Blog #14

When we were first told about the blog that we were supposed to keep all year I was kind of angry.  I did not want to do something that just took up time and I though would be pointless.  Now my view is very different.  I enjoyed doing the blogs this year and learned quite a bit from them.  It helped to reflect on the stories and it made me analyze the story more which in turn helped me on the tests.  One of my favorite topics of the blogs this year was creating endings to stories.  It was so much fun and it made me remember the actual story.  I also am not the most creative person ever so it was kind of fun to practice making things up and having it pertain to the story.  I definitely thought it was a good learning experience. I learned not to just do something half-minded even though it is simple and to take your time on some of the small things.
My favorite stories
1. Pit and the pendulum
2. The Great Gatsby
3. Owl Creek Bridge

Blog #12

The 1920's were a time of fun and excitement following World War 1.  One of the most memorable things from this time was the music.  The majority of the music can be summed up in one word: jazz.  Or Dance may be more appropriate.
1. St. Louis Blues- Bessie Smith.
       I chose this song because I remember the title from jazz band ad it was a song that we played.  Then I listened to it on youtube and it was pretty exciting to listen to.  It definitely showed what this age was all about.  The soul that Bessie Smith sang with showed how much she meant the lyrics, and I really enjoyed listening to it.

The next song that i picked was also off of a list of the 100 most popular songs during this time.
Heebie Jeebies-Louis Armstrong
     I mainly looked up this song because Louis Armstrong is an amazing trumpeteer and singer.  I listened to it while typing this and it was a lot of fun.  It just put me in a good mood.  I can just see the characters from "Great Gatsby" going to club and dancing to Louis Armstrong playing and singing live and everyone having a lively time.

Blog #13

Advice is always something I enjoy giving haha. My first word of advice is to try and be friends with your students.  Say hi to them if you see them (unless you don't like them of course, just kidding.)  I know from my experience, it makes working with teachers a lot easier if they are friendly to you.  It is simple logic.  If you are kind to someone they are typically kind back.  Teachers need all the help they can get when it comes to gaining respect especially with some classes from what I have heard.

A second bit of advice involves homework and tests.  I know you can't just not assign stuff and just give everyone 100s on test, but try to be lenient on test dates.  Junior year was honestly the worst year of high school by an enormous margin. However, Mr. Fisk was always willing to move a test back a day if we had other stuff going on.  Sometimes we had a test in 7/8 of our classes in one day.  Just take the time to ask what else is going on and the students will greatly appreciate it.

Blog #11

To find Mark Twain quotes, I literally googled " Mark Twain Quotes."  I clicked on the first site, and from there on read the first quote.  Reading the first quote was all I had to read.  It applied to me perfectly and I was actually just going what this quote says at the same instant.  It was kind of weird. 
The quote is: "A man cannot be comfortable without his own approval."  This really applies to me.  For some reason I am extremely hard on myself.  People will tell me good job, and I will just shrug it off because in my opinion it was not good enough.  Mr. Weiderkehr reminded me of this the other day.  Math has never been challenging for me until these past few weeks.  I have spent multiple hours in his room trying to get help.  At one point I was so angry at myself for not understanding the math.  Eventually Mr. Weiderkehr told me that I can only do as best as I can.  I have to accept myself for who I am and what I am capable of.  I cannot be perfect at everything, so I need to accept myself before I can truly be me.

Blog #10

One of my favorite television shows is Glee.  A lot of people consider this show gay or girly.  But that is one thing that it really has a good perception of.  In fact it shows people who are gay and shows the problems that they have to deal with every day.  In the season finale one of the kids tried to hang himself after kids made fun of him.  The show always has good messages like that.  Mixed in with the life lessons is a fun musical environment.  I love singing and the songs that they do are great. It is also full of issues and things that kids in high school go through.  Unfortunately I have work on Tuesday so i have to miss the new episodes.  And now on fox.com, you have to wait 8 days to watch the episode.  But I really like this show.

Blog #9

One person that i found who has an untold story of her civil rights part was Viola Liuzzo.  She was a white woman who marched with Martin Luther King and thousands of black citizens.  She had five kids at home but wanted to make a difference in the rights of African American citizens.  In 1965 during the night of one of their marches, she was killed.  The KKK brutally murdered her by shooting her in the head.  The members of the KKK were convicted and sentenced to 10 years in prison.  People will not see her name in history books but she definitely had an impact.  Anyone who was willing to give their life for the cause deserves to be recognized.  

Blog #8

One of the people I chose to write about was Countee Cullen.  I remember that we read some of his poems in class, and they were interesting.  He excelled at most all of the things he did, and was very smart.  He received his master's degree from Harvard.  Later on he was also a teacher like one of the Delany sisters was.  His poems influenced many people during this the Harlem Renaissance time, and his poems are famous still today.  
 Another person who was mentioned in Having Our Say was W.E.B. Du Bois.  The sisters actually met him and they played a role in different NAACP activities.