Last Bog!! :)

It has been pretty entertaining looking back on all my old posts. Reading the ones from the very beginning of the year brought me back to when I first started my blog. I have to admit, I did think it was a little weird to have one for school, but as I got used to it, I started to see the significance of it and why Mrs. Gilman had us start it. First of all, it has brought our class a little bit closer to one another because we are able to see you read what our fellow classmates are writing about and their opinions. Second, it gives us another way of expressing ourselves other than just writing long essays in and out of class. This teaches us responsibility to do things outside of class and knowing when it's due and actually getting it done on time. I think that the blog has been a very good thing for Honors English.

My very first blog was about getting knowing how we (our own self) get into a book. I think that blog helped set the groundings for the rest of the year. Our second blog was about our first outside reading assignment where I read Treasure Island. The first few months of doing the blogs helped us all get into it and understand it. Later on, we started reading To Kill a Mockingbird. I really liked that book. It had so many motifs and symbols it made it so finding those things were like an everyday thing. After that book we read The Importance of Being Ernest. This play I thought was pretty good, but a little boring. I also did learn a lot reading it though. And then came what seemed like the longest and most boring book, Great Expectations. I did not like this book at all. It was pretty hard to write an essay on it, especially because it was with a group. But working with a group on it did teach me a lot of things. How to plan who would do what part, how we were going to write it, and just how to work with a group. Then finally came Romeo and Juliet. I really enjoyed this play. It was a little hard to understand at first, but once I got used to the language, it became rather enjoyable. I liked the story and thought that it was really easy to write an essay off of it. After that we read our own book, which I was very unfortunate to get The Jungle. I did not like this book one little bit. It was rather disturbing and a really long, hard and boring read. I was glad to get done with it. Now we are still reading Of Mice and Men. I really like this book surprisingly. It has a good story line and it's a very easy read. It's probably my favorite book out of all of them.

My favorite blog out of all the ones we did this year is probably the one I wrote about dreams. It made me think very hard about what they mean and their importance. I definitely expanded my brain quite a bit when I wrote about it. I also like thinking about those kinds of things. It makes me think really hard and wonder about every little thing that people cannot explain. It's kind of like the universe in general. Nobody really knows what exactly is out there and if it ever ends or if there is life. Okay now I am getting way off subject. Anyways, I know I enjoyed writing about this kind of thing rather than a boring book like Great Expectations.

The quote, "Character is higher than intellect. A great soul will be strong to live as well as think." - Ralph Waldo Emerson, it is saying that the person you are inside is far more important than the things you know. If you are a good person, you will learn great things in the process and become the man/woman you are meant to be. I think that this is represented in a lot of the books we read this year. They all seem to be about life lessons and I think that it is what doing this blog is all about.

I really enjoyed having you Mrs. Gilman as a teacher this year. You have helped me learn a lot and so I thank you for that! Honors English has been one of my hardest classes, or maybe even the hardest class I have taken this year. I am going to miss you next year! And good luck with your future freshman!

I feel that I did a pretty good job on my Romeo and Juliet essay. I have definitely come a long ways from when we wrote our first big essay in the beginning of the year. I think that I am now good at writing meaningful and thoughtful essays. I would say that i do understand literary analysis and what it is all about. You have to understand the book from cover to cover, be able to pick up on little metaphors, and just be a good reader and essay writer. I do believe that I am able to do all of that now.

Although I think I am a pretty good essay writer, there are always areas that I can improve on. I tend to say "like" instead of "such as" a lot. I also tend to go back and forth between 2nd and 3rd person. Sometimes I say "you" and other times I say "one". I never know which one to use but I guess it is usually better to write in 3rd than it is to write in 2nd. Another thing that I do is I sometimes write in past tense. I always have to go back through my writing a bunch of times just to make sure I didn't forget and use past tense. Overall I think I have learned a lot. Romeo and Juliet essay did help me a lot.

I do tend to read more during the summer than I do during school. This summer, I am planning on reading at least two books; Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer, and Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer. The reason I would read Breaking Dawn is because I have already read the first three but I never got to the last one, so I think that this summer would be a very good time to finally read it. I want to read Artemis Fowl because I have already read the first one and it was really good so I want to read the next one. I have heard that it is just as good as the first. So overall I do have some reading planned for over the summer. I will probably end up reading more books but I do not know what they are yet.

Dreams

In my opinion, dreams do have some kind of relevance in real life. They have to come from somewhere, so maybe they do have something to do with the past or future. One dream that I have had that I can remember and means the most to me is when I was sailing out on the ocean with my dad and then all of a sudden there was a big storm and I fell over board. My dad could not hear me as he sailed away with no idea that I was not on board anymore. I was screaming and yelling at the top of my lungs but nobody could hear me! I didn't know what to do...I was so scared. Then, all of a sudden, I woke up right before I went under.

When I first thought about what my dream meant, I took it too literally. As I thought about it more, I realized it symbolized what I am truely scared of; being alone and helpless in a situation that I can't get out of, and ultimately, ending in death. In my opinion, one of the worst feelings someone can have is knowing that nobody can help them. All alone, scared and knowing that you are going to die. So from then on, I made a promise to myself that I would never let myself get into a situation where I was helpless and destined to not make it through. Ultimately, live with no regrets.

I think that my dream does relate the Romeo and Juliet. They both relate to fate and death. When Romeo has the dream that if he went to the party, death would come rather too quickly for him. But not like me, he chooses to ignore his dream, whereas I acted upon mine, but I think that I am closer to Romeo than I am to Mercutio.

Dreams do have a fairly large impact in the third act of the play. Romeo is slowly starting to realize that the dream he had earlier maybe is starting to come true. He has been exiled and now is thinking that he might as well be dead because he can't see Juliet anymore, which is slightly over dramatic. But overall, he was right and he should have acted upon it, just like I chose to do.

Romeo and Juliet

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmXb5eL1grA
This song is titled Romeo and Juliet. The lyrics in the song are "modern", but the idea and how they feel is the same as it is in the play. Many people now a days make a lot of references to Romeo and Juliet, such as when girls say, "I hope someday I can find a love just like Romeo!". Romeo is made to be the "perfect" boyfriend/husband a girl could ever dream of. Girls hope that they can find their own Romeo. Although it is basically the greatest love story ever told, people always seem to leave out the fact that they both killed themselves. The did NOT live happily ever after. They might have shared the greatest bond that two people could ever have, but it did not turn out the way they wanted. Perhaps the reason for this is because the love they shared overpowered everything else that was important, like their own lives.

I can definitely say that English Class has been an experience to remember. At the beginning of the year I was a little nervous about taking Honors English because I thought that it was going to be a lot more work than regular English, but it turns out that it hasn't been that bad! There was more reading required than I was expecting, but it's been okay so far . I do wish that we could have actually written some poems just because that's what I like to do. I think that the word "motif" has been engraved into my brain by now. During the summer reading assignment I wasn't really sure what that was supposed to be, but now, I can definitely say that I know what it is. I actually really like doing Word Power. I like learning about that kind of stuff because I want to be a doctor when I'm older. I find it an "easy learn". Well, hopefully the last few months of school will be enjoyable. Bring on Romeo and Juliet!

Skit!!!!!

The first scene that I think would be really entertaining to act out is when the convict (Magwitch) confronts Pip and pushes him around and stuff. I think that everyone would have a good time with this scene because it is exciting and humorous at the same time. This scene shows how Pip and Magwitch first meet.

Another good scene is when Pip meets Miss Havisham for then first time. This scene would be really funny to watch because of how the person playing Miss Havisham would act and talk. I think that they would have a very hard time not laughing just because the scene is kind of awkward. It is also a pretty big part of the play because it's when the reader learns everything "weird" about her; her dress, the clocks, the cake, etc.

For the last one, I think that the scene where Mrs. Joe gets hit on the head with the leg iron would be good. We could have the person who hits her cover their face because it was a bit of a mystery to who killed Mrs. Joe. I know that some of the boys particularly would have a good time with this scene just because of the violence.

Question numberrrr 2!!!

In chapter 43 in the first couple pages, (352-354), Pip is saying that since his benefactor is a convict, he can no longer be with Estella (even though he really wasn't from the beginning). I understand the reason for him to feel this way, because he thinks she won't want him because all his money is coming from a convict, but why would he even tell her where all the money came from? Can't he just keep it quiet so that Estella will think it's his money? Maybe it's because he would feel guilty, but I still don't understand it completely. If he told her that it came from a man named Magwitch, how would she know he is a convict? I don't think she will even care where the money came from, so why does he think she will care so much? And why does he need to tell her where it came from in the first place?

There has been a few things that I have not understood in the book, but the one that stands out to me most is how Estella can be so rude and not even think about Pip's feelings. She did not like Pip from the beginning just because he was "common". It's obvious that Miss Havisham doesn't want Estella to like Pip because she did tell her to break his heart, for her own purposes, but that doesn't mean Estella has to listen. When Estella says, "Oh! I have a heart to be stabbed in or shot in,I have no doubt, and, of course, if it ceased to beat, I should cease to be. But you know what I mean. I have no softness there, no-sympathy-sentiment-nonsense." (238), she is saying that she has a heart, but its just filling a place in her chest that's practically empty. But she has to have some softness and sympathy just for telling Pip that, she just chooses to hide it so she doesn't seem weak. She's giving Pip a reason, where if she didn't have any sympathy and softness she would just keep hurting Pip with no reason for it. Why would she not want to seem weak? Nobody would hold anything against her, so what's the point?

Photo

I think that this photo symbolizes when Pip has to leave his life he knows to go become somethings he's been dreaming of; A gentleman. In the photo, the boy jumping off the building to go fly with the birds represents Pip taking the "leap". He doesn't know what to expect, he will either succeed or fail, which has to be hard for him. It is also very hard on Pip to say goodbye, especially to Joe, but he knows that there is a great reward coming his way if he just is brave and takes the leap.

In the quote, "Pause you who read this, and think for a moment of the long chain of iron or gold, of thorns or flowers, that would never have bound you, but for the formation of the first link on one memorable day.", Pip is referring to the first day he went to Miss Havisham's house. The first day he went there, he was introduced to Estella and Miss Havisham, who are of a higher class than Pip, so it was a different environment for him. Once Estella tells Pip that he is common, he immediately tries to become uncommon, just so he can impress Her. By this, he eventually doesn't even want to become Joe's apprentice anymore, just because he knows Estella would never want to be with a blacksmith. He changes what he wants to do and how he wants to live his life just for a girl who treats him like dirt.

There has been many memorable days in my life, but the one that i feel started my big chain is the day i started playing volleyball. My dad introduced me to the sport when i was just a small baby. He was a coach and he would bring me to his practices, and ever since then I have been in love with it. From the day of my first tryout, it has been 7 years since I started playing. I know that my life would be completely different if I never started playing volleyball. It has helped me become who I am today.

Dishonesty

For my first concrete detail, I am going to discuss how the author uses dishonesty to develop the characters in the play. Wilde uses it to give the personality traits and characteristics of Ernest and Algernon to show how their lies contribute to the play and how it gets them out of bad situations. For my second concrete detail, I will discuss how dishonesty reflects Victorian society. The characters do this by living up to the social expectations, even though that means they try to be something they're not, basically by acting fake. Finally for my third concrete detail, I am going to discuss how dishonesty develops the play as a whole. Wilde portrays the idea of dishonesty through dark humor and reflection on the way they lived way back then. It also shows the satire on social expectations and marriage throughout the entire book. The next paragraph will talk about the different levels of dishonesty.

So far, the book The Importance of Being Earnest has been very interesting to read. There are many parts throughout the it, that without my knowledge of the Victorian Era, I would have been lost most of the way through the it. For instance, social class was a very big thing back then. If you were of a higher class, you were expected to marry someone of your own class or even higher. Its like when Gwendolen gets engaged to Ernest, who is actually Jack, and if he were of a lower class, she would not have paid any attention to him. It seems a little unfair to me, just the fact that if someone was of a lower class, it would be very hard for them or maybe even impossible to move up.

Another big part of the Victorian Era was the role women played. There were certain standards made and women were expected to follow them. In my research, I found out that the men were expected to do all the work while the women were to stay home and do all the house chores and take care of their children if they had any. Gwendolen and Cecily are two very good examples of what the women stereotype was back then. They both were very lady like and they were both beautiful. They were of a higher class so they were very proper. Cecily was very sheltered when she was being raised. She has a fond interest in so called bad boys, who happened to also be "Ernest" who was really Algernon. All in all I am very glad we did the Victorian research. It helped a lot with the understanding of the book and how and why they lived their lives the way they did.