AOW Impressions - march 16 - march 23

// Reflect upon what you learned about the Holocaust from your peers. //

    This week, I think that I learned more about the Holocaust than most of my time of learning about the Holocaust in school. A lot of the topics talked about today varied from survivors to revenge stories. One of the most interesting articles that I heard was from Gustavo; he talked about a survivor of Berlgin-Belsin camp where a man named Martin Greenfield got caught stealing and eating rabbit's food and the mayor's wife caught him and Martin got brutally beat. Years later, after his liberation Martin went to get revenge on the mayor's wife and stole her car and tried to kill her. I think that this was interesting not only because he was a Holocaust survivor, but because he actually tried to get revenge on his captors. This article also helped me learn about the kinds of treatment and strict policies that people in camps had to endure.

    Another really interesting thing that I learned was about a specific survivor named Ava who was captured while reading on a park bench at only eighteen years old and sent to Auschwitz. Both Abdiel and Amelia had this article and both gave some different details about their articles. For example, Abdiel talked more about her life after being liberated like how she had moved to the Soviet Union where Jews were still considered a threat and how hew husband got arrested. I found this really surprising because this was after she had been liberated and her life still revolved around what religion she was. Amelia, on the other hand, talked about how Ava said that she wanted the guards at the camp to "pay the price" for what they had done.

    Overall, it was really amazing learning about all of the survivors and all of the different events that every single one of them experienced.

Berlin Memorial Activity Reflection

// Reflect on the Berlin Memorial Activity we did in class //   

 

   
    Based on the activity that we did in class today,  I learned a lot about the years preceding the Holocaust that I never really learned about in depth before. I had heard about the different legislations passed to take away the basic rights and needs of Jews, but I had never thought of how insane and real the decrees would be. For example, the decree that didn't allow Jews to have pets was completely insignificant to me, like why would Hitler and his regime even care about their pets. I also learned how smart Hitler was, and how he placed the laws during certain times, not too many at some points where there was media attention on Germany, while piling them when Germany was left alone.

    I think that this monument was built not only to remember the people that perished, but to remember what they had to go through. While at the same time, I think it was built to remind people of this tragic event in history, which is the Holocaust, in hopes that it won't repeat itself. Whenever memorials are built, they are to remind the public of something that happened that not only affected a group of people, or even an entire country, but the entire world. I think that the Holocaust completely affected the way the entire world acts now, and I think that this particular memorial was put out in a very public place so that people can read them and share them with others; to try and stop history from repeating itself.

    The activity that we did in class helped to show how the number of laws changed in certain years. For example, in 1934, only one or two people went up, but when it came to 1937-8, almost the entire class got up. I think that this helps to show the slyness of Hitler and his regime during this time, because every law was placed when it was because it was the "perfect time". For example, only one or two decrees were passed in the year 1936 because that was when the Olympic Games were held in Germany and that year Germany was an open book and they couldn't risk getting a bad rep or else Hitler's Final Solution would have never happened. While in 1937, a year after the Olympics, Hitler piled decrees like how Jewish men needed to have the middle name Israel, while Jewish women had to have Sarah as their middle name.

    Personally, I think that I would have the most trouble with the decree passed in 1938 which says that no one could go to school. I'm not a big fan of school now, and I want to leave as soon as possible, but having an education in the 1930s was really huge, and to have a career that actually payed off was granted to those who had an eduction. I also think that in the present day, we spend most of our day and half of our entire lives in school that I don't think I would be sane if I couldn't go to school and actually get a little bit of social interaction.

Comments: Gustavo, Jesus, Elenia

3rd Quarter Reflection

    Out of all of the books that I have read this quarter, I think that Murderous Minds was probably my favorite, because I have always really been into neurology and psychology, so it really opened up the window to learn more about those subjects. Also, it was the first non-fiction book I have read in a really long time, so it felt refreshing. I also learned a lot from the book. For example, in a past blog I had written the most interesting thing that I read was "an estimated 1 out of 100 adults is a psychopath", so now when I walk around in the mall, or if I'm in my car, I just creepily stare at people and wonder whether they are psychopaths. Overall though, I think that Murderous Minds helped to branch out my taste, and teach me a lot more than I would have learned from rereading Looking For Alaska for the fifth time.

    I think that my biggest improvement in the third quarter has been researching and providing reliable and strong evidence in my pieces. After the argumentative piece, and now with the Holocaust web quest, my skills in researching has improved significantly. For example, I used to use evidence from answers.com or from any website that had an answer that I was looking for; now I try to find more reliable sources like websites that end in .gov, instead of trusting random sites. Going along with researching, I now know what evidence to use and what to throw away. For example, I used to play it safe and add as many quotes of evidence as possible just so I knew that people got the point, but I was so repetitive in my writing that the arguments became really boring. Now, I know that to truly create a strong argument, you have to chose one, or two, to the point, and reliable quotes. This skill has not only helped me in research papers or in argumentative pieces, but it has helped me format all of my other paragraphs, whether that be in a blog or in an AOW. 

    The most challenging part of third quarter was probably the two papers that we had to write, because we haven't had to do that in any of our classes recently,  so it was tough to remember the format and citations. It was also pretty challenging because, personally, I felt like every time I read it, there was something wrong, but I didn't really know how to fix it; whether to change the word choice or to just take out that sentence. Even though, the papers were challenging, they helped me a lot in preparing for high school essays (which I am grateful for). 

    Since the new year, I am really proud that I don't have to stay up until midnight to finish homework since I haven't been procrastinating as much. I think that every year, my new year's resolution is to stop procrastinating and try to finish homework as soon as possible, but I never really accomplish it. Now, I have really been putting in the effort, because the bad habit of not sleeping until midnight or after, was really making me cranky and stuff, so now I have been finishing my homework before 10! I also think that because I am getting rid of procrastinating so much, the quality of my work is more up to par. Since, I'm  not doing homework last minute now, I have more time to actually revise my work and make sure that it is up to par.

Comments: Carlos, Amelia, Abdiel

Bio-Poem for Maria

Maria
Outgoing, Assertive, Loving, Homesick
A character in Judith Ortiz Cofer's story.
Lover of poetry, Puerto Rican culture, family, and the Island from where her memories were made
Who notices the rain patterns during a thunderstorm, the features of other's faces when they are sad, and people growing up.
Who feels melancholy because she misses her mother, amazement at all the new customs in the barrio, and confusion at the way people act.
Who learns to "pay now and fly later", to be cautious with love, and how precious friendships really are.
Who says "My goal is to get into college and move into an apartment above ground where I can see the sky through my windows instead of the legs of people on the sidewalk, although you can tell a lot about people by the shoes they wear."
Who used to think that you only get one home but now knows that home is where the heart is. 
Major character in Call Me Maria. 
A Book that brings families and cultures together, to realize the meaning of comfort and love.

AOW Impressions - 3/6/14

// What did you learn from your classmates this week? //

 
    This week, a lot of the blogs varied in topic and the topics took place in a lot of different places. One of the most interesting things that I learned was from Athziry and she talked about how studies show that social media is actually driving more teens into suicide. She had mentioned that two transgender kids posted their suicide notes on Tumblr and other people felt like their feelings were the same, which consequently, triggered them into committing suicide. I believe that this is important for the world to hear because in schools, we are always taught the bullying and rough lives at home lead to suicide and that parents should watch for those things, but now kids are killing themselves because they see others do it. I believe that this not only shows the power of soil media and the consequences of it, but it also shows the power that teens have. I think that this is an eye-opener to people around the world because anyone from any place can access these suicide letters online.

    Like most weeks, the most common topic was ISIS. Like I mentioned last week, a lot of the articles were different events surrounding ISIS. For example, Abdiel talked about teenage girls who ran away to join ISIS; while Gianna talked about releasing 19, Christian prisoners, and Steven talked about ISIS attacking archeological sites. I think that so many classmates chose ISIS, because it is quite frightening that all of the news on them, is all of the tragic events they are causing and nothing about actions taking place to stop them. The most interesting thing that I learned was from Gianna and the prisoners released by ISIS. Apparently, ISIS released the 19 Christians they had held hostage because "they didn't want to harm their neighbors." Overall, I believe that everyone is becoming better in summarizing their articles while giving out a lot of information.


Comments: Darya and Joey

Call Me Maria - Week of 02/23/15

Pages read: 0 - 48
Prompt: Do you like what you're reading? Why or why not?

    Truthfully, I am disliking the book more than I am enjoying it and a lot of it has to do with word choice. I think that because Mrs. Larson has been repeatedly talking about how important word choice is, I feel like now I have that mentality. Now word choice really affects what I read and whether I want to keep reading or not. In this book, the main character Maria, was born in Puerto Rico and her first language was Spanish. During her years in Puerto Rico, her mother taught her English, so when she moves to New York, she isn't completely lost, but in her letters and poems she writes in "Spanglish", which bothers me A LOT. I think that the Spanglish really bothers me because it just really takes away from the flow of the writing. In a lot of the lines where she adds a Spanish word, she says what it is in English, which to me, makes no sense because it is just adding repetition that makes the prose harder to enjoy.

    In this book, the writings jump all over the place, which again, looses the flow of the text. For example, on page 34 it is a writing piece describing all of the foods that her dad likes to eat, and she never says why its important or who was supposed to read that writing. In the poem after that, it is describing a girl named Whoopee, which at first I though was a dog, but later Maria says that Whoopee talks so then I made the connection that it was a girl. It was still very difficult to make the connection that Whoopee was Maria's friend and not someone she really admired because of the way Maria talked about Whoopee, like "Eyes, black, ebony, three A.M. on a clear night black..". I can see how the author would want to make a variety of writings, but I believe that there should be a connection between all of them and not just random writings that really throw me off.

    Now, I'm not just writing this blog to trash the book, because there are some parts that I have enjoyed from reading this. I really enjoyed how realistic the writing is written (besides the Spanglish) and how it really shows the personality of the character. So far in the book, it is very evident that Maria is extremely family-orientited and she shows this by explaining her worries for her mother and her excitement for her father. My favorite part so far,  is when Maria described her English teacher, Mr. Golden, by saying that his voice is like "chocolate ice cream, like warm honey, like the golden light of the sun at the end of a winter's day." I find this really cute and even laughable because it reminds of every romance movie ever. Again, it also shows Maria's personality and how she focuses on certain aspects of people like their voices.

Comments: Elenia, Steven, Gianna
 

AOW Impressions - 02/20/15

     This week, most of the article were about ISIS and all of the different upheavals they are causing. What I found really interesting about this was that not one article talked about the same situation about ISIS. For example, Diego talked about the cyber side of ISIS and how they are hacking pages and making threats, while Amelia talked about other people's opinions ISIS. She mentioned that many people believed that ISIS's plans will backfire in the future and that they can/will be defeated because 63 countries have agreed to fight ISIS if they have to and finally, mine was about the terror of ISIS spreading to Italy. Personally, I see this as a wake up call, this shows that ISIS is something that not only news reporters around the world are thinking about, but students in our own classroom find it interesting but at the same time, frightening. As we have progressed with the AOWs, ISIS has also progressed and I think that all of the articles about ISIS aren't going to stop. ISIS isn't going to stop. And we need to do something about it.

     I also believe that this week's gallery walk of AOWs went a lot better than last week because there was more variety in the articles. For example, Jenna talked about a boy who was gay and because his dad didn't approve of this, he made his son go through all sorts of dumb treatments that his son ended up in a really bad condition, mostly because of all of the different drugs given to him. But in the end, the son told his boyfriend that he loves him by hanging a banner outside of his hospital room. I think that this had to be one of the most unique articles and personally, I feel like it gives a bittersweet message. I believe that it shows the terrifying techniques that are still used against gays, not only by inconsiderate strangers, but even their family members. But at the same time, this article was posted to expose this father and the practices he uses, and personally, I believe that a lot more attention will be brought up to this man and his son, and it will end up in a happy ending for the son. Overall, I believe that the AOW gallery walk went really well, and everyone got to not only learn about the progress of ISIS, but also got to learn about something new.

Murderous Minds - Week of 02/16/15

Pages read: 0 - 37
Prompt: What have you learned from what you're reading?

    This week I am reading the nonfiction book, Murderous Minds, and it is about neuroscience, and the "criminal mind." This book is really interesting but at the same time very complicated that I had to red whole pages more then three times so I could actually understand the topic. For example, in the first chapter, the author was taking about how mental illnesses play a huge role in psychotics and the reason behind the crimes they commit. He started to talk about different parts of the brain and their roles in mental illnesses. For example, he said "The loss of dopamine-producing neurons in the substantial nigra affects a neighboring part of the brain called the striatum, whose cells depend on dopamine to function properly." That was just one sentence and I had to read it a few times to understand, but the thing about this book is that everything is intertwined, so if you don't understand the previous sentence or even paragraph, most likely; you won't understand the next few paragraphs to come.

    One of the most interesting facts that I have learned form the book so far is that "an estimated 1 out of 100 adults is a psychopath" so if you think about it, you have probably encountered a psychopath and you didn't realize it! But don't get me wrong, psychopaths don't necessarily mean killers. Even though when you hear psychopaths you think of some crazy murderer who chops off people's limbs and feeds them to his pig, "for every psychotic serial killer, there are literally millions of psychopaths who don't kill." Psychotics are people who are out of touch with reality, most likely have a mental illness and most likely have violent impulses. So in reality, you could have met a psychopath but don't think of them as killers, because statistically, it is unlikely that they are killers.

    There is a test called the PCL-R test which basically test psychopathy in people. The test is taken in an interview format and the interviewer takes notes on different factors to see whether the person is a psychopath or not. It is a 20-item test and the interview rates the factors on a scale from 0 - 2; 0 meaning that there is no sign of it at all, 1 being that there are hints of it and 2 as being very present. One of the factors is manipulative behavior. So if someone was interviewing you for this and you showed no sign of manipulation then you would get a 0 for that factor, but if you showed a plethora of signs of lack of remorse or guilt, you would get a 2. In the end the score is tallied up and out of the maximum of 40 points, if you have 30, you are labeled as a psychopath in the US. The interview can take, the minimum of 2 hours, up to four hours to get all of the evidence needed to write down the points.

Comments: Leanna, Marisa, and Gustavo