As I read The Soloist I feel myself being more and more drawn to the life and story of Nathaniel Ayers. He spent the majority of his life living in the streets with a mental illness and underneath all of that he has a great passion for music and is getting back on track with it. He is very inspirational and he has accomplished so very much. He is also very interesting in that he is very intelligent and talented even though he is living on the streets.
The way Steve Lopez portrays this point in both of their lives is amazing and it kept me hooked. The story of Steve Lopez's experiences and troubles and trials with Nathaniel is so honest and real I could picture everything happening and I could tell that the emotions were real. Lopez didn't write for sympathy and he didn't exaggerate or underrate anything and that's part of what kept me so hooked to this book. Also the way it was written. I have never seen a book written to be a biography within an auto-biography and i think that makes it so unique and makes you want to keep reading to see what happens in both participants lives not just one.
Friday, May 8, 2009
Sunday, April 26, 2009
The Catcher in the Rye
This story was not interesting at all. I don't understand why he couldn't just stay in a school and deal with all the normal stereo-types like all the rest of us have to. All this story tells me is that he couldn't make up his mind about anything and he was very judgemental. I didn't really like this book because I felt that it was quite purposeless. It appears that someone just decided a book for no reason and get it published.
Not to say that it didn't have any good points but the bad just outweigh the good. I don't see why he was so mean about every girl he spoke to. Everyone has their bad points and quite frankly his bad points are worse than any of theirs.
Not to say that it didn't have any good points but the bad just outweigh the good. I don't see why he was so mean about every girl he spoke to. Everyone has their bad points and quite frankly his bad points are worse than any of theirs.
Death Of A Salesman
To understand the play you must first understand that "The American Dream" is just a way of thinking. To me the American Dream is to achieve happiness and well being within your home and work. To most it is having a lot of money and nice things. Willy wanted the American Dream but he was so focused on working a job he was horrible at because he saw someone else prevail that he lost sight of the importance of his home and family. Charlie was pointing out that just because you may have money you still may not have accomplished anything because at the end of the day all you are left with is what you sold.
Willy definitely had the wrong idea when he chose his profession. He also didn't change professions when he realized that this one wasn't the right one for him. He spent so much time trying to do good that he didn't focus on the important thing-his family.
Willy definitely had the wrong idea when he chose his profession. He also didn't change professions when he realized that this one wasn't the right one for him. He spent so much time trying to do good that he didn't focus on the important thing-his family.
Friday, March 27, 2009
Blogging for Blogger
1. Has blogging been valuable to you as a student, thinker, reader, and writer?
As a writer blogging is an easier way to put all of my ideas into words and to show my words to everyone who may want to read them. Blogging is a great way to express myself and I like to do it.
2.What have you taken away from taking this approach to submitting writing for a class?
It shows a broader way to being able to answer questions, write essays, and express my concerns, ideas, or just random thoughts.
3.How do you feel about doing and continuing to do this kind of work?
I like doing this kind of work and definitely would not object if we had to continue doing our work this way.
4.Is this work different from other experiences that you have had in English classes?
This work is very different. I'm used to being assigned book reports and vocabulary. But in this class we have been forced to delve deeper into the reading and really comprehend what we are reading. This isn't the usual read and answer questions. It's read and analyze and show that you comprehend what you are reading and doing.
5.What suggestions do you have for me as a teacher who uses blogging in his English classes?
From my experience you should probably monitor a lot of the laughter because that usually means that they are definitely not doing the assignment.
6.Looking forward, do you have suggestions for how you want to be graded on this writing?
On this writing specifically I think that since it is mostly opinion and not hard cold facts we should be graded on how good our responses are and how honest we are while writing.
7.Has doing this work changed the community within your own class or between classes (11-1 and 11-2) in any way?
I suppose it has. It has given us farther insight about how our fellow classmates think, feel, and react to things as opposed to only knowing our perspective on things.
Blogging is fun because it helps us to interact with our classmates and get a better knowledge about technology and how things are going to work in college. It truly prepares us to go to college and grow us. well some of us anyways.
As a writer blogging is an easier way to put all of my ideas into words and to show my words to everyone who may want to read them. Blogging is a great way to express myself and I like to do it.
2.What have you taken away from taking this approach to submitting writing for a class?
It shows a broader way to being able to answer questions, write essays, and express my concerns, ideas, or just random thoughts.
3.How do you feel about doing and continuing to do this kind of work?
I like doing this kind of work and definitely would not object if we had to continue doing our work this way.
4.Is this work different from other experiences that you have had in English classes?
This work is very different. I'm used to being assigned book reports and vocabulary. But in this class we have been forced to delve deeper into the reading and really comprehend what we are reading. This isn't the usual read and answer questions. It's read and analyze and show that you comprehend what you are reading and doing.
5.What suggestions do you have for me as a teacher who uses blogging in his English classes?
From my experience you should probably monitor a lot of the laughter because that usually means that they are definitely not doing the assignment.
6.Looking forward, do you have suggestions for how you want to be graded on this writing?
On this writing specifically I think that since it is mostly opinion and not hard cold facts we should be graded on how good our responses are and how honest we are while writing.
7.Has doing this work changed the community within your own class or between classes (11-1 and 11-2) in any way?
I suppose it has. It has given us farther insight about how our fellow classmates think, feel, and react to things as opposed to only knowing our perspective on things.
Blogging is fun because it helps us to interact with our classmates and get a better knowledge about technology and how things are going to work in college. It truly prepares us to go to college and grow us. well some of us anyways.
Quote of Fitzgerald
"Riches have never fascinated me, unless combined with the greatest charm or distinction."
This quote stood out to me as soon as I read it because it reminded me of how fascinated Nick was with Gatsby and how much influence he had on Nick. Nick wasn't particularly interested in Gatsby until he got a lot more background insight on him. The it was as if they were inseparable.
It also reminded me of Daisy and how she rejected Gatsby when he was broke but went right back to him when she realized he was rich.
Money has great influence on your perspective of people no matter how much you say otherwise.
If Gatsby had been a poor man he wouldn't have been involved with Nick in the first place and the whole plot of the story would be defeated and lost. Riches always fascinate people and thats a big part of why Gatsby was such a monumental part of this story.
This quote stood out to me as soon as I read it because it reminded me of how fascinated Nick was with Gatsby and how much influence he had on Nick. Nick wasn't particularly interested in Gatsby until he got a lot more background insight on him. The it was as if they were inseparable.
It also reminded me of Daisy and how she rejected Gatsby when he was broke but went right back to him when she realized he was rich.
Money has great influence on your perspective of people no matter how much you say otherwise.
If Gatsby had been a poor man he wouldn't have been involved with Nick in the first place and the whole plot of the story would be defeated and lost. Riches always fascinate people and thats a big part of why Gatsby was such a monumental part of this story.
Friday, March 20, 2009
Great Gatsby
I think that this obsession with Gatsby is completely ridiculous. He doesn't even know who Gatsby is yet and he is so interested and obsessed with him. The excessive amount of detail here is confusing me quite a bit but I really like the plot of the story. I don't understand why it was necessary for Tom had to break Myrtle's nose that way. It wasn't a major deal all she did was say his wife's name. I wonder what will happen with Nick and Gatsby and if they will ever meet.
Why is the part about him visiting family and the woman being there so very important?
What is Nick's preoccupation with Gatsby?
Will Daisy ever find out about Myrtle?
Why doest Myrtle's husband do anything???
Friday, March 6, 2009
712 by Emily Dickinson
Biography info
96 by Emily Dickinson
Emily Dickinson was born in 1830 in Amherst, Massachusetts. She attended school for one year and went back home because she was homesick. It was then that her reclusiveness began. She rarely left the house and rarely had visitors.Her friends and family were the topics of her writing and when one of her close friends left her writing became depressing. By the age of thirty she was almost totally recluse and spent the majority of her time reading or with her family. Her poetry tends to depict lonely people and their desire for something more. She and her sister lived in similar isolation whist her brother got married and moved in with his wife next door. Her writings were religious and encouraged by the poetry of seventeenth century Metaphysicalists. She died in 1886 and upon her death they found almost two thousand poems that she wrote. For a womans work to be published at that time was unheard of and her work wasn't published until the early 19th century.
I chose the poem "Because I could not stop for Death..."and it has rhyme and figurative language. She personified death and made it seem like a human being. She also used rhyme in alot of the poem but not the whole thing. The rhythm of the poem also made it alot easier to read and understand. It also held my interest and made me pay alot more attention to what I was reading.
For my second poem I chose her poem numbered 96 and entitled "My life closed twice before its close." It was quite short but it held a great deal of meaning in it. Reading this poem made me look at life with a different prospective because it made me realize that life is short and whilst for most there is a life after death you never really know what life has in store for you.
Emily Dickinson is definately an American poet because she is very much a realist and she writes in the same dark way that many of the realists in America are. She has a very distinct style of writing and it is very American in the way that she writes about life and death and loneliness and wanting.
Biography info
96 by Emily Dickinson
Emily Dickinson was born in 1830 in Amherst, Massachusetts. She attended school for one year and went back home because she was homesick. It was then that her reclusiveness began. She rarely left the house and rarely had visitors.Her friends and family were the topics of her writing and when one of her close friends left her writing became depressing. By the age of thirty she was almost totally recluse and spent the majority of her time reading or with her family. Her poetry tends to depict lonely people and their desire for something more. She and her sister lived in similar isolation whist her brother got married and moved in with his wife next door. Her writings were religious and encouraged by the poetry of seventeenth century Metaphysicalists. She died in 1886 and upon her death they found almost two thousand poems that she wrote. For a womans work to be published at that time was unheard of and her work wasn't published until the early 19th century.
I chose the poem "Because I could not stop for Death..."and it has rhyme and figurative language. She personified death and made it seem like a human being. She also used rhyme in alot of the poem but not the whole thing. The rhythm of the poem also made it alot easier to read and understand. It also held my interest and made me pay alot more attention to what I was reading.
For my second poem I chose her poem numbered 96 and entitled "My life closed twice before its close." It was quite short but it held a great deal of meaning in it. Reading this poem made me look at life with a different prospective because it made me realize that life is short and whilst for most there is a life after death you never really know what life has in store for you.
Emily Dickinson is definately an American poet because she is very much a realist and she writes in the same dark way that many of the realists in America are. She has a very distinct style of writing and it is very American in the way that she writes about life and death and loneliness and wanting.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
Mark Twain
I chose to read Mark Twain and I didn't find him romantic at all. He has a really wise sense of humor and his punch lines are hard to understand at first. When I read his two stories I found them very interesting. But the main one that truly caught my interest was the good little boy and bad little boy. The complete irony of the two boys situations was very humorous. He focused on the biblical stories and told of how the lifestyles of the two boys compared to the bible stories. The two boys ware Jacob and Jim and they both had very different lives. From the way they lived them to how they ended up.
Jacob was a very good boy and he tried very hard to do good deeds but his good deeds always backfired on him. From helping a blind old man to helping a child do good and not steal. He always ended up getting hurt or scolded. As for Jim, he always did wrong. He stole and disobeyed his mother and lied and cheated and beat his family. Jacob died a horrible tragic death whilst Jim lived a long prosperous life. The theme was to not force anything. If you are a genuine person then you can live your life to its fullest. Don't try to live someone elses life for them. I think these stories were directed to society in general and not a specific set of people. I think this because it isn't very formal or informal it just is. It is subtle but easy to understand. Mark Twain is very biblical in this and it shows that he was very religious.
As the reader of these pieces of literature I felt that they were very relevant. They spoke to everyone and told us all not to be too concerned of others and to really take care of ourselves.
I chose to read Mark Twain because I had always heard of him and never truly read anything by him. I like the passage where the good boy wanted to talk to the subjects of his Sunday books. It was interesting because he realized the boys never lived long enough for him to talk to them.
That within itself should have been enough for him to realize that being too good and trying too hard will get him nowhere in life. It was a good theme to learn early on in the story. Its just such a shame that he didn't see the irony of the situations. Maybe if he had he would have lived to be old just like Jim did.
Jacob was a very good boy and he tried very hard to do good deeds but his good deeds always backfired on him. From helping a blind old man to helping a child do good and not steal. He always ended up getting hurt or scolded. As for Jim, he always did wrong. He stole and disobeyed his mother and lied and cheated and beat his family. Jacob died a horrible tragic death whilst Jim lived a long prosperous life. The theme was to not force anything. If you are a genuine person then you can live your life to its fullest. Don't try to live someone elses life for them. I think these stories were directed to society in general and not a specific set of people. I think this because it isn't very formal or informal it just is. It is subtle but easy to understand. Mark Twain is very biblical in this and it shows that he was very religious.
As the reader of these pieces of literature I felt that they were very relevant. They spoke to everyone and told us all not to be too concerned of others and to really take care of ourselves.
I chose to read Mark Twain because I had always heard of him and never truly read anything by him. I like the passage where the good boy wanted to talk to the subjects of his Sunday books. It was interesting because he realized the boys never lived long enough for him to talk to them.
That within itself should have been enough for him to realize that being too good and trying too hard will get him nowhere in life. It was a good theme to learn early on in the story. Its just such a shame that he didn't see the irony of the situations. Maybe if he had he would have lived to be old just like Jim did.
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Can Writing Make A Change?
Can writing truly make a change?? Can it make people see things differently and think of things in a different perspective? To the open minded anything is possible. I believe that writing can bring about change regardless of the topic or the style. Be it a poem, a letter, a narrative, a short story, or an informative piece it still effects the way we see things.
Writing is the main way of communication amongst the world. It could be written in Hebrew or Spanish and still have the same meaning around the globe. It can be about happiness and people would be able to communicate to it. It could be about hope, despair, anger, and everyone would be able to connect with it in some way. Writing is the best way to express yourself and the things you see feel and hear. You never know when something you write will be read, and when read, taken as inspiration or even in offense.
You can feel a certain way about a subject and then read a paper or speech about it and change your veiw on said subject. In Dr. King's letter he spoke about how his rights were being violated and that he as a black man should have the same right to vote and have a say in the law as the white man. Many people opposed to this but when people read his letter it inspired them and changed their views on alot of things. Dr. King was a great inspiration to everyone through his writing and his words. With just his writing the world changed.
This is exactly why writing is so important. It can alter the world as we know it and change our veiws about anything and everything. The world has powerful writers with powerful veiws and takes on different matters. All we can do is read and form our own veiws and takes on the same matter. But either way it will have been because of the writing that we have read or the speech that was written and heard.
Writing is the main way of communication amongst the world. It could be written in Hebrew or Spanish and still have the same meaning around the globe. It can be about happiness and people would be able to communicate to it. It could be about hope, despair, anger, and everyone would be able to connect with it in some way. Writing is the best way to express yourself and the things you see feel and hear. You never know when something you write will be read, and when read, taken as inspiration or even in offense.
You can feel a certain way about a subject and then read a paper or speech about it and change your veiw on said subject. In Dr. King's letter he spoke about how his rights were being violated and that he as a black man should have the same right to vote and have a say in the law as the white man. Many people opposed to this but when people read his letter it inspired them and changed their views on alot of things. Dr. King was a great inspiration to everyone through his writing and his words. With just his writing the world changed.
This is exactly why writing is so important. It can alter the world as we know it and change our veiws about anything and everything. The world has powerful writers with powerful veiws and takes on different matters. All we can do is read and form our own veiws and takes on the same matter. But either way it will have been because of the writing that we have read or the speech that was written and heard.
Friday, February 13, 2009
Price Of A Child Writing Assignment
Tyree
Smart, Handsome, Strong
Dark brown skin, Chocolate brown eyes, Bright white smile
Confident talk, Swaggering walk
Sets my body on fire.
Calm, Cool, Suave
Responsible, Honest, Loyal
Loving deposition, Caring imposition
Arousing both my body and my mind.
He makes me feel loved
He makes me feel joy
He makes me feel special to him
As if I have a place in his heart.
He is brilliant and beautiful, and oh my how I want him.
He makes me wild with lust and crazy with love.
I feel him here with me, at night, alone.
He comforts me and I am never alone.
He is my knight in shining armor and my bright light in the darkness
He is my beacon of joy in this pit of despair.
He makes me smile when all I want to do is cry
He makes me hot and I don’t know why.
It must be the smile, or the eyes or the personality
Maybe it’s just the love that I feel emanating off of him and into my heart
Warming me. Setting me free. Letting me live in happiness.
Now all I need is my Bennie, and my life will be complete.
Smart, Handsome, Strong
Dark brown skin, Chocolate brown eyes, Bright white smile
Confident talk, Swaggering walk
Sets my body on fire.
Calm, Cool, Suave
Responsible, Honest, Loyal
Loving deposition, Caring imposition
Arousing both my body and my mind.
He makes me feel loved
He makes me feel joy
He makes me feel special to him
As if I have a place in his heart.
He is brilliant and beautiful, and oh my how I want him.
He makes me wild with lust and crazy with love.
I feel him here with me, at night, alone.
He comforts me and I am never alone.
He is my knight in shining armor and my bright light in the darkness
He is my beacon of joy in this pit of despair.
He makes me smile when all I want to do is cry
He makes me hot and I don’t know why.
It must be the smile, or the eyes or the personality
Maybe it’s just the love that I feel emanating off of him and into my heart
Warming me. Setting me free. Letting me live in happiness.
Now all I need is my Bennie, and my life will be complete.
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