Mrs Sallibartan's English ressources

You might like playing with cards at home, but check this out!

Bryan Berg has just broken his own Guinness World Record for building the largest free standing building out of packs of cards.

It's a model of the world's largest hotel and he used more than 200,000 cards to make it. And it took 44 days to complete!

See the huge model here...

Now tell me :

Do you like playing cards?

Do you prefer building things?

Do you like records or competiton?

What records do you know?

What are your records?

As we've just started a new chapter in our book about travels and adventures why don't you tell me about your experiences.

This site may give you some ideas and guide you to answer click here.

There English pupils can chat about the best places they’ve been to or would like to go to, where they think they might go 100 years in the future, and issues affecting travel like climate changes.

Don't forget details like the means of transport, how long you stayed, who you went with, what the weather was like,what you brought back, what you enjoyed or what surprised you, the specialities you tested ...

You can also send some pictures of the sights with your parents permissions of course.

Today is World Book Day - it was brought in to try and get more people reading books instead of watching TV. But with more and more books being turned into films - what's better?

 Reading the book, or watching the movie - Angharad tells us what she thinks......

CLIP: "When you read the books they're really good and they have loads of things in it, then when you see the films they don't have as many things because they can't fit it all in - so they're not as interesting to watch."

But it's a different story for Olivia....

CLIP: "It's just easier to watch them rather than read them - because you have to concentrate a lot more when you read them."

And if you want to tell me which you prefer - you can send me your comments I'll e-mail them at cbbcnewsround@bbc.co.uk.

Watch this video

• Olympic Golden Girl Amy's Victory Bus Tour  SkyNews - March 3, 2010, 07:50 pm

of her bus tour in Bath to see how people welcomed her

or this one to see her in Canada.

As the holiday is coming to its end soon, you may not feel like coming back to school.  Yet some children over the world would very much like to be in your place and fight to get some education.

Read this article from the BBC and watch the video you'll understand their hunger. 

Around the world millions of children are not getting a proper education because their families are too poor to afford to send them to school.

In India, one schoolboy is trying to change that.

In the first report in the BBC's Hunger to Learn series, Damian Grammaticas meets Babar Ali, whose remarkable education project is transforming the lives of hundreds of poor children.

At 16 years old, Babar Ali must be the youngest headmaster in the world. He's a teenager who is in charge of teaching hundreds of students in his family's backyard, where he runs classes for poor children from his village.

The story of this young man from Murshidabad in West Bengal is a remarkable tale of the desire to learn.

Babar Ali's day starts early. He wakes, pitches in with the household chores, then jumps on an auto-rickshaw which takes him part of the 10km (six mile) ride to the Raj Govinda school. The last couple of kilometres he has to walk.

The school is the best in this part of West Bengal. There are hundreds of students, boys and girls. The classrooms are neat, if bare. But there are desks, chairs, a blackboard, and the teachers are all dedicated and well-qualified.

As the class 12 roll-call is taken, Babar Ali is seated in the middle in the front row. He's a tall, slim, gangly teenager, studious and smart in his blue and white uniform. He takes his notes carefully. He is the model student.

Babar Ali is the first member of his family ever to get a proper education.

"It's not easy for me to come to school because I live so far away," he says, "but the teachers are good and I love learning. And my parents believe I must get the best education possible that's why I am here."

Raj Govinda school is government-run so it is free, all Babar Ali has to pay for is his uniform, his books and the rickshaw ride to get there. But still that means his family has to find around 1,800 rupees a year ($40, £25) to send him to school. In this part of West Bengal that is a lot of money. Many poor families simply can't afford to send their children to school, even when it is free.

Chumki Hajra is one who has never been to school. She is 14 years old and lives in a tiny shack with her grandmother. Their home is simple A-frame supporting a thatched roof next to the rice paddies and coconut palms at the edge of the village. Inside the hut there is just room for a bed and a few possessions.

Every morning, instead of going to school, she scrubs the dishes and cleans the homes of her neighbours. She's done this ever since she was five. For her work she earns just 200 rupees a month ($5, £3). It's not much, but it's money her family desperately needs. And it means that she has to work as a servant everyday in the village.

"My father is handicapped and can't work," Chumki tells me as she scrubs a pot. "We need the money. If I don't work, we can't survive as a family. So I have no choice but to do this job."

You can listen to more from her here

Chumki is now getting an education, thanks to Babar Ali. The 16-year-old has made it his mission to help Chumki and hundreds of other poor children in his village. The minute his lessons are over at Raj Govinda school, Babar Ali doesn't stop to play, he heads off to share what he's learnt with other children from his village.

At four o'clock every afternoon after Babar Ali gets back to his family home a bell summons children to his house. They flood through the gate into the yard behind his house, where Babar Ali now acts as headmaster of his own, unofficial school.

Lined up in his back yard the children sing the national anthem. Standing on a podium, Babar Ali lectures them about discipline, then study begins.

Babar Ali gives lessons just the way he has heard them from his teachers. Some children are seated in the mud, others on rickety benches under a rough, homemade shelter. The family chickens scratch around nearby. In every corner of the yard are groups of children studying hard.

Babar Ali was just nine when he began teaching a few friends as a game. They were all eager to know what he learnt in school every morning and he liked playing at being their teacher.

Now his afternoon school has 800 students, all from poor families, all taught for free. Most of the girls come here after working, like Chumki, as domestic helps in the village, and the boys after they have finished their day's work labouring in the fields.

"In the beginning I was just play-acting, teaching my friends," Babar Ali says, "but then I realised these children will never learn to read and write if they don't have proper lessons. It's my duty to educate them, to help our country build a better future."

Including Babar Ali there are now 10 teachers at the school, all, like him are students at school or college, who give their time voluntarily. Babar Ali doesn't charge for anything, even books and food are given free, funded by donations. It means even the poorest can come here.

"Our area is economically deprived," he says. "Without this school many kids wouldn't get an education, they'd never even be literate."

Seated on a rough bench squeezed in with about a dozen other girls, Chumki Hajra is busy scribbling notes.

Her dedication to learning is incredible to see. Every day she works in homes in the village from six in the morning until half past two in the afternoon, then she heads to Babar Ali's school. At seven every evening she heads back to do more cleaning work.

Chumki's dream is to one day become a nurse, and Babar Ali's classes might just make it possible.

The school has been recognised by the local authorities, it has helped increase literacy rates in the area, and Babar Ali has won awards for his work.

The youngest children are just four or five, and they are all squeezed in to a tiny veranda. There are just a couple of bare electric bulbs to give light as lessons stretch into the evening, and only if there is electricity.

And then the monsoon rain begins. Huge drops fall as the children scurry for cover, slipping in the mud. They crowd under a piece of plastic sheeting. Babar Ali shouts an order. Lessons are cancelled for the afternoon otherwise everyone will be soaked. Having no classrooms means lessons are at the mercy of the elements.

The children climb onto the porch of a nearby shop as the rain pours down. Then they hurry home through the downpour. Tomorrow they'll be back though. Eight hundred poor children, unable to afford an education, but hungry for anything they can learn at Babar Ali's school.

You can read some kids comments on this page and send me yours

Hoping you'll come back hungry to learn too. NS