Social Awareness:Racism

I've just finished reading a shocking article about racism. One part of the article said that the Boston Tea party may have happened partially because of racism. We were never tought things like this in school. I think that a lot of times us kids aren't being tought what's going on in the real world right now.

I don't like that we're not learning what's going on. We're never going to be socially aware unless teachers or someone else tells us what's happening. I think that once people know and understand what's going on, they'll do something about it. Once people understand things, theycan take actions about them and improve the world we live in.

I think that this social awareness project is a good idea. This assignment can teach us a lot.

Responce to articles about social issues

Earlier today I was reading an article about children who are malnutritioned. It was really upsetting. The article said that a lot of children sufferfrom this in South America and Africa. The article says there are new methods of things that will help people who are malnutritioned. The author of the article kept on repeating that the U.S. is raising money for and helping these children. I wonder of other countries are also trying to help these children. I think that more people should become socially aware of this issue so they can help malnutritioned children.

I also read an article about children who are growing up in poverty. Some of the things the article mentioned shocked me. It said that about 15% of children in the United States grow up with a single mother. About half of those people are poor. When children grow up in poverty, a lot of the time they have trouble focusing in school and their grades suffer because of this. Bad grades lead to bad jobs which lead to poverty. Poverty is a tough problem too solve and I'm not sure how it should be handled. Hopefully, one day soon, a lot less people will be poor.

My 3rd Social Awareness

I decided to find a true story about someone who changes the world in a small way. However for me, it wasn't one person but a lot of people that changed the world in a small way. To me, all of the people that did the breast cancer walk are unknown heroes.

All the people that did the walk had to work hard to get in shape for a good cause. They raised a lot of money which may be the difference between life and death for a lot of people. I do know a few people that were in the breast cancer walk, but I never got to interview them. I think that what they did was not only very impressive but it also may inspire people which may be an even bigger and more important accomplishment. I know that all the people who took place in this walk inspired me. What they've done will give people hope.

Social Awareness Poem

Rice
white rice
brown rice
yellow rice
brown rice says white rice is cold
like ice
white rice says yellow rice is mean
not nice
yellow rice says other rice is sick
not slick
fried rice says all rice will be a
side dish
I like fried rice because equal rice
is my favorite type.

Entry about The Outsiders

This week I've been reading the book The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton. A repeating pattern that I've noticed is that the greasers(poor kids) and socs(rich kids) are always angry at each other even though they never have a specific reason to have such hatred. They've always just been really angry at each other. This seems kind of like racism to me. I think that the kids in the book all have enough problems without dealing with each other. I thinh that it's dumb to cafe enough about who's rich and who's poor to risk lives.

I wonder what S.E. HInton will do about the greasers and the socs. I think he should make the two groups at least accept each other. I think that one time someone will get hurt badly in the book and then everyone will be guilty and sorry.

Social Awareness #1 Responce

I think that this social awareness project turned out to be very interesting. A main lesson that I learned from this is that thaere are a lot of complicated problems out in the "real world." None of them seem easy to resolve and everyone has there own ideas about the issues. So far I don't think that any of these problems have been completely. Some of these problems will never be resolved. Can parents get their dead children back?

This assignment has made me realize that life won't always be fair. In my opinion a lot of the problems that I've learned about for this assignment should have been resoved by now even though they aren't. I think that these problems will never be resolved unless people stop debating over what to do and start to make decisions based on what they believe.Well, that's what I think, I wonder how the politicians will handle these problems.

Entry #8

A few days ago I read the poem Mother to Son by Langston Hughes. At first when I read the poem I had no idea what Langston Hughes meant by it. When I looked at it again I thought that when Langston Houghes says "life for me aint been no crystal ball." that his life hasn't been easy. He repeats this line over and over many times. Later he says to keep on turning corners and keep on climbing. I think that by this, Langston Hughes means that in bad times if you keep oon going and keep on working hard, good things will happen.

I was also kind of confused about who the people were in the poem. Who was the mother and who was the son? At first I thought Langston Houghes may have been the mother talking to his child. However when I reread this poem, I realized that Langston Hughes was probably the son and his mom was probably the mom in the poem. I now think that the main problem in the poem was that Langston Hughes' mom was a slave. I think that Langston's mom kept on working hard and eventually she was freed. I think that she's telling her son not to give up because something bad happened to him.

I now realize that at first, I completely mis understood the meaning of the poem. Now after rereading the poem, I feel like I under stand it a lot better.

Appreciatiom Draft

A lot of people think that Bridge to Terebithia is just a book with a sad ending. But if you were to read it again, you might see that this book teaches people about a lot of life lessons. The first time that I was introduced to the book was in 3rd grade. My teacher let us go outside to the school yard and read it aloud to us. That time I didn't pay a lot of attention to the book and didn't learn much from it.

When I read this book again a few weeks ago it taught me multiple valuable lessons. One of these lessons is that you have to be understanding of other's situations. In this book there's a school bully named Janice. She gets Jesse in trouble and is mean to Leslie. One day they find Janice crying. Jesse and Leslie go out of their way to talk to Janice and find out that her dad beats her. That's why Janice bullies kids. After they find this out they treat Janice better. I think that the author of this book (Katherine Paterson) does a really good job of teaching readers lessons such as this one. I think that if people in general were more understanding of each others situations, the world would be a much nicer place to live in.

Another lesson that Katherine Paterson taught me was that it's o.k. to be different. You should be whoever you really are. In the book all of the students make fun of Leslie because she's the only one with money but no television. They also make fun of her because she's the only one who eats yogurt. They pretty much make fun of her just because she's different from the crowd. Jesse becomes friends with Leslie because she's a good person. The people that are close to Leslie are really close to Leslie and that's because of her personality. I know a lot of kids try to follow others instead of being themselves. I like the way Katherine Paterson teaches this lesson.

When Leslie passes away, Jesse is really upset and can't think of anything but Leslie. However Jesse's dad teaches Jesse that he has to move on. From this Jesse and I both learned that sometimes bad things will happen but you have to move on from them. In my own life, I was with my aunt one minute but then she suddenly passed away. I was really sad for a while and I still miss her a lot but eventually you're going to have to move on or you'll just be miserable for the rest of your life. I think the movie Bridge to Terebithia (which I rewatched) makes this point easy to understand.

On the surface, this book may seem like it's just a couple of lonely kids that became friends but if you really pay attention to details, you can learn a lot from this book. I know I did. It's impressive that a childrens book can teach you so many important, adult lessons. I think that the author of this book  Katherine Paterson expects readers to be mature and handle these lessons. I like that she expects this out of readers and I think that it makes this book even better. I consider myself lucky to have been able to read and learn from this fantastic book.

Entry#7 Bridge to Terebithia-background research

I tried to find some research on the book Bridge to Terebithia. One thing that I did was find out information on the author of this book Katherine Paterson. In an interview about the book she was asked when she first wanted to be an author. She replied that she hadn't always wanted to be an author. She didn't know when she first wanted to be an author but, she certainly is happy to be an author now. I think that this is a little bit strange because in the book she wrote Jesse wanted to be an author since he was in first grade. I wonder if Jesse was based on someone else in her life or if she just kind of made Jesse up in her mind.

I also rewatched the movie Bridge to Terebithia (I saw it a few years ago.) I noticed that in the the movie, Leslie had longer hair then in the book. I think that the people who made this movie did this so that people would feel sorry for Leslie and feel very sad at the end of the movie. I think that it was kind of unfair for the makers of the movie to base the movie on the book and then make it different from the book. I wonder if this has upset Katherine Peterson like it annoyed me. Maybe I'll try to find out more about this another time.     

Entry#6 Bridge to Terebithia

A note that I annotated in this book is:Why is Jesse's dad so upset that Jesse wants to be an artist? Why would he say the school is turning my only son into a... to his1st grade son? If I were Jesse I'd be afraid to be an artist now.

It kind of dissapoints me that a grown up says that to his son who's only in1st grade. Jesse's dad wants Jesse to be tough like himself but that's not who Jesse is. Jesse is in 5th grade now in the book and he still thinks about the conversation he had with his dad 4 yaers ago. I think that by now, Jesse should talk to his dad and kind of make a stand.

Jesse isn't even close to his dad now and a major reason for this is because Jesse wants to be an artist. Even if Jesse still wants to be an artist he should at least try to get closer to his dad I mean it would at least be a chance for Jesse to earn his father's approval. A theme that I noticed in the book is that there always seems to be some type of peer pressure and a need for approval. 

Charlotte's Web Entry

   I noticed that in the book Charlotte's Web, a lot of characters seem to get older and change as the story goes on. In the beginning of the book, Charlotte was healthy and seemed average but by the end of the book she was rundown and weak and she died. I guess that E.B. White is trying to make the book realistic.  In my own life, my great-grandparents used to play games with me when I was 4, but a few years later they had  Alzheimer's Disease and hardly recognized me. Things will always change, some are good some are bad.

Another example of this is how Wilbur grew up.  At first he used to be like a child, always needing a mother figure (ex. Fern and Charlotte.)  Now, at the end of the book, Wilbur has finally grown up.  He's kind of like a child who turned into an adult.

Another person who changed a lot was Fern.  At the beginning of the book, all she cared about was saving Wilbur and then taking care of him.  She would visit him at her uncle's farm every day.  However, towards the end of the book, she started to go out and do more things with her friends and she didn't even stay to see Wilbur win a big prize at the county fair.  As people get older, their interests change.

I think that E.B. White wanted to make her book realistic and not just for little kids. I think that the message that E.B. White is trying to send is that as people get older they change their interests, their personalities and they change  physically too. Overall, everyone will change for better or for worse.