Blog Reflection

“Living in the Glass Castle” wasn’t my first real blog, I had a personal one for friends and family to read that I created in the fifth grade. It was called “The Young Artist” and it consisted of photos I took from my travels with my family, my own artwork and opera reviews every month. It’s similar to the one I’ve been using all year, but I’ve learned a lot more from this blog rather than the one I created years ago.

This year’s blog had taught me very much as a reader and a writer, I’ve learned to write efficiently late at night (usually the night before it’s due) and I’ve also learned how to write structurally. I think from reading other student’s blogs and reading through some of my own entries it’s made it easier to point out flaws in my own writing as I am typing. However, writing online is much harder than writing in a notebook. In a notebook you can see the entire thing and be able to cross out things, and see where the flaws are physically. I also write much faster than I type. I also find that if I type something, even if it’s crap I’ll consider it a finished project and not revise/edit it as thoroughly as I would if I wrote it out. But spell check gets editing done much faster.

I believe that people create characters for themselves online, and unless it’s an anonymous blog of some sort, people are afraid to be honest because it feels more permanent. So they create a personality that only projects some of themselves, and is mainly what they wish to be. And a lot of times teenagers abuse this freedom of creating a different you online, they say awful things to others via the internet because it feels as though they don’t have responsibility over it because it’s said though a screen. So they say things they would never say to the person’s face. It’s an immature thing to do, but in some ways it’s good, because if it’s seen through a screen, it could be less hurtful and people are being honest.

    I think after this year I may continue this blog, or continue “The Young Artist,” I’d like to focus on the arts, continue to write about it and show it to people. Blogs are a great way to show art and writing through a screen to the world and I’d like to continue keeping a blog.

Blog Post 5/18: Go Ask Alice

    In  Go Ask Alice, written by an anonymous author it is a real diary, written by a teenage girl. Since the diary is true, many names of people and places have been altered to keep the author confidential. However, despite the fact that we don’t know who the author is talking about, there is a sense of familiarity to characters, including the perspective we are reading from. The author struggles to manage her life that is filled with drugs and sex, mainly inflicted my peer pressure.

    For example, the main character was first exposed to drugs by her friends. It wasn’t really her idea, but she still gave in because of her want to fit in. In school she was also struggling with relationships and keeping friends, so she wanted to be a part of something again, “after what seemed eternities I began to come down and the party started breaking up. I sort of asked Jill what happened and she said that 10 out of the 14 bottles of coke had LSD in them and, ‘button, button,’ no one knew just who would wind up with them. Wow, am I glad I was one of the lucky ones.” Although she didn’t intentionally take the cokes with drugs, she is happy that she did in the end. But this was a pivotal moment in her life, it’s the moment that lead to her downfall and addiction to drugs, “after you’ve had it, there isn’t even life without drugs.”

    In conclusion, the main characters poor decisions and future bad decisions were caused by peer pressure, and lead to her overdose.

Blog Post 4/5: Go Ask Alice

    Go Ask Alice, written by an anonymous author is apparently a real diary, written by a teenage girl. Since the diary is true, many names of people and places have been altered to keep the author confidential. Having read only a couple entries, I have yet to read the darkest moments. However, you can already tell that the protagonist is feeling depressed and unstable.

    For example, in the first entry, she writes “Yesterday I remember thinking I was the happiest person in the whole earth, in the whole galaxy, in all of God’s creation… Now it’s all smashed down upon my head and I wish I could just melt into the blaaaa-ness of the universe and cease to exist.” This demonstrates how the author was at one point happy, but can be easily brought down, she extensively explains the downfall of her happiness. Her being sad isn’t just her being sad, she is grieving and she is depressed, just because a boy dumped her. This gives some clue as to what will happen in the future. Will there be a higher peak and a greater crash? Will the grief lead into something much worse than just crying and stress-eating?

    Is Go Ask Alice actually true, or is it a marketing technique? Did people buy more copies because they believed that it was a true story? As I read, I will make sure to realize mistakes or unlikely eb=vents to determine whether or not the book is truly someone’s diary.

Blog Post 4/20: China's Cram Schools

          In "China's Cram Schools," written by Brook Larmer, the article exposes the harsh competition to get into university. Students must cram their way into passing the test, so they attend the expensive and highly-praise cram high school Maotanchang. Maotanchang is known for being very strict and helping students succeed. The strict rules and the harsh competition set on students is devastating and unhealthy. It offers injustice in the student’s part.

For example, the strict rules at Maotanchang high school, “located in the Anhui province, two hours from the nearest city, the school prides itself on eliminating the distractions of modern life. Cellphones and laptops are forbidden. The dorms, where about half the students live, have no electrical outlets. Dating is banned. In town, where the rest of the students live, mostly with their mothers in tiny partitioned rooms, the local government has shut down all forms of entertainment. This may be the only town in China with no video arcade, billiards hall, or Internet cafe.”  This is unfair because these students have moved, probably a long way with or without their family. They don’t have much contact with them and they can’t really have a social life in school. There were also reports of students committing suicide. This demonstrates how unhealthy the rules and restrictions are at the high school. Many of these kids are the only hope for their family making it past the farms, “Cao, tanked the exam. Cao’s family was heartbroken. His father had worked 12-hour days, 50 weeks a year, building high rises in eastern China to pay Maotanchang fees. His family couldn’t afford to repeat the year… He would end up on a construction site, just like his father.” This is unfair, because many families work hard and long to try and get their children a better life.

In the end, it isn’t the school’s fault. They're trying to help the students succeed and get into a good university, and they normally do. It’s just unfortunate for those who don't work well under pressure and can’t afford to do well anymore. The harsh competition is brutal.

Non-Fiction Analysis: 3/30

"Hi Mom, I'm Home!" By Adam Davidson, is what the growing number of recent college graduates moving back in with her parents. The reason for my students are moving back in with her parents because of student loans and the economy.

The number of recent college graduate who have moved back in with their parents have increased significantly over the past 20 years."Today, one in three people between the ages of 18 and 34 live with their parents. And 60 percent  of all young adults or see financial support from them. That's a big increase from a generation ago and only one and 10 young adults move back home and few receive financial support." As you can see, the number of adults moving back in with their parents has increased significantly. Some reasons are because of the student's preference, "work is no longer seen by middle-class use as simply a means of earning money to put food on the table: it is a defining part of their identity. they want it to be meaningful and enjoyable. That's why, faced with a competitive job market along with the seemingly endless possibilities available in the search for a apostate free rewarding' career, young people are taking longer to figure out their paths." Graduates want a job that they think will make their identity meaningful. Some just decide to live with their parents, such as Monica Navarro who decided to keep living at home as she pursued her career as a librarian.

Overall, there are many reasons as to why recent graduates are moving back in with their parents. What wasn't mentioned was the incredible amount of student debt, some adding up to 35,000 dollars. But many economic and emotional factors take a place as well.

Blog Post: 3/23

"The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian" by Sherman Alexie deals with many social issues including racism, body image, family dysfunction and most importantly; identity. The protagonist, "Junior," struggles to find himself as a young and smart American Indian teenage boy.

    Throughout the story Junior struggles to understand who he is. At the beginning of the book, Junior begins by telling the reader that he is hydrocephalic, a medical condition that puts him at risk of brain damage and makes him susceptible to seizures. “I was born with water on the brain. Okay, so that's not exactly true. I was actually born with too much cerebral spinal fluid inside my skull. But cerebral spinal fluid is just the doctors' fancy way of saying brain grease. And brain grease works inside the lobes like car grease works inside an engine. It keeps things running smooth and fast. But weird me, I was born with too much grease inside my skull, and it got all thick and muddy and disgusting, and it only mucked up the works. My thinking and breathing and living engine slowed down and flooded. My brain was drowning in grease. But that makes the whole thing sound weirdo and funny, like my brain was a giant French fry, so it seems more serious and poetic and accurate to say, ‘I was born with water on the brain.’” Hydrocephalus is very important to how he sees himself – and how others see him as well. He also mentions multiple times that he is a weirdo. Another example is, “They stared at me, the Indian boy with the black eye and swollen nose, my going-away gifts from Rowdy. Those white kids couldn't believe their eyes. They stared at me like I was Bigfoot or a UFO. What was I doing at Reardan, whose mascot was an Indian, thereby making me the only other Indian in town?” In this quote, Junior clearly mentions the ethnicity difference between him and the other students. He already sees himself as an outcast in that community, as well had his at home.

    Junior’s real name is Arnold spirit, and he struggles so much with his two identities, “‘My name is Junior,’ I said. ‘And my name is Arnold. It's Junior and Arnold. I'm both’ I felt like two different people inside of one body.”

    Junior is clearly confused as to who he is, however throughout the story, with the help of his new friends, he begins to realize who he is. He is a part-time Indian who is willing to live his life out to the fullest.

   

Blog Post 2/23: The Giver

    “The Giver” by Lois Lowry is a young adult novel set in dystopian earth. Everyone lives in a perfect community where everything is the same. At age 12, children are put into the job that they would potentially thrive in until they would be “released.” To make this world perfect the “Chief Elder” controls how the world works, and the human emotions. At the beginning of each day residents of the community must take injections to numb their feelings. The “Chief Elder” offers a great injustice, she takes away the people’s freedom.

    The protagonist, Jonas has been assigned the job as the Receiver. This job is assigned to one person every ten or so years. Jonas is an average boy in the community, he goes to school, he volunteers and he takes his injections. As the new Receiver he meets with the Giver everyday. The Giver provides information on what the world was like with history and laughter, with joy and emotion -- with colour. The community lives in black and white because the “Chief Elder” has taken away colour.

    The ‘Chief Elder” is the superior of the community, she chooses everything for everyone. This is a great injustice because no one ha freedom. They don’t understand what real emotions feel like, they don’t understand what the real world is like. Instead they abide by strict rules and all they do is make sure the community is healthy and they reproduce. She has taken away the freedom of the people, they aren’t allowed to do anything.

    We live in an era where we have freedom of speech, we see in colour, and although we hate to, we make mistakes. “The Giver” is really about the world that w could be living in, but instead we are rewarded with this one.