9th March 2010
In our last two lessons on Tuesday we worked with our book again. In the first lesson we thought about lies and promises and about white lies. White lies are used when somebody doesn’t say all of the truth because he doesn’t want to hurt the other.We talked about Christopher's interpretation of white lies and that he thinks that white lies are statements that have in common that something has to be left out. We found out, that Christopher´s opinion means, that all people lie if they leave something out. This is not right; of course, people leave something out, because some things are not relevant. At the end of the first lesson we discussed Christopher´s traits and peculiarities. For example that he is not touched with pleasure.In the second lesson we spoke about Christopher´s father and the rules he sets his son. The rules are: 1.) Don´t ask Mrs. Shears who killed Wellington!2.) Don’t say the name “Mr. Shears”!3.) Stop the detective game!4.) Don´t walk into other people’s garden!5.) Don´t stick your nose into other people’s business!6.) Stop writing the book!Then we talked about how cleverly Christopher handles these regulations. We came to the result that Christopher broke none of the first 5 rules. We think that Christopher takes a passive role; it means that he doesn’t ask about the killing of the dog and only listens to other people. The name “Mr. Shears” is spokes by him only out of the house. He breaks only the last rule. We found out, that if he stopped writing his book than the novel would have ended on the point where his dad forbade him to write it. We all agreed that this would have been horrible.Think about it!In addition, we read a few more chapters and then the lesson was also over again. Check again to see like it goes on.(by Alexander)
Task: Write about the character of Mother. What kind of person is she to you? What can you tell about her relationship to Christopher? Support your opinion with references to the text. Only use evidence from the letters.
Judy Boone is the mother of Christopher John Francis Boone and lives with Roger Shears in London. Although she loves her son very much, she left him because of her affair with Mr. Shears but the biggest reason for moving to London without him was that she thought it’s the best for Christopher. Judy Boone is a very hot-tempered person, who gets angry very quickly, shouts very often and also hit Christopher sometimes. That’s also why she didn’t stay with Christopher anymore; she said she “couldn’t take it anymore”. Because of getting angry so often she had a lot of discussions with her husband, so she felt lonely and looked for help in Roger Shear’s arms and so it’s happened that they fell in love with each other. Christopher’s Mom and Dad are very different on the emotional layer. On the one hand Ed Boone is very patient and doesn’t shout often, on the other side Judy Boone gets angry very quickly. So this relationship didn’t work anymore. And when Judy saw how harmonic Christopher and Ed got on together she felt very sad about the feeling that they don’t need her. So she left her son, although it “breakes her heart”. She was just overwhelmed by the situation because living with an autistic child is not easy because of their exesses. She gets kind of depressive and so she thought it’d better for her son when she left. In the letters you see how hard the situation is for her. Phrases like “I think about you all the time” or “I still love you” show that Judy Boone can’t live with her son anymore but she also tries to explain to him why she left. She says frequently that she is sorry for everything. She is very honest because she told his son her true situation - That she couldn’t handle the situation and was tired of Christopher’s illness. Her love for her son is also expressed in questions like “Do you remember…?”, there you can see that she likes to think about the “old good times” together. She wants her son to live in her life, so she told him much about her life, although they are divided by a very long distance. In my opinion she took the right decision once she shows her endless joy about Christopher’s visit to London and leaving Roger for living with Christopher. In the end you can say about Judy that she is a very hot-tempered person who loves her son very much and wants only the best for him, but she is also a emotional woman who needs her own life with love and a privacy.
(by Sarah L.)
5th March 2010
In our English lessons on Thursday and Friday we went on talking about our murder mystery novel. On Thursday we started with the topic body language because Christopher as a teenager with Asperger Syndrome tries to understand it but he can´t do it very well.
There are many forms of body language, for example you can move your arms and hands in a special way to say something or you speak louder or faster. You can also get a clue about how somebody is feeling when you look at how his skin colour changes.
We also found out on Thursday that Christopher is sometimes very superstitious, although he thinks very rational and believes only what scientists can prove. So, for fun we did a little test to see whether we are superstitious or not. The outputs were very different.
In our Friday lesson we got acquainted with dramatic irony. What this is? You can find dramatic irony, when the reader of a book knows something about what´s happening in the plot, about which the character has no knowledge. In “The Curios Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time” we can find this when Christopher´s mother is said to be dead but he doesn´t visit the funeral or has any evidence for her death. The effect is that we know more than Christopher and want to see how he will get the information that his mother is still alive.
So far for that week, now we are curious about what we´ll do next lesson.
(by Robert)
After her death Christopher has his own way of thinking where his mother is now. Explain what you think of his ideas and compare them to your own beliefs. Do you find them disgusting? Comforting? Weird? Factual? How do his ideas fit with what you know about his way of thinking?
Christopher as a special kind of human has a very factual view of life and death and life after death. Actually, he does not believe in life after death for the reason that he cannot imagine that there is something like heaven or hell or even a soul. He rather thinks of humans as biochemical complexes whose lives are over when their brains stop working. The only way people could exist further is - in Christopher's opinion - as dust and molecules we get in our lungs every time we breathe. This point of view must be sort of disgusting for some people. I also can just partly agree with his perception. Our bodies might be divided into tiny pieces after we are dead and we will become part of the environment but I believe in souls. I have no idea what could happen to them; either there is a heaven or reincarnation or anything else. No one can tell because no one has ever returned from death until now. Moreover, it is unromantic to think that we are just bodies with no content or deeper sense. It is hard to accept that our thoughts and emotions will end with our death so we try to make up a world beyond life. And that might be the reason why most of the people feel uncomfortable when they are confronted with Christopher's way of thinking.
(by Ly)
As we know Christopher can only understand things which he can explain to himself with science (physics, maths, etc.). So when he was told his mother died, he had to imagine where she has gone. Mrs Forbes told him that her mother has gone to heaven but he cannot trust her because she believes in heaven and for Christopher, who is not able to explain heaven in a scientific way, it does not exist though. When her husband, the vicar called Reverend Peters, told him that heaven is not in our universe Christopher tried to explain this possibility with a black hole in fact that there is nothing in our universe like heaven. And to get dead people there he thought of shooting them on rockets into the black holes but this would be noticed by other people.
But his mother was cremated so she burnt into ash and smoke. What happened to the ash he will never know because he could not ask the crematorium due to his absent during the funeral. The smoke went through the chimney into the sky and so Christopher thought that there were molecules of his mother in the sky, “or in clouds over Africa or the Antarctic, or coming down as rain in rainforests in Brazil, or in snow somewhere.”
Christopher tried to explain heaven as a proven thing by science as in fact he cannot imagine illogical things. He does not notice that he destroys the beliefs of other people with his way of thinking and explaining. His biological view on death is in my opinion the most factual and believable explanation (because it is science) but the idea of shooting dead people with rockets into black holes is far from factual it is more disgusting and weird. However, all in all it is a typical thought of Christopher by explaining it with science.
As for me, the biological explanation fits the most because I do not believe such things as heaven but maybe some kind of circulating souls in the world.
(by Philipp)
Today our teacher Ms. Böttger gave me a very difficult task and now I’ve got a problem. I have to write at least 300 words, but I don’t know how I can realize that. I want to try:
In our fourth lesson about the novel we talked about people’s emotions, especially about Christopher and his problem with non-verbal communication. As you know he is autistic and so it’s difficult for him to recognize his emotions and to show or to say them. Also, he can´t imagine the feelings of others and it’s impossible for him to interpret something like gestures.
Therefore, Siobhan gave him some smileys on a piece of paper and explained to him what they meant. Until this moment the paper is Christopher’s companion - he carries it in his pocket. But that’s not all what she does for him concerning this topic. She helps Christopher to understand that one smiley can express different feelings and moods. However in the daily communication with other people the smiley-paper in his pocket doesn’t help him. It’s very difficult to decide which diagram is most like the face a person makes, because people’s faces move very quickly. So, he throws the paper in the bin and gets used to asking people what they mean or he walks away.
For us as readers it is not easy to recognize the character’s emotions because Christopher can’t describe them correctly. But it is possible, if we look exactly at Christopher’s words. You should know, Christopher uses a lot of aspects to describe the figures behaviour and feelings in the novel (that means in his own book). So it’s an indirect way for us to understand people’s emotions. For example: If Christopher describes, that the policeman “closed his mouth and breathed out loudly through his nose” I as a reader know that this man is stressed.
Another example … Oh sorry, it’s time to end – 323 words. Good bye! :)
(by Loreen)
