Reading

How did I grow as a reader this year?
            This year I grew substantially as a reader. In the past I never liked books about things that seemed weird. In the past I would not read things my friends were reading like Harry Potter or Percy Jackson. Dystopian writing, for example, made me uncomfortable. This year I was forced to read some books that were somewhat disturbing, and I have learned that I am more ready for those books now than I was before. While I still enjoy reading books with endings where good things happen to good people and the good guys win, I also have learned to read through the things that made me uncomfortable in the past.


List of Books I read this year

Macbeth by William Shakespeare (I am currently in the process of reading this.)
Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie
The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver

Ungifted by Gordon Korman
Chasing Vermer by Blue Balliett
Through my Eyes: A Quarterback’s Journey by Tim Tebow and Nathan Whitaker
The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein
The Sea of Monsters by Rick Riordan (I started but did not complete this book.)


Two pieces of evidence of my work in reading

1      Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Bread and Butter Assignment, Part 1 through page 70 submitted on March 26, 2017

     This book was assigned to me to read by my English teacher, it is required reading. It is not a book I think I would have chosen to read, but I have enjoyed several books I didn’t think I would enjoy.  I am hoping this turns out to be a good book for me.
     The first chapters of the book do not go in chronological order so I sometimes must reread parts to understand it well. The story is narrated by Kambili Achike, a 15 year old devout Catholic girl who lives in Nigeria with her 17 year old brother, Jaja, and their parents. The father is a wealthy businessman, devout strict Catholic who is respected by the community in part for his generosity. At home, however, the father abuses the mother physically and even caused her to miscarry. While Kambili wants to earn her father’s love and respect she also fears his harsh punishment. He expects his children to be the best at school and being second is not good enough for him. The book is showing the conflicts that are happening within the family with the political and military conflicts happening in Nigeria in the background.  Many of the ideas being introduced in the book are about conflict in one way or another. For example, the father is very upset when an employee of his is tortured in prison but he has beaten his wife. Religion and love of God is taught by the mother as reverence for nature and beauty and by the father as fear of hell. I expect the book will continue to explore these and many other conflicts in the next chapters.  

2      The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie, Blog Assignment through page 101 posted on February 5, 2017

            First, I am enjoying this book and I didn't think I was even going to like it. Reading it makes me want to read more books by Sherman Alexia.
            Ok, Jr. starts a new school in Rearden with mostly white people. We learn Jr's real name is Arnold Spirit and that he kind of becomes Arnold at school and Jr on the rez. We also find out about the Indian Rules of Fisticuffs and that Jr doesn't realize everyone doesn't follow these rules he has known all of his life. Arnold also is confronted by a group of studs and eventually punches one of them name Roger. Roger then respects Arnold.
            Arnold likes a girl at school named Penelope. She is nice to Arnold and seems to respect him but doesn't like him in the same way he likes her. Also, Arnold realized he is smarter than most of the kids at his new school and eventually he becomes sort of friends with a smart nerd named Gordy.
            Mary, Jr.'s sister, sends him an email letting him know about her life on the big new reservation in Montana called Flathead and she loves her life. The email tells how different life is on that reservation from the rez where Jr. lives.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Writing Center Experience

            My experiences with the Writing Center were good ones. Each time I went to the Center I learned something new. Now that I reflect on it I realize what I learned is not what I expected and what I learned does have value to me.             My first appointments with the Writing Center were because I was required to make appointments for my research paper. I made appointments online, and there were problems with that. Even though I made the appointment correctly, it had to be changed. I also waited too long to make the appointments so when the first appointment had to be rescheduled it was hard to rearrange. When I made appointments for my revision assignment, I went to the Writing Center and made several appointments. That process worked better for me, and I will do that in the future. That is one of the things I learned.       ...
Read more

Writings Goals for Next Year

            Next year my writing goals are to write faster, make better transitions, improve my thesis writing, and use commas correctly. I also want my writing to stay honest and a reflection of me. It is important to me that my writing is interesting. And it is important to me that I make good grades in school and that includes English of course. My last goal and an important one to me, I want to be more relaxed when I write. I do not want to be so stressed when I write. My teacher this year has already helped me be less nervous about writing. She lets me speak with her about what is going on in our lives. She gives us extensions is we ask correctly, and she gives us good feedback.              One of the ways I will achieve my goals for next year is to try this summer to improve my typing speed. I think this will help me in every class and especially when it comes to writing papers. Next ye...
Read more

My Strengths as a Writer

            The first strength I have as a writer is that I am an honest writer. I write the way I think and feel so my writing is true to who I am. Another strength I have as a writer is that I have creative thoughts in writing. I come up with ideas that are a little different and that people seem to like. When I review my writing, I am a usually good at finding my errors. I am not great with commas, but I am good at catching misspelled or left out words.              I think the best way I learned about my strengths is through the blogs I was required to write. This year I had to write approximately two blogs a week unless there was an exception. I also had to read and comment on other student’s blogs each week.   So, I have written and read a lot of blogs. That is how I realized that I usually catch my mistakes and have some decent ideas. That is also how I know I am a...
Read more