A MONTH OF CURIOSITY PROMPTS
Unleash your curiosity this month!
We’ve come up with 4 weeks worth of thought provoking activities which will give you an opportunity to get back in touch with your curiosity and take you on an adventure, with each day being different then the one before.
On Monday you will start your week by thinking about something that excites you, whether that is things already in your life or something to come.
Tuesdays will help you connect with your adventurous side as you go out into nature and take in the world around you.
Every Wednesday you are going to try something new! Maybe watch a documentary you’ve had your eye on for while…
Thursdays are for cooking, so grab your pots and pans and get ready.
I hope you’re excited because Friday is the day where anything can happen!
Saturday’s are your chance to tap into your creative side.
And lastly every Sunday you’ll have a day to reflect back on your week and what you’ve learned.
We’ve got some recommendations from the Curious Agenda team which will be helpful for completing a couple activities:
Books:
Strong Female Character by Fern Brady (Biography/Memoir)
In this funny and eye-opening book, Fern Brady tells us how she spent 20 years being told she can't be autistic because she's had loads of boyfriends and is good at eye contact.
Legends and Lattes by Travis Baldree (Fantasy)
This 'cosy fantasy' book follows Viv, an Orc barbarian who leaves behind the warrior's life to follow her true passion: opening a coffee shop.
The Wolf Den trilogy by Elodie Harper (Historical Fiction)
Set in the brothels of ancient Pompeii, The Wolf Den imagines the lives of the women who have long been overlooked.
Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin (Contemporary Literary Fiction)
A glorious and immersive page-turner about two childhood friends, once estranged, who reunite as adults to create video games, finding an intimacy in digital worlds that eludes them in their real lives.
Documentaries:
My Octopus Teacher
After years of swimming every day in the freezing ocean at the tip of Africa, Craig Foster meets an unlikely teacher a young octopus who displays remarkable curiosity. Visiting her den and tracking her movements for months on end he eventually wins the animal's trust and they develop a never before seen bond between human and wild animal.
Boybands Forever
Behind the singing, smiles and double denim was blood, sweat and tears. Heartthrobs from Take That to Westlife and 911 share tales of success, adoration and the flipside of fame.
Paris is Burning
A documentary of New York's LGBT scene in the 1980s, showing the real life of Black and Latin LGBT people, introduce the ballrooms, the categories, the houses, the voguing, and the dreams and ambitions of these people who are systematically excluded from society, they fight to conquer the right to be and to reinvent themselves in a world starring straight and white people. They use the balls to show their creativity, have fun with their community and family, shining, and having their names recognized in the ballroom scene.
The Act of Killing (18+)
A documentary which challenges former Indonesian death-squad leaders to re-enact their mass-killings in whichever cinematic genres they wish, including classic Hollywood crime scenarios and lavish musical numbers.
Fantastic Fungi
June 12, 2019 From the Maui Film Festival's Celestial Cinema. Imagine an organism that feeds you, heals you, reveals secrets of the universe and could help save the planet. Fantastic Fungi is a revelatory time-lapse journey, from 2019 Maui Film Festival Visionary Award honouree and director Louie Schwartzberg, about the magical, mysterious and medicinal world of fungi and their power to heal, sustain and contribute to the regeneration of life on Earth that began 3.5 billion years ago.
Films:
Adult-
Dead Poets Society
Painfully shy Todd Anderson has been sent to the school where his popular older brother was valedictorian. His roommate, Neil Perry, although exceedingly bright and popular, is very much under the thumb of his overbearing father. The two, along with their other friends, meet Professor Keating, their new English teacher, who tells them of the Dead Poets Society, and encourages them to go against the status quo. Each does so in his own way, and is changed for life.
Theory of Everything
The Theory of Everything is the story of the most brilliant and celebrated physicist of our time, Stephen Hawking, and Jane Wilde, the arts student he fell in love with while studying at Cambridge in the 1960s. Little was expected from Hawking, a bright but shiftless student of cosmology, after he was given just two years to live following the diagnosis of a fatal illness (ALS) at 21 years of age. He became galvanized, however, by the love Jane Wilde, and went on to be called the "successor to Einstein," as well as a husband and father to their three children. Over the course of their marriage, however, as Stephen's body collapsed and his academic renown soared, fault lines were exposed that tested the resolve of their relationship and dramatically altered the course of both of their lives.
Imitation Game
It is based on the real life story of legendary cryptanalyst Alan Turing. The film portrays the nail-biting race against time by Turing and his brilliant team of code-breakers at Britain's top-secret Government Code and Cypher School at Bletchley Park, during the darkest days of World War II.
Hidden Figures
As the United States raced against Russia to put a man in space, NASA found untapped talent in a group of African-American female mathematicians that served as the brains behind one of the greatest operations in U.S. history. Based on the unbelievably true life stories of three of these women, known as "human computers", we follow these women as they quickly rose the ranks of NASA alongside many of history's greatest minds specifically tasked with calculating the momentous launch of astronaut John Glenn into orbit, and guaranteeing his safe return. Dorothy Vaughan, Mary Jackson, and Katherine Gobels Johnson crossed all gender, race, and professional lines while their brilliance and desire to dream big, beyond anything ever accomplished before by the human race, firmly cemented them in U.S. history as true American heroes.
Family-
Wonder
Based on the New York Times bestseller, "Wonder" tells the incredibly inspiring, heartwarming story of August Pullman. Born with facial differences that, up until now, have prevented him from going to a mainstream school, Auggie becomes the most unlikely of heroes when he enters the local fifth grade. As his family, his new classmates, and the larger community all struggle to discover their compassion and acceptance, Auggie's extraordinary journey will unite them all and prove you can't blend in when you were born to stand out.
Spirited Away (any Studio Ghibli)
The fanciful adventures of a ten-year-old girl named Chihiro, who discovers a secret world when she and her family get lost and venture through a hillside tunnel. When her parents undergo a mysterious transformation, Chihiro must fend for herself as she encounters strange spirits, assorted creatures and a grumpy sorceress who seeks to prevent her from returning to the human world.
Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971)
The world is astounded when Willy Wonka, for years a recluse in his factory, announces that five lucky people will be given a tour of the factory, shown all the secrets of his amazing candy, and one will win a lifetime supply of Wonka chocolate. Nobody wants the prize more than young Charlie, but as his family is so poor that buying even one bar of chocolate is a treat, buying enough bars to find one of the five golden tickets is unlikely in the extreme. But in movieland, magic can happen. Charlie, along with four somewhat odious other children, get the chance of a lifetime and a tour of the factory.
The Chronicles of Narnia-The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe
Four children from the same family have to leave their town because of the bombings of WWII. A woman and a professor take the children to their house. While playing a game of hide-and-seek, the youngest member of the family, Lucy, finds a wardrobe to hide in. She travels back and back into the wardrobe and finds a place named Narnia.
Spend your month embracing your curiosity!
By Rose Bailey
