Poetry Out Loud

The poem I chose to do was Broken Promises by David Kirby. Its meaning is about raising children. You make promises to yourself about how you will raise your children. Then you end up breaking them because sometimes its just too hard to do something you say your not going to. Also the parent in this poem which I personally thinks is a father, cannot understand the actions of his children. He doesn't get why he can do so much for them but yet they do not care. They are rude and nasty. They don't even care that he is the one that puts a roof over their heads.In the end the father has enough. He hates them for how ungrateful they are and tells them they need to love him. If it wasn't for him they wouldn't even exist.
The meaning of the poem to my life is simple. Sometimes teenagers take there parents for granted. When we get punished we act like they are horrible people even though later on we will end up sleeping in our beds which is provided by them. Also I have made promises to myself about how I want to raise my children when I am older. How do I know I will follow through with those and won't end up breaking them when the temptation becomes just to much for me to handle anymore.
In the way I will speak is how I will convey the meaning. In the beginning I will put passion in my voice and then look sad and sound sad when the father gets rejected. I will show how I feel about my children growing up in my facial expressions and voice. Then as I get to the end where the child is kicking and screaming I will sound angrier and angrier. Finally I will scream one word and bring it down to soft sad tones for the last line. I haven't really thought of any hand movements. I'm not a hand movement type of person.

Poetry Out Loud

PART ONE:
One poem I read that starts with the first letter of my name is, My Grandmother’s Love Letters. The poem I read that begins with the third letter in my last name is, Life in a Love. The poem I was suggested to read by Joel was, First Poem for You. The poem I suggested for Joel was, Romance. The last two poems I read were, I Dreamed That I Was Old and Fairy-tale Logic. 
 PART TWO:
Out of all the five poems I read, I liked Fairy-tale Logic the best.  I liked this one because it wasn't so serious. It was playful and meant for entertainment. It tried to play off that it was being serious which also added to the funniness of it.  I really did not like My Grandmother's Love Letters because I didn't understand it. I couldn't figure out where the author was trying to go with the poem. It talked about the old age of the letters but nothing about the content. That's what I cared about. I feel if I was forced to choose one of these poems, I would do the Fairy-tale Logic. My personality connected with this poem because I'm not really a serious person and either is this poem.  I love dragons and it speaks of those creatures.
PART THREE:
The two criteria that I know will be easiest for me is being attentive, having good eye contact and looking at everyone not just the judges. The other criteria I will succeed on is capturing the audiences attention. I have a good volume of projection so even the people in the back can hear me. The two criteria I will need to work on is getting the meaning of the poem across as I read it to the audience. The other criteria I will have to work on is not sounding bored as I talk. People say I tend to read monotone.
PART FOUR:
The first video I watched was, Bilingual/Bilingüe. It was a successful performance because she used a little bit of hand movements when it was good timing for it. She changed the way she spoke for how the mood of the poem was at each part. It almost felt like she wrote the poem, not someone else. She looked confident and you couldn't tell if she was uncomfortable up there by her stage presence.
The other video I watched was, The Man-Moth. He did a successful performance because he talked in this way that made you think about what he was saying. His pauses added to the quality of the performance. He spoke loud and clear. You could tell he really knew this poem and that he understood it. He gave you these facial expressions that went with what he was saying.
PART FIVE:
I think I will do just fine in the competition. I did something like this in fourth grade and my poem was very long. I had no problem memorizing it. The website I personally don't like. It is kinda hard at times to find stuff since its in small print. I think I will memorize Broken Promises. I understand the meaning and I just like the metaphors he used. I think the competition will be interesting to watch. I just am worried to see how good or bad people will do. I don't really have a great idea of how it will go, but I guess I have to wait and see.

Thanksgiving Extra credit

I feel that the most important and helpful thing I have learned in English so far would have to be the 5 part paragraph. Rewriting our To Kill a Mockingbird paper showed me how many different skills you have to master to be successful with this type if writing. I had no idea what embedding your quotes was and I had a hard time with that but after talking to you about it, I now understand. Also when I write papers for school I tend to be very wordy and write a little too much. When you are doing the 5 part paragraph you can't do that. You just need to get your point across plain and simple. I know that mastering how to write these will help me and all your other students to be better at writing because that is a strict format we must follow, but once we have less restrictions we will have masterpieces of writing. This is so important because writing is an everyday skill. Just like reading is. The better you are at it, the easier life will be. Who wants to be hire someone who can't write well. Having good writing skills is such a necessity and I thank you for helping us grow in that area of education.

"Knife"

In my group discussion of "The Knife"  one idea that was brought up that I didn't give a lot of thought to was the fact that he compared being a surgeon to a priest. A lot of people talked about the many ways these two comparisons made sense. Most of the time was spent talking about this one topic. A heated debate was started from this. Many knew ideas were formed and even Mrs. Gilman said she didn't think about some of these ideas. I'm glad this was brought up since it definitely helped me understand this essay better.
They mentioned that a priest saves people's lives by having them except God into their hearts and a surgeon saves people by performing surgery. This better helped me understand the meaning of him talking about how stressful his job is since he basically can end or save your life right then and there.

5 Part Paragraph

As I listened to the comments and the papers be read, I consistently noticed that many students did not embed their quotes. Most people thought they had but were confused on how to do it correctly. Another thing most people need to work on is not using plot summary in their commentary. Its hard to start out the quote and then have to think of something new to support it. Many of my peers need to choose topics that made it easy to find quotes that they could easily support. Also another big problem was using transition for the concluding sentence. It was like people almost forgot that they needed to have a transition at the end,  but if they would have reread it with the check list, they would have caught their error. When it comes to writing topic sentences, people need to think "okay, what am I trying to prove? does my topic sentence clearly show what that is?" If you answer those questions with a yes, your good to go. If not, you need go back and read your topic sentences over again and fix your mistake. When your writing your concrete detail, you need to introduce it with a little back round information so the audience knows what your about to say. Then before you use your quotes, set it up so it isn't awkward to read. Go back to that part of the story and start it off from there. Then when you are writing your commentary, you need to make sure it is all your own ideas. If it sounds like it came from the story, change it to your own thinking. That's the key to having good commentary. Also if your commentary makes sense and goes with explaining the quote.
I didn't get to read my paper. I do not know what I need to work on.

Story Time

I currently am a violinist. We needed to sharpen our musical skills for our concert on the evening of October 28. We went into the PAC to perform our amazing pieces of creative works of art. The sound thundered throughout the room with a sense of pure happiness. My teacher was full of pride as he looked at our gathering of outstanding teens. He praised us for our accomplishments and said he would reward us with a spooky adventure. He brought us to a frigid room with cold stone steps leading to a platform. He then lectured us how we needed to take everything extremely serious and there should be no nonsense taking place. We went up the uninviting stairs and were met by a dark, coal colored ladder. I watched him vanish up this portal to another level above. I looked about my peers uncertain if I should follow. I then grasped the ladder and made my way creeping upwards. I had no problem going up it as for I didn't look down like the foolish people did. I then stepped on a platform that looked out upon the whole room. The catwalk was right next to me. I felt superior to everyone else in the school because few would get to experience this. We evenly spread out for safety issues. I then roamed around the crowed area which I was confided in. We did not get to stay up there long for there was a limited amount of enjoyments we could do up there. I had to descend back to the ground and once I saw how long the fall was, my heart raced at an intense speed. My hands became all clammy and my throat was becoming tighter and tighter. It was like I had a snake wrapped around my neck slowly cutting off my air supply. I scurried down that ladder in record time. I was filled with pride as I felt the cement under my dainty feet. I sprinted out those doors and sat down to have my normal lunch. I felt like I had a little secret since no one at my table had no idea what I went through during 3rd period.

Writing about Writing

My favorite writing piece would have to be my book review I wrote about Gone With the Wind. I had to write it last year in block. It was my best writing because I really connected with the book and understood it. It was easy to just get my words flowing and not once did I have to sit and think about what to say next. I got one of the highest grades on it and my teacher asked if she could keep it for examples. I really showed how Scarlett uses her immense pride to over come some of the toughest challenges you can face in life. Also I showed how the effects of the civil war affected everyone. It was one of the few times that I was able to write carefree without letting myself have the pressure of knowing I was getting graded on it. If I could have more school writing assignments where I was able to write with such confidence that I felt no pressure, I would be one happy student!

Pride and Prejudice

My feelings towards the book so far is that it is confusing. They switch who is talking way to often and its hard to keep up with which characters are speaking. They also don't make a clear theme or plot. There is no real description of the setting or what some characters look like. Also they introduce to many characters at one time to keep track with everyone. The one thing I do like is Elizabeth. Her character is interesting to me. She sorta reminds me of my mother.
Characters will be one the main thing to point out in my project. The whole point of the book is people and their relationships with one another. The whole reason for the characters is to get the story going so it will reach its climax. All it is right now is people talking with one another. There isn't any action.
Pride and Prejudice is like Gone with the Wind. They both have a huge focus on pride. They mention pride a lot in the book and in Gone with the Wind, the reason for why most conflicts happen is because of Scarlett's pride. Also they both deal with love which is why they are love stories. They both also take place in the 1800's and the main characters are women.
I think I am going to make a movie. That seem like the easiest way to capture the true meaning of the story. Also because I am not good at all at art. I don't really have any other options because I don't remember the other choices we had for our projects.

Extending The Themes(:

When I read to To Kill a Mockingbird the fact that so many people judge each other and have preset judgments really related to me and the other students at school. A lot of people are very judgemental towards one another and once a group of people have an idea about you, it sticks. There is no changing it. You never really think what this does to people. I saw the effects through the book. As you read on many characters are pinpointed for being prejudged. Tom Robinson, the woman of the town, Mayella being called white trash even though she tried her best to be above that, and many more. They knew they couldn't change the name society had given them. That's why Tom took 17 bullets.
Another way this book spoke to me as an individual is because I have a sister who is the same age difference as Scout and Jem. You watch Jem grow up and not need Scout that much, He stops wanting to do things with her and is very grumpy towards her. They way he acted to Scout was the same was my sister did once she became a teenager. This just shows Jem trying to gain his independence without needing Scout there with him.
This book to me is a reminder. It reminds you how one person can effect a whole community with just a few words. That you must be careful what you do and say because the consequences might change people's lives for the worst. Also that children have the same effect. Scout proved that by calming the angry mob down by talking about Mr.Cunningham's son. Everyone thought about how they had kids at home and how would they feel if someone beat them up badly. Next time your going to do something, think about if the outcome will be good or bad. You might be suprised by your answer.

Childhood to Adolescence

As a child, a simple sorry fixes just about everything. Your mean to a fellow friend or disobey your parents, all you have to say is sorry and that sin is like it never even happened. So as you get older and you learn about worse crimes committed, how do you understand that you can't say sorry and have things be all rosy. As a little girl this is what confused me the most.
My sister and i constantly fought with each other. We both liked to make the rules and neither one of us followed them. My mother would shout at us to apologize and make-up with one another. As soon as we said what was needed, we loved each other again. This happened day after day without fail. I just assumed that when people fought you didn't have to worry about what you said or what you did. In the end you would love each other.
One day my parents got in a big argument and it was like no big deal. Then things were so tense in the house. All cheery I asked if they said sorry and my dad looked at me and told me that sorry was not going to fix things. I just looked at him like maybe he was crazy. I thought about that for days. How could sorry just not be enough. I stopped trying to explain it to myself. I was just thinking my parents were being silly.
Finally as I got a little older, I understood that my parents weren't being silly. My friend and I got in an  argument just like my parents did. She said things that I couldn't believe you would say to a friend. I walked off steaming inside. She later told me how sorry she was. I told her that I forgave her, but sorry wasn't going to change the fact that she said those things and that we couldn't be friends. My mind when back to the day of my parents final argument, and I got why sorry just can't change everything.

Introduction (:

When all you followers out there read my blog, you should expect long elaborate posts.I like to you use creative, exciting words in my writing. My personality shines through my writing and sentence structure. I would have to say I'm pasionate English student. I get pumped up to read any piece of literature. Then I have to jump right in on discussing whatever parts of the book interest me the most.