23/02/2021
As promised, here is our next story. We hope you and your children enjoy it.
Connie The Owl Concentrates
There was once a little owl called Connie who lived in a beautiful, soft nest with her mummy. She wasn’t very old; she’d only hatched out of her egg a few weeks ago.
Connie was a very happy owl but there was one thing that she really, really wanted to be able to do and that was to learn how to fly! She asked her mummy nearly every day if today was the day she could finally leave the nest and every day her mummy sensibly replied, “No, not yet. You need to be a little bit older. You need to learn to concentrate before you can learn to fly.”
Connie wasn’t sure what her mummy meant by ‘concentrate’ so she decided to ask her. If she could learn to concentrate, then maybe she would be allowed to take her first flight.
“Concentrate is a very big word,” agreed her mother. “Really, if you are good at concentrating, you need to be good at 3 things. First, you need to focus on what you are doing.”
“Focus Mummy? What does focus mean?”
Connie’s mother explained that when you focus on something you only think about that one, important thing. You try to forget about everything else that is going on around you. So, when you’re flying, that’s all you think about and you forget about everything else.
“Secondly,” said her mummy, “you need to think about the detail.”
“Detail Mummy? What does detail mean?”
Connie’s mother explained that detail meant thinking about all the small things that go to make up what you are trying to do. So, when you fly you don’t just stick your wings out and hope for the best! No, when you fly, it is important to keep your wings stretched out wide; it is important to use really big movements, up and down, and it is important to look where you were going.
“Finally,” said Connie’s mummy, “you need to stick at what you are doing, not just stop as soon as you’ve started.”
“I promise I won’t give up,” replied Connie. “It sounds like concentration is very important when you are learning to fly.”
“Concentration is important when you are learning to do anything,” replied Connie’s mummy. “Do you think you can concentrate enough to fly?’’
“Oh yes!” exclaimed Connie. “I will focus; I will think about the details, and I will stick at it.”
“In that case,’’ said her mummy, “you are ready to take your very first flight!’’
Excitedly, Connie shuffled forward and hopped onto the end of the branch. As she looked down, her mother said, “Ok Connie, when you are ready, off you go!” With that, Connie gave herself a little push and left the branch behind her. She made sure she concentrated hard. She was flying!
Connie felt so proud of herself. She flew up, up, up and soared through the sky. As she went along she saw fields and hedges; houses and barns; roads and paths. She kept concentrating as she flew, remembering to focus, think about the details and stick at it. But then, something else caught her eye. Something was moving below her. She saw a little rabbit scampering along the field. It was so amazing that Connie forgot what she was doing! She started to wobble. Oh no! She was in danger of falling to the ground.
“I’ve forgotten to focus!’’ said Connie to herself. “I started to think about other things instead of concentrating on what I was doing. Now I know what Mummy meant when she said that it is important to focus. If I don’t think about what I am doing, I won’t be able to fly. I could fall and hurt myself.”
She brought her mind back to what she was doing and flew high above the trees again.
Connie loved being in the sky and seeing all the wonderful sights. “Flying is easy,’’ she thought. But, as she carried on, the movements she made with her wings began to get smaller until she started to fall towards the ground again.
“I’ve forgotten to think about the details!’’ said Connie to herself. “I forgot to make really big movements with my wings. Now I know what Mummy meant when she said that the small details are important. If I don’t think about what I’m doing, I won’t be able to fly. I could fall and hurt myself.’’
Connie carried on with her flight but it wasn’t long before she started to feel tired, so she pulled her wings into her body to give them a little rest. As soon as she did this, she started to fall towards the ground again.
“I’ve forgotten to stick at it!’’ thought Connie. “I stopped keeping my wings stretched wide. Now I know what Mummy meant when she said that it is important to stick at it. If I stop what I’m doing, l won’t be able to fly. I could fall and hurt myself.”
Connie stretched out her wings again and once more she flew high above the trees. Eventually, she decided to head for home and tell her mummy all about her flying.
“How did it go?” asked her mummy when she got back to her branch.
“It was amazing. I remembered to focus, I remembered the details and I remembered to stick at it! I concentrated and that meant I could learn to fly. I’m so happy.”
“You must have concentrated very well then,’’ said Mummy. “And now you know how to concentrate, you can do that whenever you have something new to learn. It will help you to become a really good learner.’’
Good learners need to be like Connie. They need to be able to concentrate. It takes a bit of practice sometimes but to be a good learner you need to be able to really focus on what you are doing; you need to be able to think about all the details, or small parts, of your learning, and you need stick at what you are doing for a while. Next time you are struggling to learn something, just check that you are concentrating properly. It will help you to learn, just like it helped Connie.
