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Avery Monroe Public Feed

Adolescents, Crime and Brain Development by Avery Monroe

Posted by Avery Monroe in Science And Society - Best - Y on Tuesday, June 7, 2016 at 7:34 pm
​

All around the world, children who commit crimes are being tried, and often times they are being tried as if they were adults. There has been a very big debate in science and with the people convicting kids of crime on whether kids should really be so harshly punished for what that are doing. While the kids are doing things that are bad, should they be tried and charged they way they do when they are still developing and aren’t fully finished growing yet?
When people are growing and maturing, their brains are also growing and maturing. It doesn’t all happen at once which is a cause for younger people changing emotionally. Our brains continue to grow until we are fully grown. When our brains are growing like this, according to Laurence Steinberg, we can’t always be taken responsible for our actions. Steinberg also said that because these brains will be changing later on that trials with young people should be revisited once they are adults. In this article, written by Emily Kaiser, she talks about 6 facts about the crime with children. One of her facts is that when kids are in groups with their friends they make more risky decisions. In this section she talks about Steinberg's driving simulation that he did with kids. He would take one kid and have them do this driving game and then he told him that his friends were watching him and had them do the simulation again. What they saw was that he crashed more and did worse things when his friends were “watching”. They saw that this was because when you’re with your friends, a part of your brain is stimulated which is the same part of your brain that makes it seem like you are being rewarded. Especially at this age when reward is such a big thing to teens.
Another side of this is that even though the brain of these young people are still developing, if they are going to commit horrendous crimes they need to be tried. These kids know that the crimes that they are committing are illegal and wrong so why not be tried for what they are doing? By the age that kids are allowed to be going out and doing things on their own they should have learned all of this, and the changing of their brain shouldn’t have anything to do with it.
Elizabeth S. Scott from Columbia University along with some other professors, did a study about this in 2007. They wanted to find out how the brain of a child or young adult differed from that of an adult and what it had to do with the likeliness of being reckless and doing things that they shouldn't do. They got people from the ages of 10-25 and studied their brains while doing different activities in different moods and emotional states. They also looked at what the brain function was like under the pressure of peers around them. The study is not complete yet but it is in the process of being completed. Research like this is helping change the minds of people who believe that children should be so harshly punished for crimes they commit.  
From the studies that have been conducted and that are still being conducted, we can see that children are not 100% responsible for every action that they do when their brains are still developing. There are many kids who are in jail with life sentences. What will happen to these children? And how do we know if a child is really responsible or if it had something to do with their brain developing?


Cites used:

1. Kaiser, Emily. "6 Facts about Crime and the Adolescent Brain." Minnesota Public Radio News. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 June 2016. <http://www.mprnews.org/story/2012/11/15/daily-circuit-juvenile-offenders-brain-development>.

2. "Criminal Justice and the Juvenile Brain." Columbia Law School. Columbia University, 10 July 2013. Web. <https://www.law.columbia.edu/media_inquiries/news_events/2013/july2013/scott-brain-research>.

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Sandra Avery Monroe Capstone

Posted by Avery Monroe in Capstone - Manuel - Wed on Thursday, May 19, 2016 at 7:00 pm
​

Abstract:

Over the past 4 years, I feel like I haven’t really taken the time to get know each and every person at the school, and I still don’t know every person. This year, I wanted to make an effort to get to know new people and talk to them. I also wanted to show people who all of the different students at SLA  are and how they make the community the way it is now. SLA is such a diverse school in so many different ways. We have people from all different neighborhoods, cultures, races and ethnicities. There are also so many different people with different personalities that it made it very interesting to hear about them and then to put a face to those pictures.

With the help of Myrna Yousuf and Ms. Giknis, we created a blog where we interviewed students, teachers, and even a few visitors in the school. We wanted to get a chance to talk to them. The outcomes were different depending on who we talked to. We got some funny stories, some sad stories, some random stores. All of it put together created an awesome, diverse page. By myself, I created a magazine where I had a couple of people write poems and articles about being human and being a human of SLA. Myrna and I had the chance to collaborate with so many really interesting people to create a diverse experience and blog throughout our senior year of high school.

Here is the link for my magazine: http://joom.ag/9gYQ
Here is the link to our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/humansofsla/


Annotated Bibliography:

  1. Benaroya, Ana. Illustration Next: Contemporary Creative Collaboration. Thames & Hudson. Print. This source provided me with a couple of questions that could be used in interviews with different students. I selected this source because as I looked through it, I really liked the questions that they asked. There were about 6 questions that were asked to every artist in the book. I thought it was very interesting to see the responses that the interviewer would get. I wanted to know how the students at SLA would respond to those questions and how similar they were to the answers I was seeing in the book. I found this source useful because at times I was stuck with what to ask people and I stumbled upon this book and I really liked what I was seeing. One limitation to this book was that some of the questions couldn’t really be applied to the real world and many of them were too broad.


  1. Carrier, Nicole. "Four Ways To Get People's Attention Online." Forbes. Forbes Magazine. Web. 04 Feb. 2016. This information was helpful for what I am going to do with both the HumansofSLA pages and also the magazine that will be created. This was helpful because often times it is very difficult to get people to pay attention to what you want them to pay attention to. This gave me good pointers for that problem. I selected this because as soon as I saw the first suggestion, I knew that is what I wanted to do with this entire project and that it would have more great information. I think the only flaw with this site was that there wasn’t more information about how to catch attention.


  1. Isreal, Shel. "9 Tips on Conducting Great Interviews." Forbes. Forbes Magazine. Web. 10 Jan. 2016.As soon as I saw this source, I knew that it would be very helpful and very reliable. The source provided me with a lot of great tips and pointers on how to conduct an interview. There was information on what types of questions to ask, and information on how to make sure it was a comfortable and personable situation. I thought it was helpful to have all of this information on how to be successful when interviewing somebody, especially if it is somebody that I don’t know. I selected this source because it was one of the first and best sources I found when looking for information on conducting a successful interview.


  1. Kotter, John. "The Power Of Stories." Forbes. Forbes Magazine, 12 Apr. 2006. Web. 20 Nov. 2015. This source was a very interesting read for me. This made me want to get more stories from people that were at my school and hear about what they have to say. I think that through doing this, I have learned so much about people. I have learned and changed from doing this project and that is what the article talks about. I used this source because it showed me how important this could be to me and the other people that are reading the stories. I like that this source showed what happened when people didn’t tell stories and how it wasn’t as effective. I also like how they showed what it was like when there were stories told in places instead of just people talking at you with a presentation.


  1. Kuhel, Beth. "The Secret to a Successful Interview: Great Storytelling." US News RSS. 17 Apr. 2014. Web. 04 Nov. 2015. I used this website because it gave me information on interviews but then it also gave me a lot of information on how to put that into storytelling. This website helped me think of what would be helpful to get a good interview started. This helped me generate questions, even if I didn’t know the person. I selected this source because I felt that when I was brainstorming how to create a good interview this helped me a lot. It made it easier for me to make it a very personal experience for me and for the person that is being interviewed. This source helped me create a good flow for my interviews.


  1. Parr, Ben. "7 Ways to Capture Someone's Attention." Harvard Business Review. 03 Mar. 2015. Web. 04 Feb. 2016. For one of the parts of my capstone, I am going to be creating an online magazine for people to look at and they will be able to submit different pieces for my magazine. This website was helpful because it helped me see what I can do to make the website more appealing to people who will be viewing it. I found this source useful because it was a good starting point on what I could do to make my website more attractive. I think that this source could have been a little more helpful if it had been more focused towards grabbing attention on a magazine.



  1. Resorts, Wynn. "The Power of Storytelling." The Power of Storytelling. Web. 01 Feb. 2016. This is an entire website that focuses on telling stories and how powerful they can be to people. This motivated me to find better questions, and I also liked to see how helpful stories could be to people. One part that I found particularly helpful was when they talked about how people use stories to make sense of different things that they have seen because of the lens that they look through. I liked this because I see this a lot when I am doing interviews, and it was interesting to see this in a business.

  2. Stanton, Brandon. Humans of New York: Stories. St. Martins, 2015. Print.My entire capstone was based off of this website and book. We saw this website and were very inspired to create our own version of it. It was helpful to have something so similar to base our work off of. We selected this source because it was very interesting and we liked the idea of implementing this into our own school. This source really laid out everything that we wanted to do. Even if ours wasn’t going to look the exact same way. Through this source, we could look at how the pictures were taken, and try and backtrack to see what types of questions were being asked to the people he was talking to.

  3. Wolfe, K., J. Carroll, and T. Bush. "Tips for a Successful Interview - 9.151 - Colorado State University Extension." Colorado State University Extension. Web. 15 Jan. 2016. This website was helpful for both conducting an interview and also being interviewed. I used it to give me information on this because at first, even though I knew how to do both of those, I needed the extra information just so that I could make sure I was being professional. The only flaw with this website was that since I didn’t know all of these people, I couldn’t always be prepared for the person. I wish they had pointers on what to do if you are interviewing somebody you don’t know.

  4. "Fun Photos: A Look at What Participants Bring to the Booth." StoryCorps. Web. 04 Feb. 2016. This website was very helpful because with this, I could see the types of pictures that I could take to really represent people. I had other websites like this, but I liked this one a lot because it was a similar type of thing to what I was doing. I think that a flaw with this was that with these they didn’t really have stories with the pictures so even though you saw an interesting picture of someone, you couldn’t really get a story about them. I did like this website as a whole though because they had a lot of different stories on them and that was the whole thing that they did on the website.

  5. "The Octoroon - The Broadview Anthology of British Literature." The Broadview Anthology of British Literature. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 May 2016.

For one of the people that wrote an essay for me, they talked about this play, so I wanted to get some photos so that there was a visual of the play that was being talked about.

  1. "The Octoroon: A Play, in Four Acts." Louisiana Anthology. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 May 2016.

This was another picture that I used that had to do with the play.

  1. Jacobs-Jenkins, Branden. "The Wilma Theater: An Octoroon [03/16/16]." The Wilma Theater: An Octoroon [03/16/16]. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 May 2016.

This photo has to do with the more modern version of the play that was being talked about. The person that wrote about it, wrote about this version so I had a picture of this and also of the older version.

Tags: capstone, 2016, Manuel
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Allergies

Posted by Avery Monroe in Science And Society - Best - Y on Thursday, April 21, 2016 at 1:47 pm
​Science
  • Allergies are a bad response from our bodies to a substance

    • An external stimulant either ingested or airborne

  • Allergens are seen as foreign to our bodies and we react to them.

  • When our bodies come in contact with allergens it releases antibodies

    • A protein that attaches to some antigens.

    • Antibodies are y shaped proteins

  • When having an allergic reaction:

    • Antibody and antigen attach and travel to the mast cell in body tissue.

      • The purpose is to flush out allergen.

      • Kill chemicals that cause allergic reaction
    There are a couple different kinds that happen when we come in contact with different allergens. Theres hay fever which the most common, they are seasonal allergies. The next one is Contact dermatitis and this happens when we a chemical in a soap, lotion, detergent, or clothing makes us react and we get a rash. The last one is a food allergy which we get when we eat certain foods and they can make us sick. Sometimes when people with food allergies eat the food they are allergic to their throats can close or they can have swelling in the face or mouth. One other thing that is important is anaphylaxis, this is when we have one of the above allergies, but we react much different to that and it is more extreme then it would be if we had a regular allergy.
Society
  • In 2010, $17.5 billion dollars were spent on health costs by people with nasal swelling they lost approximately 6 million days at work/school and made 16 million doctor visits.

  • Food allergies cost about $25 billion each year.
Self
I have really bad allergies and I have had them for a while now, so this was something that was interesting and important to me. I also did it because it is allergy season


Here is a link to my full slide show
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Q3 Art Portfolio

Posted by Avery Monroe in Senior Art - Hull - D on Wednesday, April 13, 2016 at 4:45 pm
This quarter was a little more difficult for me as an artist. I had to do things that I wasn't particularly as interested in so I had a harder time completing them. I think that I had fun trying to complete it. At the end I was proud of myself for what i did finish even though it was a little tricky for me. My favorite piece was the watercolor piece. I was really proud of the outcome of it. I thought it looked really good when it was done. One thing I wish I had taken more time to do was the wire sculpture. I completed it but I was not very happy with the end result. I think if I had different tools to work with I could have created something I was a little more proud of. 
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Quarter 2, Avery Monroe

Posted by Avery Monroe in Senior Art - Hull - D on Friday, January 29, 2016 at 4:04 pm

I had a lot of fun with this quarters pieces. It reminded me of when I was younger in art class and we did block prints a lot. My favorite piece in this would have to be the Golden Ratio collage. I like the contrast of he pinks to the blue. It made me really happy to finish it because I liked it so much. To do these pieces I did a lot of research and it helped me to see what I could take from what I saw and make it my own. I guess other people were a big help in inspiring what I did this quarter. 

I like this class a lot and doing this type of stuff because it shows me the kinds of things that I am good at and what I like to do. I get to learn about all these different types of art, and I am excited to see what we get to do in the rest of the year. 

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McCarthy Unabridged: The Road, Page 247

Posted by Avery Monroe in Being Human - Giknis - B on Thursday, January 28, 2016 at 9:33 pm
​The passage below is a scene that I think could have been in McCarthy's The Road.

He let the boy go as this was the last time he would see or touch him. He watched them walk away until the light no longer lit their way. Darkness absorbed them. The man sat and wept until he he had nothing left. He drifted in and out of sleep until morning, when he knew he had to get up and get moving.


He packed everything, put it all in his bag, and started on his way. The man slowly sauntered down the cold and bare dark road. There was a noise coming from up the road. It sounded like a little boy. His little boy. The man didn’t have much energy but he used all that was in him to run towards the sound. There was laughing, and the sound of joyfulness, he could hear it in the distance.


Papa, come here!


The sound of his son's voice made him happy, he ran closer to the sound, but couldn’t find it, it sounded like it was getting further and further away. The happiness in his son’s voice turned into sadness, then to the faint sound of a cry. He finally came upon something, something that was not the boy. It was something he almost recognized. In the man's fugue state he saw the boy’s mother as a chimera, more charybdis than woman.


The man woke with tears streaming down his face, his heart beating fast, and his son calling him to get up.



Below is the rational to show why I made the decisions in my scene:

The character I wanted to mainly focus on in my creative piece was the man and how it would be for him to be without his son. I think the only reason the man tries everyday is so that he can be there for the little boy and help him so that he can survive. When I was deciding what I would make happen to the boy I remembered that his mother did mention taking him at one point in the story in a memory that the man has. I felt that if I had the boys mom take the boy it would make it more interesting than him dying. When thinking of a place to put this I decided I wanted to put it in the part of the book where the little boy is sick. I did this because I knew that the would be worrying about his son, and he would always be thinking about it, even subconsciously. The McCarthy-esque word that I decided to use was Chimera. This word means something that can be hoped for or not, but it happens many times in dreams because it is often times a fantasy that we have. I thought this was very fitting for the situation since this was a dream and he really wanted to see his son again.

When picking a theme for my creative piece, I chose family and loneliness. I wanted to pick them because the boy is his son, and without him he doesn’t really have anything to live for anymore. The man’s son was such a huge part of everything that went on in the book, I feel like family is really important. For the motifs of my added scene of the book, I chose to use fear and dreams. I chose to do a dream because we know this clearly couldn’t have really happened or the story would have been totally different, and also because I wanted to show the fear he would have without having his son and then get to wake up and realize it was just a dream. I chose fear and survival because I wanted to show the fear he has without his son. Lastly, my essential question was very obvious for me after I finished everything else. I did “who/what do we live for? What if it is gone?” the boy was taken from the man and it clearly really hurt him. I wanted to use this question because I feel like it is really interesting and really important as well. It is important in this book and it also really applies to real life which made it even more interesting to me. I think that a lot of the things that I did for my story seemed to fall into place perfectly to create something I am proud of.

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Marking Period 1 Art

Posted by Avery Monroe in Senior Art - Hull - D on Friday, November 13, 2015 at 12:35 pm

For the first quarter in Senior Art, we had a couple pieces that we got to create. The most important thing to remember while doing these pieces was that we had to make it our own, put our own spin on it. There was a lot of space for making our own decisions on what we wanted to do. Everything that I made was something that I thought was. I created things that I cared about. I have never really had to do anything like this before, so I think that all of this art that I created was me just having fun.

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NMoore

Posted by Avery Monroe in English 3 - Pahomov - D on Thursday, June 4, 2015 at 9:55 pm
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1yyQzfIjap1vZ8lFj7iZ7z3hMcN50RjjR1Mq6h_eOsBc/edit?usp=sharing
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Love Actually...or Not

Posted by Avery Monroe in English 3 - Pahomov - D on Monday, April 20, 2015 at 12:10 pm
Comparing “Taming of the Shrew” to “Love Actually”


    “Taming of the Shrew” is a play about romance and the idea of looking for it. Two sisters, Katherine-the shrew- and Bianca-the “nice and gentle” one- have to get married. Bianca can’t get married until Katherine does. Petruchio, a suitor, says that he doesn’t care what kind of attitude Katherine has, he will still marry her so he must impress her father first. “Love Actually”, a romantic comedy that came out in 2003, showed a couple different story plots about love involving different people. One of the plots was about a little boy named Sam who had a huge crush on a girl he knew. He tries to win her over. Of course the techniques of trying to win over a girl are different from Petruchio in “The Taming of the Shrew” and Sam from “Love Actually” but they still had the same idea of trying to impress a girl. When looking at the two different stories,can see that they are very similar but also very different. In the modern love story, women have a lot more say in what they do, but with saying that, relationships- romantically or not- always have to do with winning somebody over. This type of love story has been romanticized and hailed by society forever, from the cheesy movies from the 50s to songs like “We Belong Together” by Mariah Carey. We as people crave someone to root for, an underdog, the geek that gets the girl.

    




“...And therefore, if thou know one rich enough to be Petruchio’s wife (as wealth is burden of my wooing dance), be she as foul as was Florentius’ love, as old as sibyl, and as curst and shrewd as Socrates’ Xanthippe, or a worse,…”

(Act I, Scene ii, Lines 67-72)


Petruchio has just arrived in Padua and is looking for a lady for marriage. He is speaking to another character from the play. He is saying that he basically just needs a girl with wealth. He doesn’t care about anything else about her. None of her other qualities matter as long as she has money.


In the movie, Sam is in a similar situation when he is explaining to his step father the crush he has on a classmate.



Screen Shot 2015-04-16 at 8.58.00 PM
Screen Shot 2015-04-16 at 8.58.00 PM

In this scene from the movie, Sam’s step father asks him what has been going on. He says, “Is it school? Are you being bullied? Or is it something worse?” Sam is admitting that he has a crush on a girl named Joanna, and that he is in love with her. He replies, “The truth is, actually, I’m in love...” He says that there is nothing he can do about it. We can see that he, similar to Petruchio, is explaining the relationship he is wanting to get involved with. They are both trying to court a girl. The difference between Sam and Petruchio is that Sam really does love this girl or at least thinks he does. Petruchio wants money. They both continue on this quest to getting their respective girls. This scene shows how Sam wants to be in a relationship with the girl and it shows his status with her.




“...I’ll attend her here- And woo her with some spirit when she comes! Say that she rail, why then ill tell her plain she sings as sweetly as a nightingale. Say that she frown, I’ll say she looks as clear As morning roses newly washed with dew...”

(Act II, Scene i, Lines 176-181)


In this scene, Petruchio is explaining what he will do to please Katherine. He wants to make her like him so he thinks that complimenting her and everything will make her like him a little more. Any time she says something bad he will kind of contradict it and make it into a compliment.


Likewise, in the movie, Sam is talking to his stepfather because he wants to impress the girl that he likes.


Screen Shot 2015-04-19 at 11.35.16 AM
Screen Shot 2015-04-19 at 11.35.16 AM

He says, “Girls love musicians, even the really weird ones get girlfriends.”  He later says that there is a big concert that Joanna is in, and he wants to join so that she will see him play and maybe start to like him. Both Sam and Petruchio are willing to do something or say something that they don’t exactly believe in so that they can get the girl they want. Sam wants a girlfriend and Petruchio wants a wife. Both are unsure if this will work, but they are both willing to try and see what happens.


In the end of the movie, Joanna moves back to America where she is from. She does come back for a visit eventually, but we have to remember that they are only 12 and while they may have crushes on each other; this doesn’t build into a relationship, at least from what we can see. Petruchio, gets the wife that he always wanted and the dowry that came along with her. Sam may not get the girl he had been crushing on, but he is still excited that he got to show her how he truly felt.



Works Cited:

1. Shakespeare, William, and W. J. Rolfe. Shakespeare's Comedy of the Taming of the Shrew. New York: Harper & Bros., 1881. Print.

2. Love Actually. Dir. Richard Curtis. Perf. Hugh Grant, Thomas Brodie Sangster, Olivia Olsen. 2003. Website.


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Changing World Project

Posted by Avery Monroe in English 3 - Pahomov - D on Tuesday, January 13, 2015 at 10:30 pm

Analytical Essay:

Running and hiding are figurative and literal things people do when they see their worlds changing. People don’t like to experience new things that they aren’t comfortable with, or not knowing what is going to happen. A lot of times change can be good, but the fear of not knowing where that change will lead you makes change scary. Sometimes change can be life altering. “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’brien is a great example of people experiencing change and how it has affected them. Change is inevitable and in many cases can be scary. The fear of the unknown makes people not want to experience the change.

The main Character of the book, Tim O’brien, lived in Minnesota where he spent his summer working in a meatpacking plant. He would work there all day then drive around during the night time. One day he came home to a draft notice in the mail. He states, “The draft notice arrived on June 17th, 1968...I remember opening up the letter, scanning the first few lines, feeling the blood go thick behind my eyes. I remember a sound in my head. “(42) He talks about what it was like when he found out that this new thing was going to be happening in his life. It was so scary for him, and he didn’t know how to deal with it. It was a huge change, he would be going to a war that he didn’t believe in, and that he could possibly die from. He faced the decision of either fleeing the country, or staying there until he had to leave for the Vietnam War. Now it is a choice of people if they want to go into a war like this, unless there aren’t enough volunteers, but during the Vietnam War there was a draft, and he didn’t have a choice on whether he wanted to go or not.  Readers can understand how scary this would be to receive a letter like this. In war, it is a daily fight for ones life.

Tim feels like nobody understands what this war is about, and would sometimes start big arguments with people over the anger he had inside him. They were sending him off to war yet they didn’t really understand the war themselves. He says “I was bitter, sure. But it was so much more than that. The emotions went from outrage to terror to bewilderment to guilt to sorrow and then back again to outrage. I felt sickness inside me. Real disease.” (45/46) He didn’t like that he was going somewhere that nobody knew anything about. They didn’t understand him and what he was going through. He was mad. He was going through all of these feelings because of this change that he was so scared of. He didn’t know what would happen to him, just like nobody really knows, so it was making him nervous. People who have not experienced war, don’t understand it. He didn’t understand what he was getting in to. The fear was making him start these arguments with people because he felt like he was going through this alone.

After receiving the draft letter, O’brien had a hard decision to make: Flee to Canada, or stay and go to War. O’brien decides to go, but later decides to come back. On his way there, he states,  “I headed up the rainy river, which separates Minnesota from Canada, and which for me separated one life from another.” (47) Tim going to Canada is deciding whether he goes to war or not. If he flees, they won’t be able to find him and take him away. He knows this and he knows that he doesn’t want to change his life. The author of the book, Tim O’brien, is trying to tell the readers that he was scared. He feared what was going to be so new to him. This decision is life altering, and he doesn’t know what to expect either way he goes. He states that this separates one life from another, which is very true. On one side, he will be fighting for his life, and seeing so much death, but on the other hand he is leaving and having to start a new life over. Both are big changes, but one is much bigger than the other.

Tim has been in many interviews since the writing of his book. He talks about what it was like when he first received the letter.  ''I went to my room in the basement and started pounding the typewriter,'' he recalled. ''I did it all summer. It was the most terrible summer of my life, worse than being in the war. My conscience kept telling me not to go, but my whole upbringing told me I had to. That horrible summer made me a writer. I don't know what I wrote. I've still got it, reams of it, but I'm not willing to look at it. It was just stuff - bitter, bitter stuff, and it's probably full of self-pity. But that was the beginning.'' ("A storyteller for the war that won't end"). Tim talks about when he first got the draft notice. He didn’t know what to do and it was all he could think about. He talks about how he was having an internal conflict between his conscience and everything he believes in from growing up. He was scared yet felt he had to do it. He was scared for his entire life to change. He talks about it as it is a good thing, that having this struggle made him a much writer and he was more able to express his feelings. Even though, that is not the first thing that comes to mind when thinking about going to war and writing about it, there were some good things that came out of it. Writing helped O’brien cope with this change a little more, and changed his perspective on the war.

Change is inevitable and in many cases can appear scary. The fear of the unknown makes people not want to experience the change. When there is a change people are going into something that they might not be very comfortable with, something, that in very many situations it is out of their comfort zone. It takes time to adjust to something new in a persons life.


Works Cited for Analytical Essay:



  1. O'brien, Tim. "A Storyteller for the War That Won't End." Interview by D.J.R Bruckner. The New York Times. N.p., 3 Apr. 1990. Web. 10 Jan. 2015. <http://www.nytimes.com/books/98/09/20/specials/obrien-storyteller.html>.

  2. O'Brien, Tim. The Things They Carried: A Work of Fiction. New York: Broadway, 1998. Print.









Narrative Essay:

“You will be going to a new school this year.”

“But why?”

“It is more affordable and a lot easier.”

I remember it was going into my fifth grade year. I felt like my world was crumbling down. At this point in my life, I had been experiencing so much change in different areas that I just couldn’t deal with anymore. My parents were separating, I was moving to a new house, and now this. I didn’t know what to expect walking into a new school. It was all I could think about all summer. Right before the school year started I knew I wasn’t ready for this change. It was like starting all over again. I didn’t want to have to make new friends and go in to a new environment that I wasn’t used to. I honestly thought I was going to be the only new one at school and I would be the odd one out.

The school that I came from was a very small school with not much diversity. It was a great school, but it was nothing different since I had gone there since pre-k. It was a very colorful and interesting school. It was so much different than the school that I transferred to. My new school, was a lot more structured. The classrooms were all made of this bland, brown color. It was almost like they picked the most boring color they could find. The school was a lot more diverse in the types of students they had, which was a very good part of the move. None of the teachers really had a life to them, they were all so stern, and there we so many rules. I now understand why everything was this way, but coming in as a fifth grader, I just saw something that I didn’t like.

I remember being so nervous when I walked in. I have a very shy personality, and I knew that I wasn’t going to talk to anybody, being the new girl. When I got there I realized that there were actually a lot of new students, and one of them I became very good friends with. Some of the kids at my new school were very friendly and made me feel so comfortable while others just stared at me and made me feel uncomfortable. I feared what was going to happen at a new school. It could have gone many ways. I am glad that there were people there to make my change nice and comfortable, but I do realize that there are also people there that are going to try and make things hard for you no matter what you are doing in life.

As the year went on, I noticed that my environment was not the only change I would be experiencing. I had to make new friends, but I didn’t realize that I would slowly be losing the old. I don’t quite know when it all happened, but I think it was right after I stopped playing soccer. I played with mostly girls from my old school. Once I stopped, my relationship with them ended as well. It happened pretty quickly. I never got to see them because my life became so busy, and I was never seeing them during the week like I always used to. I remember I woke up one saturday and realized that I only really talked to the people at my new school. I had experienced a change that I was so scared of. I never really got too upset about it, I just knew that me talking to them was seperating my old life from my new life. I think that at first I was very scared for this adjustment in my life, but it soon just became so normal that it didn’t matter much anymore. I almost knew this was going to happen when I went to a new school, but it was hard to make it a reality.

As I got older, things that were so strange to me became normal, but things were still changing. A large change that I have been facing is my siblings going off to college. My brother was the first to go, and then followed my sister.  It made me really upset knowing that I wasn’t going to be with them all the time. I was scared to be alone. I was scared that once they left everything would change. I would basically be alone in the house and I would only really be able to talk to them through the phone. Before they were leaving, I never really thought about it, and when I did I was kind of excited to have the house alone. Both times though, as they left, it dawned on me that I would not get to be with them as much, and it made me upset. I didn’t notice the change until the last minute, and until it was probably too late for me to realize. I wasn’t going to be able to talk to them about how annoying our parents were being, or laugh with them when we are making fun of our parents. We just had so much fun together. I think of this as not one of my most traumatic changes, not saying it wasn’t life changing, but is something that I would have overcome eventually and is something that I needed to face.

I still tend to get very nervous around change but I have learned to cope with my nerves. I have started to become numb to it. I have been through so much change already that it is starting to not affect me unless the change is very drastic. There are so many things that I wish never changed, but if they hadn’t I don’t know where my life would be now. It could be better but it also could have been a lot worse. I think that is why so many people fear change. They don’t know what will happen either way.

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Avery Monroe 2fer Revision

Posted by Avery Monroe in English 3 - Pahomov - D on Monday, November 10, 2014 at 8:54 am

Death is inevitable, but it can happen in many different ways. Those who cause death, are often sentenced to death as a punishment. When convicted of murder, there is always a consequence. When someone is given the death penalty it is because they have been found guilty of a certain crime, there is a small list of crimes that would make the death penalty a possibility. There are currently 32 states that still practice the death penalty. Not only is the death penalty a cruel and unusual punishment but also, it can be extremely expensive and devastating to the prison and state system. Experts say, sentencing a prisoner to death on average costs about three times as much compared to sentencing them to life in prison. The Death Penalty should be banned in every state, because it is a financial burden that will eventually cause major problems to the prison and state system.

If the person is not given the death penalty the alternative is usually life in prison. Although the price that the prison system has to pay varies from state to state, it is pretty similar. According to Amnesty USA, “Death penalty case costs were counted through to execution (median cost $1.26 million). Non-death penalty case costs were counted through to the end of incarceration (median cost $740,000).” Criminals have committed a crime that is not only constitutional in our governments eyes, but also have committed such an inhumane act of foul behavior. It is difficult to believe that states spend millions of dollars to allow the death penalty to continue. Instead of creating a cycle of death, the state should abolish the death penalty and replace it with a more suitable consequence. It costs so much more to kill somebody than to just give them time in prison. Since there are sometimes large numbers of people on Death Row, this will cause a default in the money that the government has.

To be on Death Row, there must be a deplorable crime that has been committed. It is up to the judge of the court to decide if the crime was horrendous enough to give the criminal the death penalty. Mario M. Cuomo, the previous Governor of New York, stated that “That law is a stain on our conscience... The 46 executions in the United States in 2008 were, I believe, an abomination. People have a right to demand a civilized level of law and peace.” Not only was Mario Cuomo a respected governor, he raises a fair point on the matter. As stated before, the cost of having criminals on death row creates a staggering cost due after the senseless “consequence” they completed. According to information gathered previously and the information from Mario M. Cuomo, those 46 executions in 2008 would have been a grand total of over 58 million dollars. While on the other hand they could have spent a more manageable portion of money. Yet still expensive, the cost for the 46 inmates sentenced to life without parole would have been closer to $35 million. Spending this much more money, over time, will mean the states have to take money from other resources and will eventually will end up causing bankruptcy to the state. It is much more of a financial burden to the states to continue the death penalty.

When a state spends so much money executing inmates, they do not have to money to do other things that are very necessary, such as reducing available resources. Again, Amnestyusa states, ” Reducing the resources available for crime prevention, mental health treatment, education and rehabilitation, meaningful victims' services, and drug treatment programs.” When spending money to put people on Death Row, the state prison system is not only at risk of going into bankruptcy, but also at risk of reducing, or eliminating other state needs. One of the resources that will be diminished is “crime prevention”. Using this money for crime prevention will reduce Capital and violent crimes that they are being put on death row for. What sense does it make for the states to take the money to kill people when they could be taking the money to stop crime in the first place? So many of these resources are vastly important and useful to everybody.


The Death Penalty should be banned in every state, because it is a financial burden that will eventually cause major problems to the prison and state system. If the state stopped to think about it, they would realize that The Death Penalty is does not just affect the money in the state, but the children as well. There is a lot of money that gets spent on the prison system every year. A lof of this money could, instead, go to children in the school districts. It is effecting the children, and could start a cycle of people who do not go to school ending up in prison. It costs a lot more for the prisons and states to continue with the death penalty law, rather than to imprison the criminals. Keeping the death penalty drains the financial needs for other major resources. It would be much more efficient to discontinue the law of sentencing people to death.





Works Cited:


  1. Slobodzian, Joseph A. "Rarely Used, Pennsylvania's Death Penalty Remains a Headache on Both Sides of the Debate." Philly.com. N.p., 15 May 2011. Web. 03 Oct. 2014.

  2. "Death Penalty Cost." Amnesty International USA. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Oct. 2014.

  3. "Death Penalty Fast Facts." CNN. Cable News Network, 01 Jan. 1970. Web. 06 Oct. 2014.

  4. Cuomo, Mario M. "Death Penalty Is Dead Wrong: It's Time to Outlaw Capital Punishment in America - Completely." NY Daily News. N.p., 2 Oct. 2011. Web. 05 Oct. 2014.

2 Comments

Avery Monroe 2fer Revision

Posted by Avery Monroe in English 3 - Pahomov - C on Sunday, November 9, 2014 at 4:02 pm
​

Death is inevitable, but it can happen in many different ways. Those who cause death, are often sentenced to death as a punishment. When convicted of murder, there is always a consequence. When someone is given the death penalty it is because they have been found guilty of a certain crime, there is a small list of crimes that would make the death penalty a possibility. There are currently 32 states that still practice the death penalty. Not only is the death penalty a cruel and unusual punishment but also, it can be extremely expensive and devastating to the prison and state system. Experts say, sentencing a prisoner to death on average costs about three times as much compared to sentencing them to life in prison. The Death Penalty should be banned in every state, because it is a financial burden that will eventually cause major problems to the prison & state system.

If the person is not given the death penalty, usually the alternative, is life in prison. Although the price that the prison system has to pay varies from state to state, it is pretty similar. According to Amnesty USA, “Death penalty case costs were counted through to execution (median cost $1.26 million). Non-death penalty case costs were counted through to the end of incarceration (median cost $740,000).” Criminals have committed a crime that is not only constitutional in our governments eyes, but also have committed such an inhumane act of foul behavior. It is difficult to believe that states spend millions of dollars to allow the death penalty to continue. Instead of creating a cycle of death, the state should abolish the death penalty and replace it with a more suitable consequence. It costs so much more to kill somebody than to just give them time in prison. Since there are sometimes large numbers of people on Death Row, this will cause a default in the money that the government has.

To be on death row, there must be a deplorable crime that has been committed. It is up to the judge of the court to decide if the crime was horrendous enough to give the criminal the death penalty. Mario M. Cuomo, the previous Governor of New York, stated that “That law is a stain on our conscience... The 46 executions in the United States in 2008 were, I believe, an abomination. People have a right to demand a civilized level of law and peace.” Not only was Mario Cuomo, a respected governor, he raises a fair point on the matter. As stated before, the cost of having criminals on death row creates a staggering cost due after the senseless “consequence” they completed. According to information gathered previously and the information from Mario M. Cuomo, those 46 executions in 2008 would have been a grand total of over 58 million dollars. While on the other hand they could have spent a more manageable portion of money. Yet still expensive, the cost for the 46 inmates sentenced to life without parole would have been closer to $35 million. Spending this much more money, over time, will mean the states have to take money from other resources and will eventually will end up causing bankruptcy to the state. It is much more of a financial burden to the states to continue the death penalty.

When a state spends so much money executing inmates, they do not have to money to do other things that are very necessary, such as reducing available resources. Again, Amnestyusa states, ” Reducing the resources available for crime prevention, mental health treatment, education and rehabilitation, meaningful victims' services, and drug treatment programs.” When spending money to put people on Death Row, the state prison system is not only at risk of going into bankruptcy, but also at risk of reducing, or eliminating other state needs. One of the resources that will be diminished is “crime prevention”. Using this money for crime prevention will reduce Capital and violent crimes that they are being put on death row for What sense does it make for the states to take the money to kill people when they could be taking the money to stop crime in the first place? So many of these resources are vastly important and useful to everybody.


The Death Penalty should be banned in every state, because it is a financial burden that will eventually cause major problems to the prison & state system. If the state stopped to think about it, they would realize that The Death Penalty is does not just affect the money in the state, but the children as well. There is a lot of money that gets spent on the prison system every year. A lof of this money could, instead, go to children in the school districts. It is effecting the children, and could start a cycle of people who do not go to school ending up in prison. It costs a lot more for the prisons and states to continue with the death penalty law, rather than to imprison the criminals. Keeping the death penalty drains the financial needs for other major resources. It would be much more efficient to discontinue the law of sentencing people to death.



Works Cited:


  1. Slobodzian, Joseph A. "Rarely Used, Pennsylvania's Death Penalty Remains a Headache on Both Sides of the Debate." Philly.com. N.p., 15 May 2011. Web. 03 Oct. 2014.

  2. "Death Penalty Cost." Amnesty International USA. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Oct. 2014.

  3. "Death Penalty Fast Facts." CNN. Cable News Network, 01 Jan. 1970. Web. 06 Oct. 2014.

  4. Cuomo, Mario M. "Death Penalty Is Dead Wrong: It's Time to Outlaw Capital Punishment in America - Completely." NY Daily News. N.p., 2 Oct. 2011. Web. 05 Oct. 2014.


2 Comments

Othello Script

Posted by Avery Monroe in English 2 - Pahomov - A on Monday, June 2, 2014 at 9:08 am
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An IAT result I didn't Expect

Posted by Avery Monroe in English 2 - Pahomov - A on Friday, January 24, 2014 at 11:07 am

Gender: Female

Race/Ethnicity: Black and slightly mixed

Nationality: American

Sexual Orientation: Hetero

Age Group: 16

Hometown: Philadelphia Pa

Social Class: Middle Class

Religious Preference: Not really religious, but spiritual

Political Leaning: Progressive Liberal

Physical Appearance: I am tall, long hair, thin and athletic, easy to smile

Personality Characteristics: I am very shy at first, but after a while outgoing. I think I am very fun to be around. I am a little indecisive, which is a struggle I have to deal with sometimes.

Role in Life (ie. mother, father, daughter, occupation): student, daughter, sister, friend.

https://abagond.wordpress.com/2009/05/29/the-clark-doll-experiment/


I am a young Black heterosexual female. I was born into a middle class family in the West Mount Airy neighborhood in Philadelphia, and have lived here my whole life. West Mount Airy, is one of the first fully integrated neighborhoods in the United States.  It is an example of a progressive neighborhood that was the focus of many sociological and anthropological studies over the past few decades.  When my mom was growing up in West Mount Airy it was very similar to how it is today, there were strong liberal populations, a vibrant Jewish synagogue, upwardly mobile Blacks and progressive Whites, (some people called them hippies).

I attend Science Leadership Academy which is a public high school in Philadelphia. Living in Philadelphia, I have been exposed to many different types of people and different types of cultures. All of this exposure has brought me to realize that someones biases are formed through the stereotypes and cultures that they have experienced. All of the different parts that make up who I am have helped me create my own perspective. Through taking a couple Implicit Association Tests(IAT), I have come to realize a couple of my own personal biases.

Admittedly, I was a little surprised at the results. When taking the sexuality IAT, it was revealed that I had a “slight automatic preference” to straight people rather than gay people. That is not the way that I view myself, or the world. I had always been around different people growing up, and to see this result puzzled me. Being straight has always been considered a “social norm” and even though in my immediate life I didn’t have people telling me that it was the right way, there is so much that I hear around me in the media that influences my opinions. I don’t consider myself to have a preference to straight people. When I thought a little deeper about this, I figured that I could have gotten this result because I am heterosexual. I know more about being heterosexual and can relate to other people that are heterosexual and I think that is why I might have responded to the heterosexual pictures faster. While that may be the reason, or one of the reasons, it was still very surprising to me because someone’s sexual preference has never been, and will never be notable to me. Obviously, I can tell when my friends, acquaintances and classmates are gay, but it has never meant anything to me. To me they were just a regular person. It is no more notable than if someone has blue eyes or brown.  My friends aren’t my ‘gay’ friends, they are just my friends, it has always been that way and will always be that way.

In class one day, we started talking about our own biases and I went over to a friend of mine.

“You went to private school and then you want to public right?”

“Yeah, I was raised in a private school, but I then transferred, I feel like I fit in with both types of people.”

“Yeah I agree, you’re like an urban girl but you’re also like a private school girl. I think that you fit in more with us and feel more comfortable with us though.”

We talked about how growing up, I went to a predominantly white Quaker school. I then went to a public school where there were people that were so much different than the people at my old private school. When I took the Race IAT, I was also a bit shocked to see that I had a slight preference to European Americans. I am friends with all different types of people who come from all different types of racial backgrounds. I was expecting to get “no preference” but that is not how it turned out. My Quaker education was really helpful in the way that I view people that are different from myself. I wouldn’t say that it is good that I have a preference for European Americans, but I would say that maybe it has helped me with my view on other people. I think that it is really common to have a preference to European Americans rather than African Americans. In the media, the white people are shown with power, and all throughout history they have been shown with power as well. As shown in Dr. Kenneth Clark’s experiment; when kids were asked to pick between an African American and an European American doll, most children picked the European American doll, even the African Americans. He did a couple different tests, and in each test, the majority of the kids picked the white doll. He asked them questions, about which looks nicer, which looked worse, When that is what we hear around us, it is easy for a person’s opinion to be changed. It isn't exactly a coincidence that my bias is like a lot of Americans. Many possible causes for this can be how people are portrayed on the internet, books, and other sources in the media. Even though my answers were not as I expected them to be, I have an understanding of why.

Through researching and taking implicit association tests, I have found out so much about myself. I was very surprised and would have never thought I would have the bias that I have. Even though I was very surprised, I can understand why I got this answer. Through this whole experience, I have begun to figure out my own personal bias.




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Cuz Snoe

Posted by Avery Monroe in English 2 - Pahomov - A on Wednesday, November 20, 2013 at 12:56 pm

Cuz Snoe

(In Imanis bedroom, talking on the phone to her best friend Jamie)

“Hey, I ain’t even hear my phone, I was busy with the boo! I just got home I’m in mah bedroom”

“What...What you have to tell me”

(she laughs)

“Whats the big deal, like?”

“Okay, I am calm! Just tell me now.”

“What! Oh snoe! I don’t believe you!”

“No, he would neva”

“David would neva cheat! He in love with me”

“No, girl, you don’t know ‘bout him. Hes always tryna get at me. Like you don’t understand. He really want me. For you to tell me that he been sneaking around with some other girl is wrong. You’re lying to me. You know you are.”

“Yes you are! I don’t get you, like. Why are you doin’ all this. Like for what? LIke who are you! You don’t make any type of sense right now.”

“Yes, I remember that obviously. That was forever ago. You ain’t even know what you be talkin’ about sometimes. we was barely going together. That was barely even the start though. I was only thinkin’ ‘bout cheatin on him, I didn’t actually do it! You ain’t about to hold all that against me! Thats the past. I ain’t even worrying about that no more. Foreal though, I ain’t even care about him. He care about me!”

“Well, thank you I guess...I mean I ain’t even know if you tellin me the truth. I’ll just stop talkin’ to him anyways, like. I don’t care. I just don’t understand why he would do something so stupid like this! ”

“Its true, I don’t! Alright let me go so that I can talk to him”

(They hang up their phones, Imani throws it, and then begins to cry)

“I can’t believe this! Like how he gonna cheat on me! when I be so nice to him all the time! Why doe. I love him like he is my world. I would do anything for him. Why is it that I am beautiful and boys always do me wrong. Is it because I intimidate them? I’ve tried so hard to keep these guys, and I never can. What am I doing wrong! Please, somebody just help me, I can’t do this no more. I can’t stay with him now! He just gon’ do me wrong again and again! There gotta be a better guy out there for me. Let me call him right now. Psh, he gon’ try to explain himself, but no.”

(Picks up phone, and begins to dial)


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Thats Wicked Cool

Posted by Avery Monroe in English 2 - Pahomov - A on Sunday, November 3, 2013 at 6:10 pm

Thats Wicked Cool

Language is a big part of communication. Over time, people have changed and created their own words. I remember a couple years ago on my annual visit to Massachusetts, I was talking to my cousins who live up there.

“Look at this shirt I got today.”

“Woah, that is Wicked cool!”

“Wicked?” I questioned. I had never heard anyone use the word wicked before.

“You don’t know what that means?”

“No, nobody ever says that, did you make it up?”

We talked about it for a while and I explained to her that nobody in Philadelphia uses that word so I hadn’t known what it meant. After talking about that, we had a whole conversation on the different slang that we had in philly compared to what they had in Boston. I told her that we had commonly used words like “jawn” and  “drawl”. We also talked about how a lot of people in philly use the term “yous” and she thought that was hilarious! After she stopped making fun, we started talking about how she thought I had a really strange accent, but I thought it was totally normal.

“Say water.”

“wooder”

She loved that, I had to keep repeating the word to satisfy her. I realized that depending on where you are from, you say and pronounce things different things. I thought it was so funny at first, but then I found it so annoying that they would continue to laugh at the way I would say things, yet I didn’t say anything about they way they talked. I knew they weren’t doing it to be mean, but it still hurt my feelings. Since we go up there about twice a year, the next time I went up there I tried code switching to talk more like them. After a while I realized that I shouldn’t change who I am or how I talk to fit in with other people. There was nothing wrong with the way I talked, and there was nothing wrong with the way they talked either. We are just from different places.

On my way home from boston, I put in my headphones like always and turned on some music. The first song I happened to turn on was rap music. I to listen to a lot of rap, but all the rappers are from different places. I was thinking, what different slang do the rappers use? The language just from teenagers that are from different places are so weird, so would the rappers and other performers’ language be different too? I think that teenagers get a lot of their language from the music they listen to. They take the slang, and it becomes really popular. I listened to the song “Dope Dealer” by Meek Mill, who is from Philadelphia. I saw that he used some of the same slang as the kids that I hang out with. He used the word “Swerve” which is basically to dismiss or say no to something that somebody says to you. I realized when I was reading the lyrics that he didn’t use the word jawn which I thought he would use, or any other big philly terms that  I thought he would.

Since I was listening to a rapper from the East Coast, I decided I would listen somebody from the West coast as well. I listened to a Kendrick Lamar who is rapper from California. This was a little harder for me, because I am not from there and I haven’t even been there before. I asked my friend, TJay, don’t forget the “Ay” some of the slang as he spends his whole summer in California. I listened to the song called “Swimming Pools” with my friend and he told me about words like “blood” “scrub” “bang” “cuz”. He also told me about the pronunciation of some of their words. I thought this was really interesting as I had never heard anybody say those words in a sentence. I didn’t think that the words that people used would be so different depending on where you were from. When I was listening to the song, Kendrick actually said some of the slang Tjay taught me a couple times in his song.

Although there are so many differences in the slang from Philly, and the slang from California, there are also some similarities. When I listened to all the songs  and talked to different people, I realized that both of the rappers used words like “cuz”, “swag”, “bread” or “bout’ that life”. Cuz is basically what you would just call a person, swag has to do with the clothes you wear, and how you act, how you walk, things like that. When people say bread they are talking about money, and when people say bout’ that life it means that you agree, or you’re into something. For example if somebody is doing something inappropriate and you don’t agree with it you would say “I’m not bout’ that life.” Another thing that I found was kind of interesting that a lot of people will say “like” at the end of sentences. It doesn’t actually mean anything, but in a sentence you would say “Oh my god, I love your hair, like.” I find it very strange, and I don’t know why people use it in a sentence. Depending on where you are than your opinions change.

All the places that I have been always tell me they think Philadelphia is so weird. When I ask them why, they tell me that it is because we say “hoagie” instead of “sub” and “water ice” or “wooder ice” instead of “slush”. I never really thought that philadelphia was so much different than other places. Now I know that we have a lot of differences. I’m sure other people say that too, about the place they are from.

In class, we were reading an essay by James Baldwin. He was saying that Black English should be a language. Baldwin states, “If Black English isn’t a language, then tell me what is?” Even if it is not considered “proper” to speak that way, it is what's happening all around us. Everybody is talking like this. It has become such a big part of the “standard” English language. I decided to talk to my friend and asked her a few questions about the slang we use in philly.

“Do you know what jawn means?”

“I mean I know what it means, but I don’t really use it with my friends, I don’t want to sound rude, but I think that like a lot of black people use those kinds of words.”

“Well what words do you mean by ‘those kind’?” I asked her

“I mean like ratchet, irkin, drawlin. Those just aren’t words that everybody uses.”

I think that if everybody, even people that aren’t black, know what black slang is then it should be its own language. So many people know what it is and not everybody would have to talk like this, only people that wanted to. I think it is important that people should be able to talk however they want. Just like if I wanted to become fluent in spanish and make that my primary language. Not everyone has to do it, but I still have the ability to talk in whatever language I want.



Works Cited

“If Black English isn’t a language than tell me what is” by James Baldwin



Tjay

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Element Project

Posted by Avery Monroe on Tuesday, June 11, 2013 at 11:03 am
Inquiry - 
I did not no anything about my element, so I had to ask a lot of information about my element. I needed to know things such as what it looks like, and different properties. I liked it a lot because I didn't know anything about my element at all.
Research - 
I went on to the internet and had to research things about my element. I looked for what it looked like and I also had to find out what they used my element. I used that information to create a picture that had to do with my element.
Collaboration - 
My friends that were sitting with me helped me a lot. I was really stuck on what to do for my print because I found my element very difficult. My friend sat down with me and she helped me a lot. We came put with a couple ideas together, and I figured out what I wanted to do.
Presentation - 
To present our prints we are going to put them around the school, we are also going to make a periodic table with all of the elements pictures that everybody made.
Reflection -
I really enjoyed this because I actually didn't even know about this element. I had a lot of fun doing this. It was really cool, and I found out a lot about my element. I also learned a lot about printing when I didn't know anything about it before.
IMG_2268
IMG_2268
IMG_2269
IMG_2269
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La Casa Ideal

Posted by Avery Monroe in Spanish 1 - Manuel on Wednesday, June 5, 2013 at 8:28 am
​
  • Nombre: Naomi Fecher-Davis

  • Edad: 14

  • Color: morado

  • Animales: dos gatos

  • Bicicleta/carro: uno bici

  • solo ella

  • 5 niños

  • béisbol, ciclismo, fútbol

  • ver la tele / ver películas

  • dormitorios : por lo menos cinco

  • baños: por lo menos

  • enorme casa

  • vive en la playa

  • cerca de su casa: el transporte público, las escuelas, un centro comercial

  • pedidos especiales: Un television grande y internet muy rapido.


    Se llama Naomi.  Le gusta béisbol, ciclismo, y fútbol. Le gusta casa enorma.Esta casa está en Los Angeles, California. Está Cerca de la playa, el transporte público, las escuelas, y un centro comercial.


    ¡La casa tiene TODO!

    • La casa es muy grande y moderna.  Es muy elegante y lujoso.  

    • La televisión es muy grande porque Naomi encanta ver la tele y películas.

    • En la casa, hay seis cuartos. Todos tienen una cama, una ventana, una puerta, un tv, y un escritorio.  Esto es para que todo pueden relajar, trabajo en su escritorio y ver la televisión.

    • En la cocina es un estufa y un nevera grande. Dos fregaderos, un lavaplatos y un horno. Hay dos ventanas.

    • En la sala está un sofá y un mesa. Hay dos sillón y un televisión grande

    • El comedor es grande, porque Naomi tiene muchos niños.  Hay una mesa larga, seis sillas, y una araña grandioso.

    • El baños tienen un espejo, una ducha bonita, y un lavamanos.  Es lujoso.
      El Precio- $80,000
      Información de contacto
      Avery y Clio
      1800-CLI-Y-AVE
      smonroe@scienceleadership.org


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Negative Space

Posted by Avery Monroe in Art - Freshman - Hull on Monday, May 6, 2013 at 7:37 pm
  A. What is negative space (explain this concept to a fourth grader that has never heard of it)
The negative space is the area around the object.

    B. Explain how you found negative space in 1. your cut out?, 2. in your still life drawing?

At first it was very hard for me to find the negative space. To find it in the cut out I had to first find the actual shape that I was making, than find all the space around it. It was much easier to find the negative space in the drawing, but I had to look at the object, than I looked at what I saw around the object, and I could draw it.

    C. Why does it help an artist to see in negative space?

I think it helps an artist to see in negative space because than there is contrast that they can see.

    D. Does seeing in negative space enhance drawings, why or why not?

I think it does enhance the drawing because there is so much contrast.
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Bullying

Posted by Avery Monroe in English 1 - Kay on Tuesday, April 30, 2013 at 1:57 pm
​This video is here to inform people about suicide due to bullying. I wanted to show what I knew, and what I learned after some research. 

english Speach from Avery Monroe on Vimeo.

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Final Perspective Drawing

Posted by Avery Monroe in Art - Freshman - Hull on Friday, April 19, 2013 at 9:36 pm
a. What is one thing that your learned specifically that you did not know before.
Before doing this project, I had no idea how to draw objects while using an orthogonal. 

b. How did learning this thing make your drawings better

If I had to draw this picture without know this, than I think that my shapes would not be perfect. I think that they would fine, but it wouldn't look as much like a real life picture.

d. What is your advice to someone who has never drawn a one point perspective drawing before?

If I had to give advice to someone, I would say that you must use a ruler, and you must make sure that all of your lines are parallel to the edges of the paper, unless you don't want it to be.
e. What resource helped you the most and why?
I think that the resource that helped me the most with this was
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Tags: presepctive, 2013, Green
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Q3 Benchmark Reflection

Posted by Avery Monroe in Geometry - Thompson on Monday, March 18, 2013 at 9:10 pm

How does this project relate to the real world?

We learned a lot doing this project that you would need to know in the real world. ​I think this project could relate to the real world because there are a lot of jobs where you would need to learn how to find heights and things. You need to know how to use a scale to draw blueprints and things like that. 

What was the most exciting portion of this project and why? What was the least exciting portion to this project and why?

I think that the most exciting part of the project was when we had to decide what we were going to change about the building. I liked that because I think it was the easiest. The least exciting part to me was when we had to actually go out and do the measurements. I didn't like that because I kept messing up, by leaning forward too much and I would get weird answers. At first it didn't make sense, but that I figured it out.

What did you learn from completing this project?

When we had to do this project I learned how to use the mirror method to figure out the height of something. I also learned how to use a scale to draw the buildings.
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Yo Poema

Posted by Avery Monroe in Spanish 1 - Manuel on Wednesday, March 6, 2013 at 11:42 am
​Yo

Yo hablo en Español

yo estudio en Español

you escribo en Español

I dream in English

I laugh in English

I try in English

I smile in English
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nuestras actividades

Posted by Avery Monroe in Spanish 1 - Manuel on Tuesday, March 5, 2013 at 1:02 pm
Mi nombre es Avery Monroe. Tengo 15 años. no soy activa. Es por eso que casi nunca auydo en la cas. Siempre domo, escho la musica, y sufeo la red. Tiempre libre paso con amigos y corro. Todos las dias yo leo, canto, y carro. Despúes las clases hago la tarea, paso con amigos, y como. 

Mi amigo es Clio Fleece. Ella es cómica. Todos los días ella habla con amigos y coma. Cuando tiene tiempo libre pasa un rato con amigos. Después de las clases pasa un rato con amigos. Ella nunca baila y corra.
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E1U4 ¡Me Escuela es Muy Interesante!

Posted by Avery Monroe in Spanish 1 - Manuel on Friday, February 8, 2013 at 6:24 am

¡Hola! Me llamo Avery Monroe. Tengo quince años. Soy estudiante de Science Leadership Academy. Está en el Centro de la Ciudad también en Filadelfia. Es pequeño, muy divertida y bastante interesante. Hay muchos estudiantes. Hay quinientos estudiantes, cuatro pisos, y veinticinco profesores. Tenemos muchos deportes y un poquito clubs. Tenemos comunidad servicio, fútbol, bailar, disco, y tecnología. Participa en comunidad servicio y Duke Of Edinburgh porque me gusta ración otra gente. Duke Of Edinburgh es muy divertida, y interesante.

Tengo Literatura, Español, Matemáticas, Bioquímica, Historia, Arte, y Tertio. Mis clases favoritas son arte y literatura. Me gusta arte porque es muy divertida y interesante. Me gusta literatura porque su bastante fácil, interesante, y divertida. No me gusta mucho historia porque su súper aburrida y difícil. En arte necesito el lápiz y cuaderno. En literature necesito el lápiz y el libro. En historia necesito el libro y el lápiz. Para tener éxito en esta clase arte prestar mucha atención.En la clase de Arte nosotros siempre dibujamos, tomar apuntes y trabajamos duo. Para tener éxito en esta clase literatura es importante tu escuchar,  hacer tu tarea, y intento. En la clase de Literatura nosotros leemos libros y depende del día a veces hacemos actividades. Para tener éxito en esta clase historia tenemos que participar, hacer toda la tarea y intento.
Me gusta el professores en SLA. Algunos son La Señorita Manuel, El Señor Kay, La Señorita Jonas, y La Señora Hull. La Señorita Manuel enseña español. Señorita Manuel es muy cómica y guapa. Le gusta los deportes y la enseñanza. Su cumpleaños es diecisiete de mayo. Me gusta español es muy divertida. Señorita Manuel hacer lo to la fiesta. Ella es to grande la profesora. ¡Es un amor de gente! El Señor Kay enseña inglés. El es muy cómico y trabajador. Me encanta su clase. Le gusta la poesía y practicar deportes. Su clase es bastante divertida y chévere. Señorita Jonas enseña Historia. Ella es súper simpática. Su clase es bien aburrida. Tenemos que tomar apuntes. Ella es tu bueno la profesora. Señora Hull enseña arte. Ella tiene un hijo. Ella es muy simpática. Su clase es bien divertida y interesante. Su es to excelente profesora. Me gusta arte.
Me encanta SLA. Lo que más me gusta de SLA es cómo el profesores el cuadado sobre nosotros así mucho. No me gusta nada el tamaño. SLA es muy divertida, un poquito, y súper único. En SLA tenemos la computadoras a hacer la tarea y proyectos SLA es la mejor escuela.
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Los Seres Queridos en Mi Vida (Loved Ones in my Life)

Posted by Avery Monroe on Monday, January 7, 2013 at 2:47 pm
¡Hola! Me llamo Avery estudiante en SLA (eseh eleh ah).

Yo:
Soy alta, inteligente, y guapa. Tengo el pelo moreno y largo y los ojos cafés. Mi cumpleaños es veintisiete de octubre. Tengo dos hermanos y una hermana. Tengo una perro también. Me gusta surfear la red y ver la tele. Soy de Filadelfia.

él/ella:
Lizzie es mi amiga. Ella es bonita y loca. Ella tiene catorce años. Su cumpleaños es el cuatro de diciembre. Le encanta Allstar Weekend, Tumblr, American Horror Story y surfear la red. No le gusta nada leer. La quiero porque ella es muy cómica, bastante simpática, y es una buenísima amiga.

ellos:
Jordan, Callie, y Lucas son mis hermanos. Son altos. Tienen el pelo moreno los ojos marrones. Depende del día son simpáticos. Ellos son de Filadelfia. No les gusta estar de vago con yo. Me caen bien porque ellos son mi familia.

ellas:
Kara y Greta es mi mejor amigas. kara tiene el pelo moreno y los ojos verdes. Greta tiene el pelo tiene rubia y los ojos azules. Los fines de semana les gusta salir con sus novios. Ellas son hermosa. Ellas son súper locas. Les gusta platicar con amigos y comer.  ¡Les gusta ir a fiestas! Me caen bien porque son loca y son buenísimas amigas.

Nosotros:
Liza y yo. Liza es mi mejor amiga. Somos locas y cómicas. Tenemos quince años. Somos de Filadelfia. Liza es muy simpatica y guapa. Nos llevamos bien porque ella es muy boba y es un amor de gente.

Conclusion:
¡Adios! Gracias por ver mi video. Tener un buen día. Por Avery Monroe
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Media Fluency

Posted by Avery Monroe in Technology- Freshmen - Hull on Thursday, December 6, 2012 at 5:34 pm

In class we have been talking about creating a slide. Most people don’t know how to create a slide correctly. A lot of people try and put too much information in a slide, but you should actually only try to have one main idea per slide. Through using two websites, I learned how to make a better slide. One of the websites said that Ikea the furniture store did a great job with the way they did their posters for advertising. I really like the way that the posters look. That is where a lot of my inspiration for my one slide came from.

When I was making my slide all I could think about was how clean and nice the Ikea posters were. I liked how they had about 2 words, and then a picture of what they were trying to sell. I like how they didn’t try to make it crowded  it with a bunch of information that they wanted you to know. When I was making my slide I didn’t want to add too many colors. I think if I did it would be a little too crazy. I made it so there is only one point on the slide just like they said on the Presentation Zen website. There is a lot of empty space on my page, so it is not too busy. Another thing that I got from the Ikea website was that it looked more interesting to bleed your pictures. I bled my picture, to make it more interesting and to make it look better. I have seen many slides where they did not bleed and I don’t think that it looked as good as Ikea’s where they bled their pictures. On slide design for developers I used the idea where you only make the size of the letters huge. I wanted to do that because that would make it so that is what the people who are reading it see that faster. If I made the letters any smaller I think that people might not go straight to that. Another idea that I got from the websites is that if you take the words and slant them in the direction of the picture it looks very nice. I think it is because when you look at the words they are leading you down to the picture. One more thing that I did with my slide was that I tried to make contrast. I made the words bright green because they make a  great contrast to the rest of slide which is all black.

I think that creating a slide was really fun because I never knew how to make a slide that actually looked good. And I also didn’t know that there was so much to learn about creating a slide. The websites that we used had a lot of useful information on them. With mine, I applied a lot of the information that I learned. Overall, this information helped me create a really cool slide.

Tech Slide Revised:

I didn’t change much on my slide. The only thing that I really changed was that I changed the picture. I thought that this picture stuck out more. The words are leading down to my picture. The picture still bleeds off. It is very similar to the first one. I think that the words stick out well so you see them first, they lead you down to the other picture. My slide is very plain because I wanted I didn’t want it to be too distracting, and I wanted people to know where their eyes are going. The way that the words go, you can see which way your eyes are supposed to go. I am very proud of my slide, considering I never got to present, and get constructive criticism. I have learned so much about this, I now have a really good understanding on how to make a slide, and I will keep these ideas forever, since I have to make slides for the rest of my life.


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Una Carta para Ti.

Posted by Avery Monroe in Spanish 1 - Manuel on Wednesday, November 28, 2012 at 6:05 pm


Querid@ _____,

¡Hola!  Saludos desde Filadelfia.  Es una ciudad grande.  ¿Qué tal?  Me llamo Avery.  ¿Cómo te llama?  ¿Cuantos años tienes tú?  Tengo quince años.  Mi cumpleaños es el veintisiete de octubre.  ¿Y tú?  Soy de Filadelfia.  Hace bastante frío en Filadelfia.

Me encanta escuchar música y ver la tele.  Los fines de semana me gusta pasar un rato con amigos.  No me gusta nada jugar videojuegos, estudiar, y leer.  Odio escribir.  Me fascina One Direction y surfear la red con amigos.  Me gusta relajar con mi familia.  Cuando tengo tiempo libre me gusta dormir.  Detesto ayudar en casa, también me gusta platicar con amigos.  ¿Ya tú?  ¿Qué te gusta hacer?

Soy muy alta, guapa, cómica, inteligente, y boba.  Soy morena y loca.  ¿Y tú?  ¿Cómo eres?  Bueno, me voy porque tengo que comer y estudiar.  Responde cuando puedas.  ¡Adiós!

Con cariño,

Avery Monroe


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Mis favoritos

Posted by Avery Monroe in Spanish 1 - Manuel on Tuesday, November 27, 2012 at 12:00 pm
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Kara Eve Rosenberg

Posted by Avery Monroe in Spanish 1 - Manuel on Tuesday, November 20, 2012 at 7:30 pm
​Se llama Kara Eve Rosenberg. Tiene catorce años. Es de Colorado pero vive en Filadelfia. Ella es guapa, loca, y un poquito boba. Ella es morena y rubia. Es un poquito alta y cómica. Le gusta comer casi siempre. Los fines de semana le gusta dormir. No le gusta practicar deportes y dibujar.
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Monroe, Sandra LucidChart Home Network

Posted by Avery Monroe in Technology- Freshmen - Hull on Thursday, November 1, 2012 at 12:40 pm
At my house, we have Verizon Fios. When you have Verizon which is a phone modem, all of your information comes from a phone cable. Connected to my phone cable I have WiFi, so that I can use laptops, tablets, ipods, phones, etc. Connected to our network we have three Iphones, mine my sisters, and my moms. We also have three laptops, mine, my moms, and my sisters. Lastly, on my WiFi we have a Wii. When we were talking about different networks in class, i learned a lot. I had no idea that there were so many different cords or so many different things that could be in your home network. For example i didn't know about Ethernets, or Airport express'. I think that if I had to tell people about having an ISP, I would tell them to go and look at all the cords they have, and to see what each thing is connected to the other. I would also tell them that it gets very easy, if you break it down, and you do what we did with the charts.
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Who are you talking to? tú vs. Ud

Posted by Avery Monroe in Spanish 1 - Manuel on Tuesday, October 23, 2012 at 2:02 pm
There is a difference between tú? and Ud.? When you are talking to your amigos (friends), or just somebody your age or younger you ask a question with tu? but when you are talking to somebody superior you say Ud.? to show respect. 

Remember
tú is for friends
usted shows respect

 Click HERE and HERE  to see videos of a student talking to their best friend vs. talking to a grown up.
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Qu dia es hoy? What day is it today?

Posted by Avery Monroe in Spanish 1 - Manuel on Tuesday, October 23, 2012 at 1:41 pm
What you need to know
The days of the week
What order they go in

Make sure to remember
They days of the week en español don't start with Sunday, they start on Monday

To ask you say "¿Qué dia es hoy?". That means "What day is it?". To answer the question you have to say "Es..." than say the day. "Es..." means "It's..." in spanish. 


 The Days of The Week

In Spanish and English

lunes

Monday

martes

Tuesday

miérocoles

Wednesday

jueves

Thursday

viernes

Friday

sábado

Saturday

domingo

Sunday


HERE is a video of when you would need this for a real life situation.
If you were in a spanish speaking country, and you wanted to know what day it was.
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