Mentor text

Friendship can come in many forms. Often the most unexpected duo can have a connection unlike any other. This becomes apparent in both my children's story and the children's movie Up. Both portray the initial stereotypical judgement, but result in a relationship like no other. In my children's story, it is slightly different though. There is a homeless man who lives outside a grocery store and a young boy who is self-centered and ignores him. In Up, the old man is more ignorant than the little boy because he would rather be alone since his wife died. He gives the boy a chance and the boy begins to grow on him as they float away in the man's house with balloons.

Up served as an excellent mentor text for my children's story. The perspective, dialogue, and attitude of a person who doesn't want to listen to anyone, or care about anything, is shown very strongly in Up which also helped me to create the mindset and thought process of the boy in my story.

I tried to foreshadow the boy's actions and feelings towards the man before he even met him. I wrote specific details that either meant a lot at the moment (causing the reader to question it) or meant absolutely nothing at all. For example, I wrote about the boy not noticing something "until it was right at his feet", this 'something' was the man freezing cold, which I later began to describe.

Also, in the movie, the man and the boy express important body language, allowing the audience to understand that the man was not interested in the boy, and that the boy really just wanted to help - never give up or lose hope - much like the homeless man in my story.

Overall, the movie, Up, was a helpful mentor text in many more ways than my others because it helped me to better understand the actual situation rather than a situation that is just similar.