This I Believe Speech

                                                              "Honesty is Key"

     I believe that honesty is key in life. Do you recall the last time that you told a lie? Many people go about their day, not even noticing that they are telling a lie. In my opinion, to live authentically, you should tell the truth to live free of doubt; and know you are doing the right thing. Well, why is honesty important? It is of great significance because it can make a massive difference in your life when you are not truthful.

    Last summer, I learned that honesty is the best policy, which is something that we are always taught. That day when I was just watching a show, my mom came into my room; and I put my phone down so I could speak to her. I presume I did it too quickly, that it appeared that I was hiding something; which lead her to question me. At the time I was way too stubborn so I didn't tell her what I was doing, even though I wasn't hiding anything. That one slight event turned into her taking my phone away for a very long time, especially since I refused to tell her my password as well.
   
      Therefore, she restarted my whole phone, and gave it back to me completely blank after about a month. I had to wait long before buying a new one myself. Eventually, we both forgave each other for what had happened; and even though this was a negative experience, I am now joyful to have experienced this to know to be honest in the future. I've found that I am a more honest person to this day, and this is a memory that will never choose to fade from my mind; as I learned my lesson that day.

Final Reflection

     Now that it's almost the end of eight grade, I have learned many things in this English Language Arts class from the three years I've been in it. One of the three most important things that I learned this year was my time management. In this class, or in any class; it can be hard to keep up with your work if you don't mange your time wisely. I have forgotten many times to do a certain assignment, but I learned from those mistakes to fix them, and get back on track.
     Also, in this class I learned to pay more attention to what is surrounding me in my life. People usually tend to only care about what goes on close to them; but not all around them. While we learned and researched about many different topics, I found out about international problems and events. The last major thing that I learned in this class was to know that the only person to indict for something that happened is yourself. This was an important lesson to remember because when you make mistakes, you try to blame it on others; when most of the time you are the one to blame.

     Something that we did this year was read the book Tuesday's With Morrie, and I think that I will remember it for the rest of my life. This is because it was a very strong and effective book and had many life lessons in it. When I read it, I found it very impacting, and I think that it will surely be difficult to forget those aphorisms.

     This year, I think that the nicest thing that someone's done for me was not really specific. There was a couple of different moments where people went out of their ways to be nice to me, but there isn't a specific thing or person in mind. Some nice things that people have done for me was to explain something that I didn't understand, or hold the door open for me. There was a lot of little things that people do for me that I can remember.

     I believe that one thing I taught my classmates this year was to work towards your goals. The reason I think this is because one goal I had was to speak more often in the Socratic seminars that we had in class. When we did our third Socratic seminar for the book Tuesday's with Morrie, I started it off with a question. This made me reach my goal because I didn't only get to speak, but I got the chance to start one off. I think that I demonstrated this to the rest of the class.

     The area that I feel I made the most improvements in was my writing and my vocabulary. I got a lot of help with my writing recently when we did our comma lessons, and just reviewing it (our writing) in general. I think that writing my argumentative essay really helped me practice with my writing. A huge part of writing is vocabulary, and I have improved with it by studying words and having tests.
     The butterfly project is an accomplishment that I am most proud of because it took me a lot of thinking and time to make, and I think it turned out pretty good. I'm content with this project because I think that it's the best and most detailed thing that I did this year.

      The most challenging part of this year for me was just trying to keep on top of all of my work. I usually have a problem with time management, but recently in 4th quarter, I've been getting way better with it. During this last quarter of the school year, I got better finishing everything, while getting less falcon fouls as well.

      My best piece of writing would probably be my Argumentative Writing essay. I think that this was the best because I really tried hard to write it, and if turned out as a better piece of writing, since I actually cared about the topic (animals). It was pretty lengthy, and I believe I was okay at executing my argument.

     I think that my favorite book that I read this year was Tuesday's With Morrie because it shows a lot of key messages in life. This book makes you look at your life in a different perspective and I think that it teaches a lot of lessons. I especially thought it was an interesting book since it was nonfiction.

     My advice for the students coming into eighth grade next year would be to manage your time wisely. It is important to keep an organized schedule to get all of your work done when it is due. When you don't keep up with the things that you have to do, it'll all add up and it's hard to get back to the top. Lastly, I would just say to not stress about things too much, and have fun.

Final Project - Aphroisms

     This drawing shows the possible (being successful), and the impossible (counting to infinity) on top. On the bottom, it shows the possible versus the impossible as well. The girl in the first picture is touching rain (which you can do), and the second girl is touching the moon and stars (which you can't do). The reason that I made the first girls dress grey is because it represents being practical. The other girl's dress is blue with a rose design at the top because a blue rose represents the impossible. Lastly, I made the aphorism orange because orange is a color that represents ambition. 

     Morrie's aphorism "Accept what you are able to do and what you are not able to do." has a main message. The main message that he wanted to get across was that you have to know what the possible is versus what the impossible is. Although, it means to not give up hope for the things that you want to do. You should try things that you think you can't, but know your limits. The whole message here is to accept what you can and cannot do. There are still things that you can do such as trying things you think you can't do, or you've never done before. An important message that ties into this aphorism is to reach high for your hopes, but don't waste your time doing something you absolutely can't do. Many lessons tie into this: you don't understand what you can/can't do until you lose the ability to, dont fight it when you can't do something, stay true to yourself and don't struggle with something you can't do, put effort in what you're capable of, focus on what you can do and don't stress on what you can't, etc.

     One thing that really relates to this aphorism from Tuesday's With Morrie is a quote said by Einstein. This quote reads, "We're all geniuses. But if you judge a fish by it's ability to climb a tree, it will spend its whole life believing that it's stupid." This fits perfectly with Morrie's aphorism because they both talk about how there are things that are simply impossible to do, and if you can't do them it doesn't mean that it's a bad thing; you just accept it.

     I agree with this aphorism because I find it very accurate and it applies to regular life. The reason that I agree with it is because I can relate to it. Throughout my life, I had to accept things that I couldn't do such as not exceeding every test that I take. In the book, it says that Morrie "wrote bite-sized philosophies about living with death's shadow..." This is a quote that really ties in with the idea that you should accept what you can do and do things that you've never tried before before you lose the ability to (hence, "death's shadow"). In summary, I really think that this aphorism is accurate and I agree with it.

My aphorism: Live life to the fullest and appreciate small things, as later in life they will become more significant.

Socratic Semimar Morrie Reflection

     The past four Socratic Seminars influenced my thinking about Tuesdsys With Morrie and life in general in several ways. One thing that I thought about after the first seminar was just about the different aspects of the book that I hadn't before. It made me notice that the book was full of both explicit and hidden lessons. I also thought about the little details that the book included, such as paying attention to your surroundings instead of "sleepwalking". The seminar also made me rethink many of my life decisions that I may have regretted, even though I'm still young.

      One trend that I noticed for my personal goals was to speak a little more, or bring up different topics that no one had brought up. Basically, most of the goals were to find somewhere to include myself in the conversation. Another goal was to give more questions to move the discussion along. This extra goal changed the pattern or trend since I actively tried to achieve my goals. I achieved my goal of speaking more by starting the third Socratic Seminar off with a question.

     There were a few trends in each of the class' discussions. Some of the trends were for the good, and some were for the bad. One trend was sometimes going off topic from what someone said, or talking about completely different things. Although, some of the things that were good trends were making connections to the books, and bringing others to the conversation. Overall, all of the Socratic seminars went very different from each other, and both had good and bad elements to them.

Tuesday's with Morrie 4/28/16

     Based off of the six Tuesday chapters that I have read in the book Tuesday's With Morrie so far; I think that the topic of death or emotions had the most impact on me. Although the one that most inspired me was The Fourth Tuesday: We Talk About Death. This is because I feel like it had the most aphorisms in and basically just a big message. One of the main aphorisms on pages 82 and 83 were "Once you learn how to die, you learn how to live." and "If you accept you are going to die, you learn how to live." They both basically have the same meaning: if you accept and learn how to die, then you'll learn how to live.

      The topic of death is important because it is something that is going to happen eventually to everyone. It even says in the book; "Everyone knows they're going to die, but nobody believes it." (P.80) Morrie thinks that the best way to prepare for death, is to always be ready for it. I agree with this because everyone thinks that it's not going to be them and they're not going to die until they're old; but the truth is that anyone can die at any given moment.

     In the book, Morrie is called "a religious mutt". This is because he takes different ideas from a variety of religions. This is why he over emphasizes the idea of learning how to die before living. In this chapter and others, Morrie is receiving lots of letters, and he's giving people with similar situations advice and also telling his own life lessons and experiences (to them). This chapter about death is one of the many Tuesday's of lessons.

Tuesday's with Morrie - Bucket List

     I have many reactions after reading what I have read so far in the book Tuesday's with Morrie. I was shocked at first when I heard that Morrie was diagnosed with ALS, and he still decided to keep on teaching as he had been for more than 30 years. Morrie was a very happy person that had a positive outlook on life which was surprising to me because many people are negative in this world. It was especially shocking to me that he was positive; having a disease, and he couldn't do what he loved: to dance and swim.

     One thing that I read in the book that I did not expect was the jealousy that Mitch had for Morrie when he saw him on television. While he was randomly looking through channels, he saw that Morrie was getting interviewed, but that actually led to him reuniting with Morrie. I didn't expect to see that Mitch would be jealous. He is envious because he sees all of the friends that Morrie has, and how he had developed a lot of real relationships with people; unlike Mitch who lost touch with many of his friends.

My Bucket List:

- Graduate high school and college
- Learn a new language (and actually use it)
- Ride in a hot air balloon
- Visit all of the major cities in the U.S.
- Learn how to drive
- Go to a real fashion show
- Meet my favorite celebrities/bands
- Ride an elephant
- Get a tattoo
- Ride in a helicopter
- Hold a baby panda
- Go to Coachella
- Swim with dolphins
- Visist a black or pink sand beach
- Hike/rock climb out of state
- Dye my hair again
- Get an Alaskan Husky

3rd Quarter Reflection 4/6/16

     In my opinion, I think that the most difficult part of 3rd quarter for me was just to keep up with all of my schoolwork and turn it in on time. I tried to manage my time wisely in order to overcome this problem. I think that the area that I made the biggest improvement in English Language Arts was my writing. I feel that I improved in this because we have wrote a lot in class and it got better with practice as I went.

     Out of all the books that I have read this quarter; my favorite book was called A Child Callet It by Dave Pelzer. It was my favorite because it was very interesting to read and it was a book that was able to sent the message of child abuse across to the readers by showing the real life cases that Dave (the author) had to go through as a child. This book was all about the mistreatment and abuse that Dave suffered through for years as a child living in his home in California.

     My research skills have improved greatly since quarter two since we have been doing a lot. One assignment that helped me improve more in my research was the argumentative writing essay. Also, I have learned much about the world while researching and while working on the article of the weeks'. So far, in my 40 book challenge, I have only read three books so far; but I have been reading more over the past few weeks as I have finished a book in only a day. Something that I've been proud of this quarter was turning in most of my work on time and not getting any falcon fouls.