THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING HONEST

This book was written by pre-adolescents

that imagine their future attitudes and
choices.
 “THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING HONEST”
This story takes place in the year 2021…the
boys and girls are in 3rd year of Secondary
School.
CHAPTER 1
A NORMAL DAY
It is Monday and the maths class is
coming to an end. The whole 3rd year class is
sitting in their classroom, the bell rings and
they put everything away and get ready to go
home. Antonio asks:
-“Do we have any homework for tomorrow?”
-“Yes, OF COURSE!” answers Mara.
-“Remember to bring some ideas for our
Natural Sciences Project”, says Brisa.
-“…and complete the exercises in the Social
Sciences Workbook”, says Vicky.
-“Do all the maths activities!” mentions
Luana.
-“Bring the History book!” adds Iara.
-“And make a mind map out of the Language
text.” finishes Martina.
All the boys are impressed with such
instructions…the girls´ brain seems to have a
fixture! But Octavio reacts: -“Boys…why don
´t you come home and we´ll play PS-X!”
“Hurray!” say the boys, and they go all
together, walking and chatting about sports,
football teams, the Leagues and the matches
to come.
 tell them about their plans. They walk
together; the house is near the school.

The girls are still at the school’s door.

Vicky says: -“Girls, why don´t you come
home and we do the homework together?”

-“GREAT IDEA!” answers Mara.

Iara adds -“I like that! It´s great to work as a

team”

Vicky phones her mum to tell her that

the girls are going home with her to do the
homework. The girls phone their parents to
CHAPTER 2 Once the girls get to Vicky´s house, they
prepare tea in the dining room: tablecloth
HOW IT ALL GET STARTED
and napkins, cups, dishes, tea spoons, glasses
The boys get to Octavio´s house at 4 of water…there´s nothing missing! It seems
o’clock p.m. and prepare a quick meal with to be a tea party. It’5 o’clock, so it´s a real 5 o
toasts, cookies, cereals & yoghurt, tea, milk ´clock tea! They are having chocolate milk,
and chocolate milk. Then they organize 2 coffee, tea, croissants, delicious homemade
uneven teams to play video games (Team 1: cookies and cupcakes.
3 skilled players, Team 2: 2 highly skilled
players and 2 not so good players). They play
in turns, so the rest of them can start doing
the homework using their books, tablets and
cell-phones.

After tea time, they prepare mate with

sugar because they like to drink this infusion
while they study. Brisa asks: -“Can you give -“They all rang together“, adds Luca.
me the Wi-Fi password, please? “
Angel replies: -“It seems to be a message for
Vicky answers: -“816110” our group! “

The girls take their cell phones and tablets -“It is a message from “Ema”; he invites us to
and add the password. a party! “, remarks Antonio.

Iara repeats slowly, so everybody can copy: Emanuel is a former classmate who
-“Eight – one – six - double one - zero”. Once shared many school years with this group
connected, they all start Googling and now goes to another School. They are
information, taking down notes, making the still good friends.
mind maps…and suddenly…all the cell
Octavio asks: -“When is the party?”
phones receive a WhatsApp message at the
same time! They look at each other,
surprised and annoyed.

Meanwhile, at Octavio’s house the boys

are playing PS-X and doing their homework.
All at once the cell phones start to sound.

-“How strange!” says Agustín.

Antonio reads: -“On Sunday, November 25th,
at 8 p.m. at the Sport Centre´s party hall.”
All the boys say: -“O.K.”….and they go on
with their activities.
A different scene takes place at Vicky’s
house. After the ring tones are heard, they all
fly to grab their cell phones. Suddenly, all the
voices mix up in a fuzzy and unclear
conversation:
-“What’s this?”
-“An invitation”
-“Is it real?”
-“Yes, it seems”
-“Who sends it?”
-“It is from Emanuel, how nice!”
-“Fantastic” -“Great” -“I love parties!”
They all shout and celebrate!!!
After a while, Brisa says: -“Ok! Ok, girls!
Let’s finish our homework now, and …´”
Mara interrupts: -“…Yes, but I’m so excited!
Ariana goes on: -“Me too!”
Martina adds: -“I can‘t stop thinking about
the party” and Luana finishes: “…and the
clothes, and everything!”
Iara tries to calm them down and bring them
back to work: -“Now let’s go on with this and
finish all our tasks”.
Vicky adds: -“Your parents are coming to
fetch you at 8:30 p.m., so let´s speed up!”
 The entire group agrees and says good bye.

CHAPTER 3 “See you tomorrow at 7:30!”

GETTING READY FOR THE EVENT

On Friday the 24th, the kids finish their school

day and start organizing how to get all
together to the party.

Octavio says: -“The Sports Centre is in front

of the Park and next to the Hospital”

Antonio says: -“Yes, it is near the School…so

we can meet here at 7:30 p.m. and walk.”

Maxi adds: -“We walk straight to the Ice

Cream Shop then we turn right and walk
down the street up to the Butcher’s.”

-“And finally we turn left and when we get to

the park, we cross the street and… there we
are!” finishes Agustín.
 others to look around and see if they can find
him. No one can see him. –“Maybe he is
CHAPTER 4
inside, waiting for the guests”, says Luca.
TO BE OR NOT TO BE...honest.
Once inside, they stay together.
On Saturday evening, everything gets Suddenly Emanuel appears and they thank
on as planned. All the young boys and girls him for the invitation. -“It´s not my party,
have their parents´ approval to walk from but I wanted you to come”, says Ema, and he
School to the Sports Centre. The girls are adds: “It´s full of unknown people, it is great
fashionably dressed, they´ve being deciding to meet new friends”.
what to wear for days! Their hairstyles and
The group of friends look at each other,
make up are perfect. The boys are smart,
they feel uncomfortable and deceived. The
confident and they act as gentlemen with the
boys want to stay and say:
girls. In less than 15 minutes they get to the
park, so they sit down in some benches -“I don´t think that this is a problem for us.”
waiting for the doors of the party hall to
-“We are already here, we should stay.”
open.
-“It´s people of our age, everything looks
Antonio notices that he can´t see
fine.”
Emanuel among the people in other groups
gathered around the entrance. He tells the
 The girls comment that they feel
cheated, and that their parents expected
them to attend to Ema´s party, with people
they know. They don´t feel fine with so many
unknown people around…so, they start
wandering what to do.
Mara and Luana want to phone their
mums to tell them what´s going on, but there
´s no connectivity inside the hall. Iara,
Martina and Vicky left their mobiles at home,
Brisa´s battery is drained out…
-“MURPHY´S LAWS… eventually something
can go wrong!”
Suddenly, Ariana notices that she has got her
mobile in one of her pockets because she
receives a WhatsApp message from her mum
that says: -“Is everything OK?” The girls
decide to answer with the truth: -“Not so
well. We are inside the party hall, but it´s not
Emanuel´s party. It´s full of unknown people.
We are all together. What do we do?”
 After a while, the girls receive an
answer: “All your mothers are having dinner
together, and we think that you should stay.
We know the place and it´s safe. We´ll pick
you up at midnight. Enjoy the party!”

Everybody has fun, dances and laughs with

no worries.
AUTHORS and ILLUSTRATORS

Agustín Cañardo Porta

Angel Agustín Torres.

Antonio Macchi

Ariana Perez Linares

Brisa Ridao

Emanuel Camargo Sosa

Iara Roxana Brigitte Ridao

Luana Catalina Ressia

Luca Fabian D’Ascaño

Mara Ailen Villalobo

Martina Abril Gallardo D’Iorio

Maximiliano Danil Cristaldo

Octavio Verón

Victoria Solís

GUIDANCE AND LANGUAGE AID:

María Victoria González.

Copyright COLEGIO DE LAS NACIONES UNIDAS – 2017