Paradoxes and Dreams 5/21/15

                "We truly believe ourselves to be natural-born mechanics and do-it-yourself-ers."

     I picked this quote from "Paradox and Dream" by John Steinbeck and it stood out to me because I find this to be true. It means that people think that they can fix anything or do anything they want; when they actually can't. An example that was in the text was where it said, "We spend our lives in motor cars, yet most of us- a great many of us at least - do not know enough about a car to look in the gas tank she the motor fails." I found this as a really good example because now that everything is more futuristic and we have more technology, people don't know as much as they used to on how to fix things when they are broken, or other things like that. Most people in the present would just look it up on Google. 

     I have seen this quote many times in real life and there are a lot of examples you can see. I've seen it when I use Google when I type in a question, and other ones pop up about different people's problems. I had this experience myself when I go on a question/answer website. People are now relying on other people from the internet for their own problems, now even their health issues! I've actually seen some people asking this questions about their health instead of actually going to the doctor.  One example is if a person would accidentally do something to their phone; they would look it up on google how to fix it. All this happens when a lot of people are bragging about knowing how to do many things. This just proves how much this quote is true. 

"We shout that we are a nation of laws, not men - and then proceed to break every law we can if we can get away with it."

     This is another quote that stood out to me and I found it to be very interesting. It basically is saying that we believe in the laws and enforce them, but if we find a chance to break one, we do it anyways. There has been way too many times that I've seen some examples of this. I find this quote to be very powerful because it is really true.

     A lot of times that I've seen these examples are on T.V; especially on reality T.V. One day I was watching this show called Beyond Scared Straight where kids go to jail for a day to see how it is. Everyone in the show says why they are there and a lot of the girls said that they always steal things from the store. One of them said; she only does it because she has gotten away with it many times and her room is filled with stolen jewelry and dresses. This is just one of the examples as stealing, but a lot of people break the law when they can get away with it.

Final Reflection 5/18/15

     The three most important things that I learned this year was to have more patience, time management, and responsibility. I learned to have more patience with people in my class when they didn't understand something or when they were being really loud. This class taught me time management because I usually save everything until last minute so I end up doing all my work on Thursday which leaves me no time to study for vocabulary. That's why now I try to do everything on different days. I learned the responsibility of turning in my things on time like article of the weeks, blogs, etc. The one thing that we did this year that I will remember for the rest of my life is two things: vocabulary and works cited. The vocabulary tests that we did helped me learn new words and expand my vocabulary. The works cited I will remember because they are very useful and I never knew how to do them until this language arts class.

     One of the nicest things that someone from this class ever did for me was to help me understand what we were doing in class when I was absent or not there. They really helped me know what was going on in class when I missed it or was late. This year, I'm not actually sure I taught my classmates or teacher anything, but if I could I would teach them that if you really try, you can get things done. For example, I am always reading in that class so that probably taught people to be determined to finish what you've started and accomplish your goal.

     I think that something I'm really proud of/improved in was my blogs. Sometimes, I used to make them kind of short and they weren't that good. I learned over the quarters how to improve my writing and actually even write more with better quality. Something that I accomplished this year that I was proud of was when I got A's every quarter for this class. I am proud of this because it's kind of hard to always get the good grade of an A. Although, the most hard part of the year for me was doing the argumentative writing because it was a lot of work and it took pretty long to do. The only thing that was easier was putting the letter together to the governor.

     The best piece of writing that I did this year was doing my Breaking Dawn blog. I think that this was one of my good blogs because I feel that it was thorough. I, for the first time, wrote a lot in my blog so I was proud of it. Even though I wrote a lot of longer lengthy blogs, this one was my favorite.

     Of all of the books that I've read this year, my favorite was Four by Veronica Roth. I liked this book a lot because I have read Divergent and this book was in Tobias's (Four) perspective. I think that it really helped me learn about his character more. I really enjoyed this book because it was the same exact story, but they put him as the main character instead, so you could see his perspective when the main character (Tris) was somewhere else.

     Some advice that I would give to the students for next year would be to have good time management and to save nothing until last minute. I am saying this from my experience because when I turned in work late, I got falcon fouls. I would also say to always do your work so you can be prepared for class. Also, I probably think that you should study your vocabulary for tests on Friday because I alway study the morning of, and I barely get a good grade. Lastly, I would just say good luck to them.

Symbolism 5/15/15

     I picked a die to represent me because I feel that I am like it. I think this because it has many different sides. I'm like this because I have many different sides to me. Also, when you roll a die, you never know what you're going to get. That's why I think I am like this because I am unpredictable just like a die.







                                      I commented on Jared, Evie, Lillian, Siari, and Rebecca.

Of Mice and Men - The Movie 5/11/15

Prompt - (Section III and IV) What does the flashback show? How does the flashback leave the audience feeling at the end of the movie? Does that feeling match the feeling at the end of the book? Why do you think the director chose to use a different ending rather than just showing exactly what's in the book? What is the line of dialogue that ends the book? What does that line tell us about the speaker? What feeling does that leave the reader with? How does it make you feel when he says that? What are your general thoughts, feelings, reactions of Of Mice and Men? What had the most profound impact on you or your understanding of the novella? Who would you recommend this book to and why?

     The flashback at the end of the movie shows George and Lennie walking (away) together in the field. It kind of shows that they are free from work and they are going to live their dream. The flashback leaves the audience feeling probably sad and disappointed because they never got their happy ending now that George killed Lennie and George was on his own. The feeling of the movie doesn't really match the feeling at the end of the book because in the book, the feeling was sort of incomplete because the author mentioned that George left with Slim but they never showed the reactions of the rest of the people. I think that the author chose to end the movie differently than the book because he probably wanted the movie to end in a flashback to make the feeling/tone stay with the movie instead of just bringing in the rest of the characters while leaving it on a cliffhanger and ruining the mood.

     The line of dialogue that ends the book is when Carlson says to Curley, "Now what the hell do you suppose is eatin' them two guys?" This line tells us that the speaker (Carlson) didn't understand why George and Slim were sad about Lennie because it's showing that back then, ranchers didn't really care about each other or if they died. Also, it shows that Carlson didn't even know how it felt to have a dream or ambition with someone and then have it ruined. It basically symbolized that him and Curley couldn't imagine the pain that George (especially) and Slim were going through. The last line leaves the reader feeling bad because the ending was really sad and it ended up in a cliffhanger. It made me feel bad for all the characters because I didn't know what was going to go on in their futures.

     I actually liked the book Of Mice and Men and I didn't expect to enjoy it because I thought it would be difficult but it actually wasn't. It was interesting to me and I think that it had a good ending even though I wanted to know more about what would happen after. The part that had the most profound impact on me was when Carson shot Candy's dog just because it was old. This impacted me because I really like animals and this showed me how back then, dogs, or animals in general weren't treated as good as they are now; or at all! I would recommend this book to anyone or everyone (of course who is old enough to understand it) because it's a good book, and I, myself liked it.

Aow Impressions Blog 5/5/15

     This week, I viewed a lot of different interesting articles. Some had the same topics that were common, and some were unique that I hadn't heard of. One of the articles that I saw more than once was about the Nepal earthquake. Another article that I saw a few times was about Baltimore riots. Even though I have seen some articles quite a few times, there were some that stood out to me. One of the articles that I found that was really interesting was one about a free wifi project on a phone that google and other companies were working on.

     Going back to the Nepal earthquake article; I noticed that all of the many ones that I viewed all had different information, but were about the same topics. This happened because news is constantly changing. One of the articles specifically said that 3,000 people were killed, and another one said 8,000 (people were killed)! That was a big difference, so all the articles were actually exactly identical even though they had the same topic. Some things that I learned from these articles was that it was the worst earthquake in 80 years and also it had a 7.5 magnitude. It occurred 7 miles below ground and it cause an avalanche in Mt. Everest. The government is helping to pay the families that lost people in the earthquake.

     In conclusion, I learned more about what's going on in the world in recent time. I found out more on the Nepal earthquake, Baltimore riots, free wifi, child abuse, Iranian forces, and more. I think that this week I have taken in a lot of new information and I definitely know more now.

Dreams Poem 5/3/15

Prompt - Using "To A Mouse" by Robert Burns as inspiration, write a short poem expressing what happens when you have a dream and it doesn't come true.


When Dreams Don't Come True - Short Poem


                            Dreams.
               Dreams are like seasons;
           they come and go eventually.
      You always have dreams and goals
               during your whole life.
You work hard towards your aspirations in life,
                flying right towards them,
       until you go in the wrong direction 
                    and sometimes;
   You just end up right where you started.