The Writing Club --2-- The Dragon Boat Festival - 卡蜜拉童創奇幻仙境

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The Writing Club --2-- The Dragon Boat Festival
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The Writing Club -- 2

By cAmilla Wu

Date: May 16, 2009

Poetry / Newspapers reading / Grammar /Topic writing: The Dragon Boat Festival

1. Poetry

2. Newspapers

(a) Taipei Times

(b) The China Post

(c) The Province (Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada)

-- A DIVISION OF CANWEST PUBLISHING INC.

3. Grammar: (reference: http://englishplus.com/grammar)

(a) Review the grammar learned from the first class

a-1. subjects / objects

a-2. tenses : There are three basic tenses: past, present and future.

ß past ßà Present ßà future à

a-3. subject-verb agreement / complete sentences / run-on sentences

(b) Introduce the progressive tense and the present perfect tense

b-1 The six progressive tenses correspond to the three basic and three perfect tenses. They are formed by the appropriate basic or perfect tense of the verb to be followed by the present participle.

ß past ß à Present ß à future à

was + Ving is + Ving will be + Ving

were + Ving am + Ving

are + Ving

* I was running. * I am running. * I will run.

* They were walking. * They are walking. * They will walk.

b-2-1 Introduce the definition of participle and the present perfect tense:

A Participle is a verb used as an adjective.

The past participle(p.p.) has the past form of the verb which would go with the verb have and would usually end in -ed. The present participle ends in -ing.

b-2-2 The three perfect tenses are the three verb tenses which show action already completed. (The word perfect literally means "made complete" or "completely done.")

ß past ßà Present ßà future à

had + p.p. has + p.p. will + p.p.

have + p.p.

* I had eaten. ** I have eaten. *** I will have eaten.

*Action is completed with respect to the past.

**Action is completed with respect to the present.

***Action is completed with respect to the future.

4. Topic Writing: The Dragon Boat Festival

(a) Group Discussion – Storytelling—The history of the dragon boat festival

(b) Review the writing skills –

b-1 Opening (Describe!) à Introduction

b-2 Body (The ideas or reasons: Write as many as we need.) à

b-3 Conclusion (Support the ideas.)

(c) Writing sharing –

The Dragon Boat Festival

By Kevin Wang

Age: 8

Date: May 16, 2009

The dragon boat festival is to commemorate Chu Yuan, who sacrificed the life for his country.

When Chu Yuan died, people in the country felt miserable and awful because Chu Yuan was such a kind and great man. They made rice dumplings for the fish to prevent them from eating Chu Yuan’s body. Besides, they also made a dragon boat and played the drum on the boat to scare the fish away.

Nowadays, people have the tradition of racing dragon boats. That is why we have the dragon boat festival.

Camilla's Corner:

Dear Children,

Happy Dragon Boat Festival! There is a history of the dragon boat festival that you might want to know more about it. Here is some information for you. Have fun reading it!

Chu Yuan (Qu Yuan, 332-296 B.C.) "I would prefer to jump into the river and be entombed in the stomachs of fishes than to bow while purity is defiled by vulgar pestilence..." (Resource: http://www.mtc.ntnu.edu.tw/dragonboat/cy_history.htm)

Chu Yuan was descended from the imperial family, and an air of suffering nobility and fantasy can easily be sensed in his works. He is one of the greatest Chinese poets of all times. His tragic death is commemorated each year on the fifth day of the fifth moon by dragon boat races and the offering of rice (zongzi) thrown into the water. On that day, Chu Yuan committed suicide in the Milo River of Hunan Province.

Chu Yuan lived at a time of remorseless wars when King Huai (329-299 B.C.) of Ch'u was busily attempting to extend the frontiers of his kingdom. As prime minister, Chu Yuan objected to the use of force, but without effect; and in 303 B.C. he was banished, never to return to power. Thereafter he wandered over the countryside, principally in the region of the vast inland T'ung-ting Lake in Northern Hunan. During this time he collected legends, rearranged folk odes, and wrote the long, tragic poem of complaint against the Emperor known as Li Sao. Eventually, unable to bear his fate any longer, he drowned himself. The Lord of the East in "Nine Songs:1" is supposed to have been the god of the eastern part of the state of Chu, of which Chu Yuan was at one time Prime Minister.

For even more information on Chu Yuan, check here.

Also, check out "The Lighter Side of Chu Yuan--A Brief History of Dragon Boating" by Andy Holmes!

cAmilla
Love, Peace, Hope & Future!

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The Dragon Boat Festival
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The Dragon Boat Festival

by Zhao Bo

(Resource: http://www.fwcc.org/dragonboat.html )

The following article is reprinted from Volume 1, number 2 of the newsletter of Families with Children from China of the San Francisco Bay Area.

According to the Chinese traditional calendar, Duanwu known in English as the Dragon Boat Festival takes place on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month.

Legend has it that the festival commemorates the life and especially the death of Qu Yuan (c. 340-278 B.C.), the first great poet in Chinese history. He lived during the Warring States period (a time when China was divided into several warring kingdoms) and was a high-ranking official in the state of Chu. At that time his homeland was under siege by another powerful state called Qin. The king of Chu did not recognize Qu Yuan’s correct stand or appreciate his suggestions for saving their country. What is more, treacherous officials slandered him, and at last he was sent into exile. On the fifth day of the fifth lunar month, when he heard news that the capital of Chu had fallen into enemy hands, he threw himself into the Miluo River (in present-day Hunan province) and drowned.

What is the connection between Qu Yuan and dragon boats? Qu Yuan, a great patriot, was loved by the people. When villagers heard he had thrown himself into the river, they rushed in their boats to try to save him, but they were too late. Dragon boat races commemorate their rescue attempt.

If you happen to visit southern China around the time of this festival and are in a town with a river, you will surely have the chance to see some magnificent racing. Along the riverbanks on houses projecting over the water hundreds of people, both locals and tourists, wait for the races to begin. The boats themselves are long and narrow, with a colorful dragon's head high up on the bow. Each one holds at least fourteen people, all dressed in gorgeous ancient costumes. The man standing at the front of the boat with a small flag in his hand is the captain; the one standing at the back is the drummer, who beats a big drum to mark the rhythm for the oarsmen to follow. With the bang of the starting gun the dragon boats rush forward like flying arrows, amid the loud banging of drums and shouts from the onlookers. It is an unforgettable scene.

But what do zongzi have to do with all this? Legend has it that when Qu Yuan drowned, his body was never found. People felt very sad and worried that his body would be eaten by the creatures in the river. So they threw packets of rice into the river to feed the hungry animals and asked them to eat the rice instead of Qu Yuan's body. Those packets were zongzi. Another legend says that the people offered zongzi as sacrifices to the soul of Qu Yuan. To prevent the food from being eaten by animals, they wound it with brightly colored thread, which they believed would scare away dragons and other aquatic beasts. Nowadays you can see at the festival markets beautiful model zongzi made of paper and covered with colorful silk thread.

Today people all over the country eat zongzi on the Dragon Boat Festival. Here is how you make them: First get some bamboo leaves about two palms long and about three to four fingers wide. Soak them in water, and clean them with soft brushes. They will serve as the wrappers for the zongzi.

In the meantime, soak glutinous rice in cold water for several hours. When the rice becomes fat, it is time to make zongzi. Take two or three bamboo leaves, overlapping the edges to form a funnel. Put glutinous rice inside, wrap it up in the shape of a pyramid, and tie it with a string. Boil them in a deep pot for hours, until the rice is cooked. This kind is called Tian zongzi, which you eat with sugar or honey. The Beijing style has rehydrated dried dates inside. In southern China people like to put bean paste or pork soaked in soy sauce in the middle of the rice.

Another custom of the festival is to wear xiangbao, fragrance pouches made of colorful cotton or silk embroidered with small animals, plants, or flowers. The inside contains a kind of perfume to ward off poisonous creatures such as scorpions. But nowadays many people, especially children, like them just as beautiful festival decorations.

Zhao Bo lives in Xin, Shanxi province, where she works in the Foreign Languages Department of the Xin Institute of Architecture and Technology. For permission to reprint this article, please contact Amy Klatzkin (klatzkin@leland.stanford.edu).

Acknowledgments: The author is grateful to her parents for kindness and criticism during the writing of this article. Special thanks also to the families of the author's aunts: Third Aunt on Zhao Bo's mother's side, and Younger Aunt on her father's side. Thanks especially to the author's best friends, Amy and Terry, for giving her the opportunity to introduce the traditional festivals of China to all her American friends with children from China!

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