Humanities Portfolio 2011

Throughout this year in Copper Stream 2010-2011 something that really stuck out to me was the poetry unit. There were many points that I was able to take with me after doing this unit. The general understanding that I got from this was that poetry is a way of expression and can be expressed through more than just writing. When we had to do our wiki spaces most of my poems talked about my dad and what I was going through at the time. The poems allowed me to get some of my bottled up emotions out and let someone hear me without hearing my voice. The poems I wrote can be found on my wiki spaces.

 I learned that poetry is more than just roses are red and violets are blue, poetry can be a song, rap, the outside world, and a drawing. There are no limits when it comes poetry and what it can mean.

Another thing that I will be able to take with me is that writing is a group process and not just an individual project. It takes more than one opinion on someone’s paper to make it right. With every paper I had wrote this year it had been edited at least twice before I finally made my final paper. One paper that I was proud of was I believe the first quarter benchmark. We had to write a letter for Lord of the Flies. On that paper I had it reviewed a few times and kept making many different adjustments to it so it will be perfect. This paper can be seen at the bottom of my blog.

The final thing I will take from this is the crossing boundaries unit and when we read the book Their Eyes Were Watching God. The units went hand in hand with one another and it’s a good thing they were placed right behind each other. We had even written some “rules, roles and responsibilities” that we as teens hear all the time and have to deal with. In mine I wrote how your suppose to go to school and maintain A’s and B’s only, your suppose to act your age not your shoe size, your not suppose to go around acting crazy or like a little boy, also you can’t just be round boys all the time. This unit helped and showed me how society looks at people and how women are treated.

While reading the book Their Eyes Were Watching God I noticed how put down a female is in society. The women are supposed to let the man be in charge and cater to his every whim. As a woman they have no control over their life and not until they get the courage to stand up and leave will anything change. I made a video that showed how many women deal with the abuse of a man but takes a long time for them to do anything about it.

Throughout the year in English and History I’ve just learned that there are a lot of things to learn about in the world. We have to understand how women get paid less than a man.  Another thing that I wont forget is how society has a certain standard of speaking. There is a Standard English that people need to live up to but in reality no one can live that standard. This classes taught me that’s its alright to be our self and live life expressing how we feel.

 

 

 

Lord of the Flies

            From the time Piggy stepped onto the island until his fatal death he was judged about everything. From his appearance to his asthma to the little things he tried to say to the group. He could never say what was on his mind or even try to act as a normal kid because of his awkwardness. Just like the way Piggy was judged so is everyone else in society.

            People judge one another like its nothing. It has become a part of human nature to just turn to someone else and start talking about someone. The judgment can be for the good or the bad. When it was time to vote for a new President people didn’t judge based on what could get done they judged based on color, gender, and age. 

            In 2008 when the presidential election was going on ever I went people were extremely happy to know that we would either have a women president or a black president. The thing I noticed though was it wasn’t about what people wanted to be able to get from these two candidates it was about color and gender. To just for everyone to be able to say they would have a black president or a women president would have been enough for the USA.

            “Assassinate Obama”, school children chanted when Obama was elected president. This was found on the site.  Another incident that happened was a nine year old boy told a little girl on the bus “I hope Obama gets assassinated.”  The same night someone trashed the little girl’s aunt lawn and left two pizza boxes full of feces because they had Obama posters on their lawn. This just shows that because of the color of Obama’s skin and the people that followed him they were judged and had to deal with the actions of other people that didn’t like the idea of having a black man run the country. People still live in the past were whites run everything and other people have to deal with the actions of those people.

            Another thing that I found was something from Karen Armstrong’s speech is when  she said that stereotypes divide us, which is very true. Ralph, Piggy, and the twins were all divided from Jack and the rest of the boys because of the differenced Jack and Ralph had. They had caused everyone else to pick a side and try to live their life as if that was the only way they could live on the island. Karen Armstrong’s statement was proved based on what theses little boys had to go through in this novel.

Reading Lord of the Flies all the boys judged each other on what they can or can’t do and how they looked. The one that experienced the most judgment was Piggy. He was noticed a little when Jack’s boys realized the specs were what gave them fire, but even then it wasn’t the type of attention he wanted or deserved. The only time he got respect was when he died, and the only one that showed him that respect was Ralph. Throughout the whole book Piggy never got a say on anything that happened. Even though Ralph listened to Piggy in some way he really didn’t listen to anything he had to say. Everyone treated Piggy as if he was just someone taking up space.

            As the time came closer to Piggy’s death he had gotten some type of respect. When he went back to get his specs he took the conch shell with him. Every time he would start talking and someone would interrupt him he got control again just by waving the conch shell around. As the bolder hit Piggy and knocking him off the cliff he never died with the respect that he should have died with. As he fell off the cliff and the shell broke everyone was a lot more worried about the shell then him. 

Never Shall I

            Never shall I forget the phone call that we had received

Never shall I forget seeing my family rushing to the hospital

Never shall I forget seeing my uncle all bruised up with broken bones

Never shall I forget sitting on my grandma’s lap while she cried her eyes out

Never shall I forget the details of my uncle’s body flying across the concrete

Never shall I forget the day my uncle was almost killed

Never shall I forget any of these details