Madeline -- Blogmeister

Misunderstanding

The Pearl River. In some places quiet, calm, peaceful. In others, swirling, deep, dangerous, deadly.

Grandpa used to tell us that some of the Greatest swimmers of Mississippi drowned in this river. The swimmers faced a few challenges while swimming here: the currants were strong, there were many black abysses known as sinkholes, over 10 feet deep. They would never get out of these sinkholes.

I used to think these were just tales to keep us kids out of the water unless and adult was watching us. But then, my brother almost died. Or so I thought.

I was in the river with my grandfather, re-baiting the trot-lines. My brother, Hayden, was on the bank of the river looking at rocks and occasionally jumping into the river if it got too hot.

Hayden swam over to us, too short at the time to touch the bottom of the river.

"Madie, I want to go back to the camp," he whined.

"Just wait. We're almost finished." I replied.

"No... NOW!" he complained.

"Go away Hayden," I yelled at him.

I watched him swim back to the bank without a second thought. I just went back to putting bait on the hooks.

I heard a familiar bark coming from the direction of the trail, declaring my aunt's arrival. Annie, my Aunt Katie's dog followed her everywhere. My slightly overweight cousin Emily was huffing and puffing not too far behind Katie.

"Hey!" she screamed happily.

BARK! Annie cried almost just as happy.

"Hi Katie," I said. "Wanna help us bait the trot-lines?"

"Sure," she replied." Emily, go play with Hayden."

Emily happily splashed over to where Hayden was. I could see his head floating above the water line.

I went back to baiting my hooks. A few minutes later, Emily came over to me. I started talking to her as I worked not really paying attention to anything else. When I looked up again, something was missing from the landscape. It took me a minute to figure out what. Hayden. He was nowhere to be seen.

A sheer panic hit me like a brick wall. Did't grandpa say that some of the best swimmers died in the river? Well, Hayden was definitely not the best swimmer and he was only seven.

" Emily, where is Hayden?" I asked already freaking out.

"I don't know. the last time I saw him, he was underwater."

Oh no, this cannot be happening. He couldn't have drowned. He just could't. He really that bad of a swimmer. Okay... he learned when he was seven but he still wasn't that bad.

"Madie, I'm sure he just went up the hill to see Julian." she said trying to reassure me. Well, too bad, it wasn't working.

I began running as fast as I could. Uphill. A half -mile. This doesn't really sound that bad b ut when you are crying, tripping over your own feet and you think your brother is dead, yeah, it feels like an eternity.

I ran over the final hill and into the little trailer were we all slept. And there was Hayden, soaking wet, eating ice cream with Julian. Like Emily told me. She was right. Hayden was fine! A puff of breath came out of me. A breath of relief. I ran and hugged him as tightly as I could.

"Why the heck are you crying?" he asked me.

"Because I thought you drowned."

"You're stupid." He smirked.

I just couldn't help laughing. Any other time I would have slapped him across the face.

I learned an important lesson that day: Never make the last thing you say to someone negative or mean. The last thing I said to him was go away, and that would have stayed with me for the rest of my life.

Themes of Red Scarf Girl

In Red Scarf Girl, there are many themes based on family, loyalty, pain, conformity, responsibility and so much more. Out of all these themes, the one that sticks out most in my mind is peer pressure. Throughout the novel, Jiang is faced with the troubles of fitting in. To do this however, she needs to give up her family name and do things that are revolutionary, basically to be Chairman Mao's child. In the beginning of Red Scarf Girl, Ji-Li is one of the most popular kids. She has good grades, she is nice to everyone and people just overall like her (1-37).

Getting towards the middle of the book, things start happening to her family and a da-zi-bao is written about her and a male teacher (49). This sign was written by a student. Another time she realizes that her "friends" don't like her is when the Red Successors, that used to be her friends, tell her about her social status as a landlord's granddaughter (58). Inside her mind, she realizes that her friends have turned against her and are now with Chairman Mao. Jiang also realizes that the only way to have friends is to stop supporting her family. This tie into another theme: loyalty to the family should come first.

By the end of the novel, Jiang begins to understand that her family is more important than fitting in and her number one priority is her family. Peer pressure plays an important role in this book because if Jiang wasn't trying to fit in, she wouldn’t care if she was a landlord's granddaughter or not. Fitting in isn't always the easiest thing to do.

Once a man was walking along a beach. The sun was shining and it was a beautiful day. Off in the distance he could see a person going back and forth between the surf's edge and and the beach. Back and forth this person went. As the man approached, he could see that there were hundreds of starfish stranded on the sand as the result of the natural action of the tide.

The man was stuck by the the apparent futility of the task. There were far too many starfish. Many of them were sure to perish. As he approached, the person continued the task of picking up starfish one by one and throwing them into the surf.

As he came up to the person, he said: "You must be crazy. There are thousands of miles of beach covered with starfish. You can't possibly make a difference." The person looked at the man. He then stooped down and pick up one more starfish and threw it back into the ocean. He turned back to the man and said: "It sure made a difference to that one!"

This story made me think that anyone can make a difference no matter how insignificant. In a way, the one act is significant. I wondered if although I am only 12 yars old if I can make a difference in the world. If I try, I can.

1.) Bullying is when a person intimidates a smaller person to make him/her do something thst that heps the bully.
2.) Some things that may be considered as bullying can include name calling, physical abuse, or even keeping someone out of activities on purpose.
3.)If you are a victim of bullying, you can ignore the bully and not let them bug you, you can get someone else to help you stay away from the bully or most importantly telling an adult about your situation.
4.)To stop bullying, I can stand up for a person who is being bullied. I can not take part in the bullying.I can also support the person being bullied, because if you were being bullied, you would want to know someone is supporting you.

This book is unlike any books I've ever read. Except for the basics of the story: a girl moves to new town, can't make friends, and has a stalker... I finished this book and I really enjoyed the plot. It has an interesting, yet sad, twist at the end. This book was really intriging and kept my attention all the way through the whole thing. I don't agree with the actions of the characters because when the second main character, Pheobe, Sees her mom kissing her stalker, it freaked her out. She assumed that her mom was cheating on her dad but it turned out that the stalker was her step brother. This book reminds me of my own life because I moved to new schools plenty of times and I am quick to assume things.

9- After some consideration, I chose to repick my career. I chose to be a photographer.
10- I redid my KWL chart for photography and I began to find more info.
11- I found all of my interesting facts I enjoyed finding facts about my career and I think they will add to my final paper.
12- Today, I finished the Lpart on the KWL chart. I was excited that I was finished.
13- I began working on my rough draft" My Seach Process" and I'm frustrated because I have no idea what to do...
14- I asked Mrs. Gutsmiedl and now I understand the rough draft better. I'm excited because now I can do my rough draft right.

The new book I am reading is called "Walk Two Moons". I think the book is about a girl who has a story and this girl also has a terrible fear of cars. Although, she is told she needs to go on a 3,000 mile trip to Idaho with her grandparents. I get along best with Sal. This is because I don't like cars either. I think that Sal is going to have to relive her past in need to retell her story to her bored grandparent on that trecherous journey to Idaho. Sal is my age and I also, hate cars. I have stories of my own to tell that intertwine with other people's lives.

February 14th- Today, I did my k&l worksheet and did some of my resarch.

I learned that Francis Scott Key only wrote Defence of Fort M'Henry. He actually experienced the poem and it wasn't just a story that he wrote. And Francis Scott key had 6 daughters and 5 sons.
What I learned a bout the technology is that when you try to communicate with people halfway across the country, it doesn't work out so well. I also learned that the work you do isn't that hard if you are organized.
I learned that if you don't communicate, you will never get your project done correctly.

1. I discovered that the poet(Francis Scott Key)actually experienced this and was a first- hand witness. I was amazed that when the bombs were going off, he was sitting in a building and when the smoke cleared, the first thing he saw was the Flag. This may have occured because the U.S. was such a strong not-yet country that was determined. And the outcome was, that we won.
2. "Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just, And this be our motto:' In God is our trust.'" What this passage means is that we fight for what we believe in and if we can't make it through the war, we are in God's hands.

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