Exhibition Night...

The date is now April 18, 2008. It is the day after exhibition night for High Tech High. We just got back from cleaning the classrooms and we are now reflecting on all the memories and experiences that we went through last night. As usual, it is impossible to get a word in edge wise when you have a whole class conversations so I kept most of my thoughts to myself. It is still hard to grasp the thought that exhibition nights 2008 has already passed with blazing speeds. It all seemed like a blur to me. Looking back now I can not pick out one certain point in time where I remember anything so clear that I could recite it with clear details. But I do know that we did really well. From everything that I put together. Pretty much the only thing that we did bad and that we could improve on for next exhibition night was that we talked a lot and explained everything in great detail. But luckily we didn’t have to many visitors, with thanks to Allie’s mom. She was standing with us the whole time helping us with our drawings. I don’t know if it was a good thing or a bad thing. Its good because we got a lot of help with working with facial expressions, but nobody would come up to us and ask us questions because I think they didn’t wasn’t to interrupt her. We got “grilled” the hardest by our fellow classmates, and we tried to keep it as professional as possible but as you may have guessed, it got a little unprofessional at times. Overall this was a great learning experience for me, and it greatly prepared me for the exhibitions to come.

Character Updates

This was a very unique and helpful way to assume the mind of our character in order to see how they would act under many different scenarios. This really helped me and partner realize that we need to change some things about our characters to make them more “human.” There were many lessons that we learned from doing this activity. One of the main ones was we learned that our characters are “3D” not “2D.” I am using metaphors to describe what we learned but basically, people weren’t giving enough personality to the characters that they were making up, so by putting them into everyday scenarios, we can see how they would react, and therefore help us get a better understanding of our characters.
I’m not going to go into huge detail into the original story that we are changing. But mainly we added more personality to the mom, we made her more fed up with Robbie’s attitude towards life. See there wasn’t much that we needed to change. When we talked to our teacher she said that we surprisingly already had complex characters compared to most people in our class. There were also some parts in our story that we found that didn’t seem natural. It seemed sort of awkward, and unnatural. That’s pretty much all that we had to change after this exercise. I hope you look forward to reading our graphic novel.

Synopsis

In our story there is a young boy who is struggling in school, he has never found anything that interests him. His mom is getting really frustrated with his grades and his newfound attitude. Then one day his teacher, while Ms. Marie, touches upon a subject that grasps his attention. All of a sudden, while looking at his textbook he briefly notices his mom’s maiden name. Little did he know that the man with his mom’s last name was actually his own great grandfather. He goes home as usual thinking this was simply a coincidence. Then that night, his mom asks him what he learned that day at school, and as usual he responded with a simple “nothing”. It wasn’t until that night after dinner when he was looking in the basement for god knows what, that he finds an old journal. Innocently, he takes it up to his room with the only intention that he needed something to read. In fact he would have never went to go look for that journal if he actually did his homework, but in a way it’s a good thing he didn’t. Without even knowing that this very notebook would change his life, he opened it and began to read it. At first he didn’t know what to think of this new “book” he found in the basement, but after about an hour he begins to realize that this is no book, it’s a journal of one called, Gabriel Kuno. Intrigued with this new journal that he stumbled upon, he went to go show his mom. He then ran downstairs with loads of energy to go show his mom what he had found in the basement. It wasn’t until the next day at school that he started putting everything together, the man in the textbook, the journal, and the fatal blimp explosion. After that day, everyone started noticing a huge change in his behavior and attitude towards life. He was so excited to tell his mom all about how his great grandfather was involved with the Hindenburg, thinking she didn’t already know. She then tells him that his great grandfather is still alive, and if he wanted to talk to him she would take him down to go see him. The truth is, when he was littler, he was never fond of his great grandfather, this is why Amanda was so surprised that Robbie wanted to go see him. This is the first time that Robbie had ever been truly attached to anyone but her, and she was glad that it was with her own grandpa. That night after picking Robbie up from her grandpa’s house she found him asleep with the journal open on his chest. The next day he stays late to show his teacher the journal, and for the next week all he wants to do is read the journal and find out more about his great grandfather. This one journal totally changed his life, and let him realize to not be afraid to get close to people, and for the first time he actually was interested in something.

Character Bio's

Robbie Alan Callaghan: Robbie Alan was born in June 12th 1992, in a hospital somewhere in L.A. He is the first born of two, his sister kaitlyn is three years younger. He found out that his dad died when he was 4, and he closed up. He doesn’t tend to become good friends with anyone. The reason he does this is because he doesn’t want to become to close with someone and then lose them. It seems like he has given up all hope on life, he doesn’t try hard at school, doesn’t really try at anything. All he really does is stay in his room and only comes out for the necessities such as school. His mom respects his decision and realizes that he just needs some time to hopefully get back on his feet.

Kaitlyn Jean Callaghan: Kaitlyn Jean was born February 9th 1995. Unlike her brother Robbie, she is extremely adventurous and isn’t afraid to speak her mind. She is independent and outspoken. Many people find her cute and innocent but once you get to know her you see the real side of her. On first impressions she comes off as being shy and quiet. This is the only thing that she and her brother have in common, they both don’t seem to attach to other people, but kaitlyn actually has friends, and they have learned to respect the fact that they cant be too close with her. Like any girl through, she enjoys hanging out at the mall with her “friends.”

Amanda Belle Callaghan: Amanda is a widowed mom with two kids. She has to work two jobs to keep a steady income. Their family is fairly rich, but she refuses to take money from her parents. She knows that if she does than they will expect something from her in return, she was a slave to them for 18 years, and she didn’t want to go back. Even though she doesn’t have a strong relationship with her parents, she knows that if she was ever in danger she could rely on them to be there for her. Her husband was an innocent bystander who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. He was killed by a stray bullet in a gang fight. When the police delivered the bad news to Amanda, she dropped to her knees and was instantly hit with depression. She had to pull herself together and not loose it because her two kids were standing at the top of the stairs watching. Luckily they were too young to know what truly happened, still to the day they ask what happened to their dad, and each day she comes up with another story to try to hide what really happened. This is a reflection of herself, she is too insecure to face what truly happened. And this is reflected in her everyday life.

Persepolis

1. What is the historical context for the story Persepolis? Discuss the entire history of Iran as told in Persepolis.
So basically, a quick overview of Persepolis is this little girl named Marjane Satrapi lives in Iran around the time of the Iranian revolution. Marji and her parents are protesters; this book is a graphic novel showing their struggles throughout life, and what they go through. The main historical event that affected her life was the Iranian revolution. There are many things that went along with the revolution. Some of which being, Ayatollah Khomeini returning from exile and enforcing the burqua, Iraq invading Iran, and finally the resolution of the fighting. The Iranian revolution really affected her life though; she was only a little girl when the revolution first started. They shut down all bilingual schools including the one that she went to, and enforced the veil. From that point there were demonstrations everyday against the veil and Ayatollah Khomeini/The Shah put into action by the proletariats of Iran. Marjane’s parents were highly active in these protests and when Marjane found out for her self that there were millions of people getting killed, she joined in on the demonstrations.

2. What are the experiences Marji endures in the text and how do those experiences shape her perceptions of her family, her country, and herself?
There are many things that happened to Marjane in her young life, including the demonstrations. The biggest thing that affected her life in my opinion was when Iraq started invading Iran. When this started, every time the sirens went off, everybody in their building had to run into the basement as an attempt to get away. Not only were there bombings everyday, but also all citizens were pretty much striped of their rights and not allowed to do anything. The most moving part of this book was when Marjane noticed that one of the bombs hit in the general area of their house. When she rushes home to see the damage, luckily she notices that it was their neighbors. But when she is walking by the house that was hit, she noticed that her neighbors were home when the bomb hit and Marji could see a bracelet that was given to one of their neighbors. After that, Marji’s parents are sent her to Austria because they didn’t want anything to happen to her. People were already getting arrested and killed for secular actions, and because Marji is becoming a teen her parents realize that she is only going to become more rebellious. Marji knows through that her parents aren’t going to make it through the war, the reason that they are leaving is they consider themselves martyrs are want to go down with their country, fighting the whole way. When she leaves Iran, she gives away all of her stuff including the posters that her dad had to sneak in. This action that was done by her dad was very clandestine and brave, he could have been taken captive and even killed. This sums up what Marji had to go through. The most important lesson that was acquired was she learned to just accept things; she pretty much has to considering that she is in a war. She also had to learn to now be less decadent, now that she has to take care of herself. The amazing part of all this is even though all this is happening Marjane keeps her reservoir of youth and ambition.

3. What do you think happens to Marji when she heads to Vienna? Write the remaining story of her life up unto the time she writes this text in 2002.
This book ends with Marji being sent off to Austria, by her parents at an attempt so save her from the fighting. I could easily read the second book, but that wouldn’t be fun. Its better to make predictions and so when we do read the second book, I can compare what I though was going to happen and what actually did.
My predictions for what is going to happen to Marjane and her family go as follows. I believe that Marji is going to go live with her dad’s best friend as planned, and she finishes college, as planned. While in college though, she meets a man that is going through the same thing as her, being sent to Vienna from Iran. The weird part is that they both grew up in the same neighborhood and saw each other from time-to-time they just never bothered to talk. They end up falling in love, they decide to move back to Iran together, but once they got there, they saw that everything was bombed down, and nothing was surviving from their hometowns, even their parents. It is veritably sad; that this happened because they had worked so hard just do get back to Iran the security guards didn’t want to let them go because they declared that it was unsafe. But in light of that they decide that they cannot stay there, it holds way to many memories from their past. Not only that but the economy is still in terrible shape because of the embargo put on all Iranian ports, in an attempt to stop the war between Iran and Iraq. Marjane then proposes that they move to the United States, seeing as how she always wanted to visit there and now she has to opportunity to live there. They end up getting married and starting a new life in the United States, and she is writing this book in 2002 as a married women with two kids.
Now mind you that this is only what my predictions are for this book, you will have to read the second book to find out what really happens. And between you and me, I cant wait to see what adventures Marji gets into.

16 = Voting???

Today in class we had a seminar based off the article of text that we read in preparation for our discussion. The article that we read and annotated was titled “You’re 16, You’re Beautiful, and You’re a Voter”. This text was all about Anya Kamenetz’s (The author) thoughts on lowering the legal voting age. The reason that we read this article was because we have been looking at the presidential election for about two weeks now. It seems only right to discuss topics that relate to voting, that will be affecting us in the near future.
After we read this, we combined all of our own thoughts and had a discussion on it. The class was split into two groups based on gender, and held two different conversations. In our group, I was the discussion leader. The point of having a discussion leader is to guide the conversation along. There were often times in the conversation were I was needed to bring it back to the text. I actually liked being the moderator for our group because I like having the responsibility of where our conversation goes.
Some of the most important ideas that were contributed to our conversation were; Lower voting age but still keep restrictions, Only allow devoted teens to vote, Not only test underage voters but voters of all ages to insure people actually know what they are voting on. During our actual seminar, everybody was very polite and was conscious of everybody thoughts. The only thing that could have changed was there were a few times were people weren’t waiting for others to talk, and shooting down ideas. That is not the point of Socratic seminars, the whole intentions of doing this activity is to learn about all the points of view regarding multiple topics.
Definitely there were some things that needed to be changed on the teachers end. One of which being, next time the teacher needs to tell us when to start wrapping up our conversations. We were late to our next class because our teacher lost track of time. Also, i don’t think that we should of split the groups up based on gender, only because each gender has different points of views, that should be integrated with others.
Overall I think that this was one of my most enjoyable seminar. Only because everyone was for the most part respectful of others, and we brought many great ideas to the table.

SAT 7-Barack the vote

A fellow classmate of mine said, “No wonder a lot of students are pumped up over voting and making a difference, Barack Obama has that effect on youth. I never cared about politics but Barack has a way with words that make you want to make a difference.” I think that this quote is very true, Barack Obama is a very progressive leader and is ready for change. “Obama radiates the new. He doesn’t just talk about change; he looks like change.” This quote pretty much sums up Barack Obama, we need a new face in office, and for years it’s only been Bush’s and Clinton’s. It’s time for change. Because he is a liberal and “hip” candidate he appeals to most modern teenagers. He is destine to revive our country to its previous standing, and undo all the bad that our incumbent president-George Bush-has already done.
I personally do not agree with the mass population of the youth. I am actually against Barack, he has no experience to back up his thoughts. Hilary Clinton isn’t as appealing because she is older, but that just means that she has more experience and knowledge. Although I am not in favor of Barack, I think he is just what our county needs to get the youth excited about voting again. The last big thing that got the youth voting was the youth suffrage act. This time it may be Barack Obama. There are many coalitions being created at collage campuses, and websites devotion their time to raise money for the Barack campaign. So as you can see many teenagers are getting fired up about this upcoming election. Everybody keeps saying that Barack is winning over the youth, but that’s not going to win him the election, there are also many adults that are voting in this election. A recent survey given by TIME magazine showed that Barack Obama had more youth votes than all the conservative republican candidates put together. This says many things, one of which being that since teenagers want change, and since Obama represents change the most, most teenagers will vote for him. One of the republican candidates is even evangelical. That means that they take gods word to the grave. They believe that god’s word is law and they think that anybody who breaks the “law” should be punished accordingly.
In conclusion, Barack Obama’s polices appeal to the young constituents in the United States, and getting them to vote for him.