Poem Idea

I have already started writing my poem and it is a narrative.

Stargirl Thesis

Thesis: In, Stargirl, by Jerry Spinelli, you learn that sometimes being different than everyone else, might change everything, and everyone around you.

Response To Poem

I think that this poem means that when you aren't famous or popular, you are a nobody and that there are a lot of "nobodys" out there in our world. It is also saying how if you happen to be famous, it's a dreadful thing because people are constantly following you around saying your name. It's important because it's saying how it's not always fun to be well known to everyone. It made me feel like I was one of those nobodys because I'm not famous.

Heroes

When you start off as a little kid, heroes are either Dora, Superman, or some other type of character. When you grow up, you start to look up to actual people. Right now, I would have to say my heroes are my parents. I admire them because they have always supported and care for me. They are just great because they always seem to be helping everyone else before themselves, and do everything they can to make sure people have what they need. They are caring, fun, genuine people that I really appreciate. I could maybe give a little more to the community and other places but I feel like I am like them in the sense that I do watch out for others before myself usually.

One Year To Live

If I only had one year left to live, I wouldn't even know what to do. I would probably spend as much time with my family and friends as possible. I would never want to sleep, and I would probably eat anything I wanted to. I would want to go to Cedar Point, Ohio too because I am in LOVE with roller coasters and that place is full of them. I would also probably do many other things I haven't done before. If I knew that I was going to die in a year, I really don't think that life would continue to have a meaning to it. When you are living, you always live life to the fullest because you never know when you or someone else you know could die. But when you know that you are going to die, it's a scary thing and nothing really has much meaning anymore.

Spring Break: Florida

This spring break vacation, I went to Florida. First I went and stayed at the HardRock hotel in Orlando. There my family, Jayla and I went to all the rides at Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure. It was so fun and there were so many great rides. My favorite one was a new one called the Rip Ride Rocket. It starts by going straight up 90 degrees and you get to pick your own music! I picked Stronger by Kayne West and Bring Me To Life by Evanescence. After Orlando we went to Kissimee where we rented a huge 5,000 square foot house. I laid out there the first day we got there. But I was stupid and didn't put any sun tan lotion on and laid out for 5 hours and got majorly burnt. We were only five minutes away from the Disney Parks so we then went to all of those. The best ride at Disney is either Expedition Everest or the Rock'n Roller Coaster. In Expedition Everest, they make it feel as if a Yeti is chasing you while you are on top of Mount Everest. In the Rock'n Roller Coaster, you are in a huge "limo" coaster, and you shoot out at 60 mph right in the beginning. After Disney, we went to the beautiful ClearWater Beach. There, we laid out for hours and went in the salty ocean. I got to see a school or sting rays, and I got to see people get cleared out of the water because sharks were feeding. One actually jumped out of the water and ate a bird! But that was my Spring Break.

Civil War Summary

1. There were many reasons that the civil war happened but the one I am going to talk about the slaves. The slaves wanted to be free, and the North wanted them to be free too. The South on the other hand did not want to give up their slaves because that's how they made their money. So the North and South were fighting for either slavery or no slavery.

2. The battle of Gettysburg was an important battle in the outcome of the war. It really set the tone of the war. After this battle, most people knew the North was dominate.

3. I think there were many important people involved in this war. But one really important person would have to be Harriet Tubman. She lead all the slaves through the underground railroad to the North.

Writing Reflection

The part of the writing process that I found to be easy was finding information on the civil war. The challenging parts was probably trying to get all the writing done in only two days. I felt very rushed and I felt as if I couldn't write to my best abilities. I did use my time as best as I could, and if I could change my story, I wish I could have made it a little more detailed than I did.

Q&A Character

Q: Why did you want to fight in the war?
A: I wanted to fight in the war so that I could try and stop slavery in America.

Q: What side are you fighting for?
A: I am fighting for the North, because they are against slavery.

Q: Do you expect to make it out alive?\
A: In fact, I do expect to make it out alive. Maybe not fully healthy, but alive.

Girls State Basketball 2011

This past weekend my team and I went to Steven's Point for the State Basketball tournament. We drove up on Friday and got to the Ramada (hotel) around 3p.m. At first we were going to go swimming, but then we decided to just hang out by the pool. So for the rest of the day we hung out, ate food and then later in the night watched a movie and ran around the hotel. On Saturday, we woke up at 8:30 a.m. to go eat breakfast. We found out very quickly that it wasn't very tasty so we just went back to our rooms and ate pop-tarts. Our first game was at 11:00, so we had to get to our game at 10:30. We got to our game, listened to some pump up music, and warmed up by shooting. Then the game started. We got an early lead in the first quarter; it was 11-3 right within the first 3 minutes. Then at half we were down 25-23. After this half we decided we needed to step up our game a little bit if we wanted to truly win. So we kicked our game into high gear and ended up winning, 45-30.
Our next three games for Saturday were a little different. Our next one we won by 5, 40-45. The one after that we won by 30, and after that 25. Finally it's Sunday. Our game to get into the final four. We played Beaver Dam and beat them by 8 to make us get into the final four. Next we would play Waunakee in order to get into the finals for the state championship game. We lost by 8... And unfortunately, our last time to try and win state for the second time, was over... In the end we got fourth, but out of 27 teams, I don't think it's that bad of a position.

Dialogue--The Cookie Creep

The Cookie Creep---

1:Taylor
2:Jayla
3:Taylor's Mom


Taylor and Jayla walk into Taylor's house after school....

3: Hi girls! How was school?

Jayla shoves Taylor to the ground.

2:COOOOOKIESSS! Must get cookies!
1:Jayla, those are for my mom's aunt's, best friend's, neighbor's, great uncle's second cousin!!!
2:JUST... NEED... ONE!
3:Jayla you can have one...
2.OhhMyGoodGollyGosh!!!! Thank ya Mrs. Bell!

Jayla walks over to the cookies and smells the delicious scent of the chocolate chips and she sees how perfectly shaped they are.

Jayla looks mischievously at Taylor.

1:Jayla....
2: Look Taylor! A bird!

Taylor looks out the window and sees nothing but Justin Bieber waiting outside her door...

1:Stupid celebrities.
1:Jayla that wasn't a bird, that was Justin Bie...

And with that Jayla crept away into the darkness... Many years after that people still could not find Jayla. Some say she was seen with crazy eyes and cheeks full of cookies in the forbidden lake. Many children claim to see her when she comes lurking in their houses to steal their cookies.. She is the ultimate cookie creep, the one all little children and adults alike, despise....

Upfront Magazine Cover Article

I thought this article was very interesting. A new fact I learned was that when Abraham Lincoln was elected, most Americans didn't even know who he was. Now and days if a presidential candidate isn't well known, they most likely won't win. I could use parts of the article as research. The parts I could use are most of the facts and some of the intro. Out of the ten things you should know list, I think the one that stated, "far more men died of disease than from rifles" was one there because I'm sure most people probably think that a lot of the people died from being shot or injured. But truth be told, most of the people did actually die from diseases.

If I was writing a "Ten Things You Should Know About Asa Clark" list, I would put down these ten things.

1.Bring your own lunch on omelet day.

2.Make sure you follow the dress code, and if you don't, make sure you hide whatever is violating it.

3.Turning work in on time, usually means you can turn it in a week after it's due.

4.Watch your step when walking up the stairs. Falling often happens.

5.Bring a sweatshirt to gym class when running outside.

6.Do your homework. If you don't have it, take it from a friend.

7.The lockers have only enough room for books and school supplies, not containers and sweatshirts.

8.Cover your face in trench. Or use someone else as a shield.

9.Keep your friends close. They'll always be here for you.

10.Study for Spanish.. Unless you like to fail.

Streamm of Consciousness

Death is the hard part. I want to stay alive. I need to take care of my wife and kids. Everyone is counting on me to help fight for what we want. My gun is aimed. I don't know whether to pull the trigger or if I should just let this guy surrender. He's on his knees praying that he won't die. How will people look at my if I just kill this man. And in the face of sorrow, I spare his life. We will take him captive. I start walking again. I see the faces of two enemies. They spot my blue uniform and know that I'm not one of them. They charge after me...

I wake up. My head hurts and my body aches. They must have hit me with their guns and knocked me out. I'm chained to a wall. I lay in the wake of destruction. Death is soon to be near. They call me by the name soldier. I am taken out of my cell. They tell me to join them. If I don't, I face consequence. I decide not to join. I feel a sharp pain in the back of my head. Everything is now black. I am now dead.

Writing Historical Fiction

I think my thesis might be something like this...
In SPIES, when men can't watch their own back anymore, some women will have to step in and see what the enemy has in store. The main point in my book is, when men in the civil war need to seek out what the other side is doing, some women will have to step in and will need to spy on the opposing side. I haven't really started thinking what my historical fiction is going to be about because I don't really know a whole lot about the civil war. For my characters I might do a slave, a general for one of the sides, or maybe even just a wife of someone in the army. I will probably have the character living in the North where slavery didn't happen. The conflict will be that someone is fighting in the war, and gets injured and then kidnapped. My character will be trying to stop slavery by fighting for it in the Civil War.

Motivations

Many many things motivate all types of people, but not the same thing motivates everyone. Some people are motivated by money, power, or even to just accomplish a simple task. I do think that people put themselves before others sometimes. But, there are times where it is responsible to do that, and other times where putting yourself first just isn't the right thing to do. And yes, we are all definitely a little, if not a lot, selfish. One time I really wanted to buy this shirt but I didn't have the money to buy it. So I asked my mom to buy it for me and she said only if I cleaned the bathrooms first. The tactics I used were asking for money which didn't work, but then I did hard work for it when I cleaned the bathrooms. So overall, my tactics technically worked because I did get the shirt in the end.

Fighting

Fighting can be done in many ways. Sometimes it's good to fight. Rather it be for something you really believe in, or maybe to stand up for someone you care about. But then, there is also bad fighting. Examples of this is bullying somebody for lunch money, or just fighting for no real reason. I feel like you can fight in a peaceful matter. You can fight peacefully by talking it out (whether that be screaming or just talking) with the person/group that your fighting with. I would fight for my friends if they are being bullied, or my family if something is going on with them. I would tell the people that are bothering them to stop, and if they didn't, I'd have to take action and maybe get others involved if it really got serious. I would fight for these people because I really care for them, and I know they would do the same for me.

Free Will

I do not think everybody has free will. In some aspects we do, but not fully. We can't just go around steeling stuff from stores, and for some reason it's a law rather we wear our seat belts or not. I formed this opinion on observation mostly. Because we all have rules to follow, we can't just do whatever we want whenever we want.

School Changes

The rules here at Pewaukee, are the rules most school usually have. No running, no fighting, have respect etc etc. But if I were in charge of the school, I would have a few changes in mind. My first rule would be for our physical education department. I would change classes up by doing different things for different units. As an example, for the basketball unit, instead of separating guys and girls, I would have the good girls and good guys play together, and I would have the people that aren't so experienced go together. Another rule I would change is having only 3 people on a bench for lunch. We aren't all insanely obese and could fit 5 maybe even 6 people on a bench if we wanted to. This rule to me seems pointless. And the last thing I would change is the rules we have for dress code. Shorts that are arms length are NOT shorts. And if you can see the straps on tank tops, who cares? If it's not hurting anyone else, and if it is still appropriate, why should it matter? None of these rules would "Un-prepare" any of us for high school. The rules I'm changing are mild, and shouldn't be rules in the first place.

Sports and your Brain

Goggles were worn and screens were surrounding the varsity sports stars and the academic stars as people were tested. The test was to try and cross a road without getting hit by a 40mph car. The cars weren't actually real considering they would lose many of their testers. But they were virtual. Why would people want to test who could get across a road without injuries between the two groups you may ask? It all started at a the University of Illinois.

36 male and female students between the ages 18-22 were recruited the test. For the study,half were varsity athletes at the university,some of them possessed amazing endurance. Others, strength and power, and some precision and grace. The other half of the students were very healthy college students, but they were not athletes. They all wore goggles and were put in a room with 10 foot square video screens. The screens were surrounding them, and they had to try and cross a road with virtual cars going at speeds of 40-55 mph. When the students felt safe, the students were to cross the road. They were told to walk, and they had a limit of 30 seconds to try and get across. Each volunteer had 96 attempts; there was much success, but also many failures. There was a 85% completion rate where students made it to the other side without an accident. The athletes were more successful than the non athletes by a huge margin. All the students walked the same pace, but the athletes thought quicker than the non athletes. In conclusion, the athletes had a quicker mind when it came to reaction, because you need to think fast in order to win games.

Project Reflection

I thought our group did really well on our opinion project. We kept the audience interested, and everybody participated. I liked this project and I would maybe like to do something like this again.