fi lms.

I wouldn’t call it gory, but there is bombing, dead bodies or sick and injured people in almost every scene, making you leave the movie theater a little bit shaken.

The characters aren’t the way they were portrayed in the fi rst two movies and seem to act a little like psycho-killers.

I would recommend this movie for at least 12 years old because of the war images and violence. This is not for kids or the weak-stomached.

I would also defi nitely recommend at least see-

ing the fi rst two movies, if not reading the books, because without them you won’t understand what anybody is talking about or why they are acting in strange ways.

But don’t get me wrong, I do recommend seeing it despite the darkness in the plot.

The acting and humor brought together a spine-tingling movie, making it a must-see for Hunger Games fans this holiday season.

When young people start to decide about under-

age drinking, they may think that they’re young and healthy, so what harm can it do?

A new study shows that heavy drinking in adolescence can do a lot of permanent harm.

It’s long been known that people who binge drink at an early age often have damage to their brain cells and, in later life, have problems thinking effectively.

But until now, nobody had shown that it was the alcohol, and not other things they might have also done, that caused this damage.

Wonder no more. University of Massachusetts researchers have shown: It’s the alcohol.

They fed sweetened sugar water to one set of rats and sweetened alcohol to another.

Nerve cells in the brains of the alcohol-drinking rats showed damage, the cells of the others did not. Photo/Kjeongeun

teen drinkinG risksperManent daMaGe

By Paige Bakke,12, a CK Reporter from Englewood

of requests from local government offi cials who feared similar political protests.

November 25, 2014

In “Doll Bones,” by Holly Black, Zach, Poppy, and Alice

have all played a game for almost forever.

It’s a game of imagination, action, and fun, filled with amazing characters like William the Blade and the Great Queen.

Now that they are in middle school, Zach’s dad is trying to get him to quit the game.

His father throws away all of Zach’s action figures used to

play the game. Now that his figu-

rines are gone he has to quit the game.

But Poppy, in a desperate attempt to play the game for a last time, says that she has been hav-ing dreams that the Great Queen doll is made of the bones of a dead girl and her

ghost will haunt them forever if

they don’t bury the doll in the empty grave of the girl.

But there is a big problem; the grave is at least two days walk from where they all live. So, they set out on a epic adventure to lay the ghost of a girl to rest.

Will the mystery of the doll be solved? Is Poppy telling the truth about her dream?

This book is a great read, and shows how awesome imagina-tion actually is.

It should be for kids 10 and up, because of mature themes.

-- Carson Butler, Littleton

“Spirit Animals: Wild Born,” by Brandon Mull, was a

disappointment. The cover is deceiving in the

sense of “Don’t judge a book by its cover.”

The idea is somewhat unorig-inal. Like other kids’ books, it is good fighting evil.

It was, I have to admit, in some parts entertaining, but it seemed the action did not take place until the ending pages of the book; it would have been more interesting if the action and tension took place through-out the whole book.

As easy as “Spirit Animals”

was to read, I felt no motiva-tion to continue reading the full series of books.

There was little to no range and dif-ficulty of words; only few escaped my vocabulary.

The age group for Spirit Animals, I think, could range from eight to nine year olds.

Kids in that age group might be able to relate to the main characters and their feelings, though, like a lot of books these

days the main characters are unkind to each other using

mean words and in multiple cases even actions.

The way they treat each other in the book could potentially influence the reader to show wrong attitudes to-ward others in their life.

I feel that this book was a waste of time, given the other great

books in the world.-- Clarise Reichley, Denver

In “Counting by 7s,” Holly Goldberg Sloan tells the story

of Willow Chance, a twelve-year-old genius going into 6th grade who finds it calming to count by sevens.

When Willow takes a standard-ized test for the state of California and hands in the test ,she is thought to have cheated.

She is sent to Dell, a coun-selor who places his students

into four categories: Misfits, Oddballs, Lone Wolves and

Weirdos.Willow is so dif-

ferent from anyone Dell ever met that he has to make up a new category just for her: Genius.

Then her life really takes a turn.

Willow is dropped off at her house only to discover the police waiting to tell her

some terrible news. I loved the way Sloan de-

scribed situations in a humor-ous way even though the book is about a tragedy.

Read the book to see if Wil-low can overcome what seems impossible to ever get over.

“Counting by 7s” is the right book for you if you enjoy reading about something ter-rible happening that changes the way the character and the reader thinks and about how they could possibly heal their wounds.

-- Asher Hoyt, Denver(Taken from his full-length

October review in NexGen)

One story on Page One tells of young people in Thailand bravely taking a risk to try to improve their nation. Another tells of young people foolishly taking a risk with their health by drinking.

Look through today’s paper for stories of people taking risks. Decide if each one is a risk that could be worthwhile or one that is just foolish.

Beyond these four pages

When the game ends, imagination takes over

Series might be a better fit for younger kids

‘Count’ on this novel to change your thinking

Colorado Kidsis produced by

Denver Post Educational ServicesExecutive Editor: Dana Plewka

dplewka@denverpost.comCK Editor: Mike Peterson

coloradokidseditor@gmail.comWe welcome your comments.

For tools to extend the learning in this feature, look under“eEdition lessons” 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 werewritten by the editor.

Each year, kids throughout the state vote for the Colorado Chil-dren’s Book Awards, at school or public libraries.But first you have to know the

books you’re voting about. We’re running reviews of the

10 Junior Book finalists, five this week and five next week.See what our reviewers say,

pick up at least three at the li-brary or your favorite bookstore, and then read and enjoy them. Your librarian can tell you more

about when and how to vote!

Picking a pet can be a dif-ficult process.

In the book “Gaby, Lost and Found” by Angela Cervantes, a girl named Gaby is able to easily find a pet she wants, but the catch is that she has no home to take it to.

This story is good for children ages 9 to 12, but that doesn’t stop it from being enjoyable for children younger or older.

Gaby is a 6th grade girl, and her class is helping out at an animal shelter.

She loves animals, especially cats, but she has been having bad luck with taking care of them.

To make matters even worse, she has to hide some dark se-crets to prevent bullies picking on her anymore than they have already.

Her mother, as sweet as she was, was arrested, leaving her with a dad she never truly loved.

Bullies at school make fun of her and she has only one friend

that she can feel safe sharing her secrets with.

“Gaby, Lost and Found” is a good book for many reasons. Most of the settings are easy to imagine, making them easy to connect with.

The characters are realistic and readers can understand how they feel.

The story is not packed full of details, but there are certainly enough to keep the plot inter-esting and vivid.

Will Gaby’s mother come back, or will she be stuck for-ever with a father who doesn’t take care of her?

-- Jasmine Douglas, Thornton

The first book in the series “The Land of Stories: The

Wishing Spell” by Chris Colfer, is amusing and adventurous.

Alex and Conner Bailey are 11 year olds twins who are not at all alike.

Alex is smart, at-tentive, and is always reading in her free time.

Conner, on the other hand, is the opposite: He always falls asleep in class, always gets deten-tion, never gets good grades, and never does his homework.

However different Alex and Conner are, they like to listen to their grandma read fairy tales from her book, “The Land of Stories.”

On their birthday, she gives them the storybook, and Alex discovers that the book glows and hums!

While Alex is determined

to figure out what the book is, Conner is content to toss it into a river.

In all the confusion, Alex and Conner accidentally fall into the book and find themselves in the

Land of Stories where fairy tales are real.

A man with a frog’s head tells them a way they can go home, which is to use the Wishing Spell.

If you collect eight specific objects, the fairies will grant you one wish, in this case, going home to the real world.

Will they collect all the items of the Wishing Spell before anyone else?

I would recommend this book for ages 10 and up because of some language issues, but “The Land of Stories” has lots of humor, and, overall, this book is one of my favorites.

-- Mreedul Gupta, Littleton

Teachers!It is time to register for the Colorado Literacy conference!

February 4 - 7, 2015Denver Marriott Tech Center

Choose from 375 sessions • 25 Invited Speakers15 Authors • Exhibits • Special Events

Go to www.CCIRA.org to register today!

Register for our session #386 and meet some CK Reporters

Visit us in the exhibit hall!

ck Kids and adults can find live links to information about stories in Colorado Kids at www.ColoradoNIE.com

SudokuRules: 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.

1 2

6 1

4

5 3

5 3 2

3 1

Adventure in a magic landTouching, realistic, vivid

The peace sign can be seen pretty much anywhere nowadays.

Likewise, another sign of peace is beginning to pop up, both locally and globally.

Peacejam recently honored community leaders Cleo Parker Robin-son and Dennis Gallagher at their 6th An-nual Hero Awards Banquet.

Peace-jam is a non-profit based in Denver that is devoted to developing global leaders and engaging in the community.

Along with education, inspi-ration is a key part of creating young leaders, which was the reason for recognizing commu-nity heroes.

“I’ve been surrounded by people enough to make the right choices,” said Cleo Parker Robinson, who started a non-profit performing arts center.

Peacejam also has support internationally, with Nobel Peace Prize laureates backing their programming and urging people to take part in shaping the world for the better.

Desmond Tutu, Nobel Peace Prize winner and former South African bishop, is one of those spirited influences.

At the entrance, a red carpet was rolled out and the “pa-parazzi” were going crazy be-cause the banquet also doubled as the Colorado premiere of “Children of the Light,” the Peacejam-made movie of his life and his effect on the world.

The movie’s impact was stag-gering, showing what South

Africa had gone through, but also how Tutu changed the outcome with non-violent protests.

The film showed how

young kids were taking his example to heart, starting their own projects.

Projects like theirs are how you can also get involved in Peacejam.

They’ve partnered with Google to create a One Billion Acts of Peace campaign, to set up a billion projects by 2019.

You can take action, and then you can take Desmond Tutu’s words, delivered via live video hookup, to heart, “Thank you, thank you, for all that you do and thank you for making me look so good on the screen.”

While you’re at it, take a peek at the movie, too.

celebration of peace

Dennis Gallagher addresses PeaceJam’s awards banquet. Photo by Brianna Wolle

A fossa is known for its long body and short feet, and is almost cat-like.

Fossa comes from the Mala-gasy language and means “cat.”

Since the word itself means cat, many people believe fossas are in the cat family. However, the exact family is uncertain.

All that is known for sure is that the fossa is related to the hyena and mongoose.

A male fossa can weigh up to 20 pounds.

Surprisingly, fossas are the largest mammalian carnivore on Madagascar, with a diet that is mainly lemurs.

The first baby fossa at the Denver Zoo is named Rico, and

was born July 28. The zookeepers had it easy

since Rico’s mom, Violet, is a good mother and did the major-ity of the work.

What the keepers mostly had to do was the weekly check-ups, including measurements and vaccinations.

Little Rico stayed out of the exhibit for the first couple of months after his birth, though his hard-working mother had stayed on display until the day of Rico’s birth.

The father, Dorian, stayed on display the entire time.

Dorian was the first fossa at the Denver Zoo, and, like Vio-let, was not born there.

Seeing the adorable fossa pup in person was a great experi-ence.

I recommend this exhibit at the Denver Zoo for all families, so hurry in because Rico won’t be a pup forever.

cute, cat-like non-cat on display at the zoo

Youth-written stories that appear here also appear on

C , !

Sudoku

Solution145326

326415

562134

214563

653241

431652

By Brianna Wolle,14, a CK Reporter from Arvada

By Nikki Dresen,13, a CK Reporter from Winter Park

Rico Fossa, Madagascar’s smallest carnivorous mammal, is now the Denver Zoo’s cutest exhibit! Photo/Denver Zoo