Dear Daddy Penguin

Dear Dad

I'm here with the human, Helen watching that World Cup thing the humans are obsessed with. Well most humans are, thankfully mine isn't! She doesn't seem to care about it at all which is great for me cause she brought me shopping for a present for you! 

Ireland is nice, very green and no snow. Human says there's never snow in June so I should stop looking for it every morning but I think she might be lying to me. It has to snow right? My human is very strange, she doesn't eat fish but eats a lot of something called chicken. I don't mind chicken but I'd rather have a good fish! Just don't tell grandma penguin I tasted weird food, you know what she's like when she hears about foreign food! 

I've discovered a new love for a thing called chocolate. It's brown and tastes delicious! Humans love it too! My favourite kind is one called a penguin bar! 

It's really yummy! I could eat them all day (with fish) but the human says I'd get fat! I don't think she knows that I need my fat to stay warm! 

Anyway, my human isn't all bad. She brings me on adventures and to see strange things. We went to the zoo in Berlin and to a spelling bee. It's fun! This week she says she's bringing me on a surprise trip! 

Oh in Ireland it's Father's Day! That's a special day where the humans celebrate great dads, my human got her dad a present so I got you one too! Here's a packet of penguin bars! Especially for you! 

Now don't say I never get you anything! I'm a great little penguin! 

Say hi to mom and grandma and all the family! It's fish time here so I can't write all night, and you know how difficult it is for us penguins to type! 

Love you Dad

Love your Waddles 

XxxX

My interview with Julia

Last week I was a lucky little Penguin and I got to chat to a really cool human. I say chat but really I mean interview, an interview is lots of questions to learn something. I felt like a news reporter. I looked her up online to see what she does and then I made a list of questions to ask Julia (thats the woman I was interviewing) and I made notes and got myself ready.

Waddles: Good morning Miss Skinner 
(Helen says its polite to say Miss Skinner because she's a grown up and I should be respectful because I'm interviewing her)

Julia, Me and Catherine

Julia: Good morning Waddles, I hope you slept well and are ready for a busy day?
Waddles: I'm really excited to be interviewing you Miss Skinner, may I call you Julia?
Julia: Julia will be fine, we are friends after all
Waddles: Thanks Julia! We are friends, I love having nice human friends! I slept really well thank you but I don't think my human did, she's really grumpy! I'm afraid to go driving with her because she's so sleepy :(
Julia: I'm not sleeping well at the moment either, I have too many things on my mind. I need to get some of them off my to do list. Do you have one of those? 
Waddles: What's a to do list?
Julia: You write down the jobs/things you need to get done, so for instance on yours you could have interview Julia!
Waddles: Ah a fish list!! Penguins have fish lists of all things they must do which always has fish on it! 

Waddles Fish List
Catch Fish in Tesco
Eat Fish
Interview Julia
Eat more fish
Drive to Dublin with human
Eat more fish
Fish
Fish
Fish
Fish
Sleep

Julia: Of course, silly me! I must get into the fish zone. I'm having prawns for my supper!
Waddles: Oh I like prawns but the shells are tricky for me because I don't have fingers like humans
Julia: Mine don't have shells. Mr Skinner puts them in pasta, he always cooks supper on Fridays and we have pasta. I love Fridays!
Waddles: What's pasta? I think I'd like anything with fish in it! 
Julia: Waddles, I think pasta might be a bit heavy for you, it tastes lovely but might stay in the bottom of your tummy and make you sink, you're such a little Penguin!!
Waddles: Oh no!!! I don't want to sink!! :(
Julia: Exactly, better stick to fish!
Waddles: I love fish! I learnt about ice cream last week, I want to try that next! 

Julia: Be careful because it's very cold! Mr Skinner says hi to you and Helen
Waddles: Helen says hi too, and that she likes pasta too! You'll have competition now, Helen cooks weird things, she never has fish and might need Mr Skinner to cook for her
Julia: He cooks pasta and roasts very well but doesn't do much else tell her. 

Waddles: Helen says she likes roasts too. I think Helen is very silly. 
Julia: Now Waddles, you mustn't be rude about humans. That isn't nice even if Helen is silly. 
Waddles: But she's my pet human. 
Julia: Yes even so...you must be polite otherwise she may take you to the zoo and leave you there
Waddles: OH NO!! I liked the zoo but I don't want to stay there, the penguins all spoke German and I like my adventures. 

Julia: Well I'm going on an adventure and may see some of your relations! I'm going to see the zoo in Singapore and Sydney. I'm also going on a night safari but I expect the penguins will be asleep then. 
Waddles: If they have sense they'll be asleep but I'll ask them to pop out and say hello to my friends
Julia: That's very kind of you Waddles

Waddles: You know Julia, I read lots of your 100 Word Challenge posts last week and I really liked them. Could you tell me about them? 
Julia: Right it's very easy really. I set a prompt each week of either a picture, part of a sentence or a few individual words. The children use the prompt and 100 words to produce a piece of their best creative writing. 
This is popped onto their class blog and then linked to my blog, where magic happens. Do you know about magic? 

Mr Skinner, me and Julia

Waddles: I know about Penguin Magic, it's where a penguin pulls a fish or tiny penguin out of a glacier. 
Julia: Yes magic is wonderful 
Waddles: But why don't the small humans only get 100 words to use? 
Julia: Well by making it 100 words the children have to think hard about the words they chose. They have to SELECT the right words. Imagine you had lots of fish but you could only eat one, You would have to make a choice and pick the best one!

Waddles: Oh that's super clever! Do the small humans make good word choices? 
Julia: Sometimes they need practice like I do with some technology. That is why they take part as often as they can. Want to know what the magic bit is??

Waddles: YES PLEASE!!
Julia: Well, when they link to 100wc.net there are big humans who comment, like you and Helen did last week. The comments make the small humans feel proud of their work. What do you feel proud of Waddles? 
Waddles: I'm proud of my blog and my tweets! And sometimes I'm proud of my human when she does nice things! I really liked reading their work, made me have a funny warm feeling in my tummy, Helen says it's cause they were well written and really clever. I think it's because I was hungry

Julia: No no no no! Waddles! If you're going to become a literary Penguin you are going to have to keep your thoughts about hunger and fish at bay!
Waddles: But I'm a penguin, I'm always hungry!
Julia: Anyway, the small humans, you know they're called children?? The children love getting comments, it makes them happy!

Julia: Are you going to get a Facebook page to talk to your penguin family?
Waddles: I don't know, Helen says no but I got a Twitter when she said I couldn't have one...
Julia: You sound like a very spoilt Penguin Waddles. Don't forget to say please and thank you
Waddles: I'm sometimes a little bold, but I don't mean to be :(
Julia: Maybe we could let the children visit your blog too
Waddles: OOOH I'd like that, they could read and ask questions and I'd answer like a sensible penguin. 

100wc.net

Julia: Do you have any other questions?
Waddles: Why do you do 100wc?  Is it because it's fun?
Julia: Well, I had a blog that nobody visited and I was very sad about that. So I thought I could do something fun with children so my blog wouldn't be lonely. The children were so keen that I set up another blog for 100 words. It does take a lot of time because I have to organise a lot of humans to comment, tell schools when the link doesn't work and post the prompts. 
Waddles: Aw poor blog, it's not nice to be lonely but now you've loads of small humans to keep you company and they write brilliant things for you to read too! You must be really busy though, don't you have time for catching fish?
Julia: No I don't have time for fishing :( I do have time for coffee though
Waddles: I don't like coffee, you should have fish instead!

Waddles: Thanks Julia, it was lovely interviewing you, you're a lovely human! Mind your beak, even though Helen says you don't have a beak!

Julia: Bye Waddles, talk soon :)

I had great fun interviewing Julia, she's super cool like me! And I love the 100 Word Challenge, I think I'd like to write one some day!

Don't forget to tweet me! @WaddlesPPenguin

My Day at Excited with the human

I was the only penguin in attendance at the Excited Learning Festival last weekend but that didn't stop me! I rocked the place! I sat with the Helen human and some of her friends, they all thought I was unreal and super cool and wanted photos with me! I'm famous! I like being famous, it means everyone knows who I am! I met my friend Minister Ciaran Cannon again and this time we really did take a photo!

Me and Ciaran Cannon, Junior Minister of Education and minder of schools

There were some really weird giant puppets around Excited too, they were super freaky! I was chatting to one called Sheila and she seemed really nice until we had a little fight about fish, surely everyone knows that eating fish fingers is just silly because fish don't have any fingers???

Sheila tried to EAT ME!!!

And the next thing I knew I was in her mouth and she was trying to eat me!! Doesn't she know that you can't eat Penguins?? I'm not dinner! I'm not tasty! I'm a penguin, I'm a visitor to Ireland and I don't need to be eaten by a giant puppet girl! I was screaming for help because I was really really scared and nobody could hear me because I was in this giant mouth and my screams were muffled! I tried to fight my way out of it and I struggled, I wriggled, I squirmed and I pushed my way out...

But in the end I won

I won in the end, I got free and jumped away! I landed on her nose though but I think it's ok because she wasn't hurt and I wasn't eaten! 

But hang on!! Who took the photos of me and Sheila??? I blame Helen......silly human didn't even try to help me! I must give out to her. 

Look at all the lovely people I met!

I loved meeting all the teachers there, they were really lovely and they all knew who I was so they all wanted to take photos with me! I'm famous! I really liked the Lego guys! They gave me a Lego duck to make and I made loads of them! It was really fun! All my ducks were in a row together! The Lego guys wanted a photo with me too! I am that cool! I think working with Lego all day would be a great job, maybe they need a Penguin to work with them? I bet they don't have a penguin employed in Lego already? And a Penguin as cool as I am? I am one of a kind :)

Me and the Lego guys

Me and all my ducks in a row

On Saturday we went to Dublin Castle again for more Excited stuff and this time I got to meet some small humans! Oh I also met some medium humans (Helen says they're teenagers) and they were all talking about education and technology stuff. They really liked me. I think they liked my blog and my tweets too! Some of them were tweeting me and telling me how cute I am! I also met Lord David Puttnam, he's a producer and makes movies but he's also a very important person in education and believes Education is the most important thing in the world, I agree with him. He has been in charge of loads of different stuff and even set up an award for brilliant teachers. I'm like a teacher, maybe some day I'll get an award! I'd like an award for best penguin teacher in the world! Would you vote for me?

David Puttnam, me and Helen the human

I really enjoyed the Excited Learning Festival, I even liked spending the day with my human Helen, she took care of me and helped me take loads of photos with all sorts of people! I think it's really important for teachers to learn from each other and from their students. I think Excited helped my human to see how much the small humans like and need technology in school, it's really easy to use and makes learning fun! I love using technology too, it helps me blog and tweet! 

Don't forget to tweet me @WaddlesPPenguin  I love making friends on twitter and chatting to classes and small humans!