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Understanndrealitiesof Alternative Education Students School Life
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The book that I chose to do is Street Pharm by Allison van Diepen, the book has 297 pages, the reason I chose this book is personally I am tired novels taking place years before I am born. This novel pertains to urban problems and one kids' attempt to survive in the pressures of present day Brooklyn. Within the novel, there are several subplots, one being his love interest, Alyse, and Ty's fight to stay in school. As well as, his fight not to lose money or control of his territory. It is interesting to watch this young man, balance these things in his life and not let them interfere with each other.
Ty Johnson has learned business from his father he knows how to survive in the real world, to take care of problems on the spot. He has everything in control and knows the way to run things. He is intelligent, patient, and skillful, everything he needs when he inherited his father's business. Ty recently got kicked out of the conventional high school, and is attending an alternative school where if he cuts class without a doctor's note, he may be expelled. School becomes better for him as he meets a girl named Alyse, they begin studying together, and Ty actually does well in his classes. After being friends with Alyse, Ty asks her out on a date. They end up going to a very high-end restaurant that Ty insists on going to, just because the food was worth it.
In the article Skin Deep written by Nina Jablonski and George Chaplin, they discuss and look deeper into the diverse differences in skin color. Our skin color has developed over the years to be dark enough to prevent the damaging sunlight that has been harming our skin and the nutrient folate that it carries. At the same time out skin is light enough to receive vitamin D.
The fourth Chapter of Estella Blackburn’s non fiction novel Broken lives “A Fathers Influence”, exposes readers to Eric Edgar Cooke and John Button’s time of adolescence. The chapter juxtaposes the two main characters too provide the reader with character analyses so later they may make judgment on the verdict. The chapter includes accounts of the crimes and punishments that Cooke contended with from 1948 to 1958. Cooke’s psychiatric assessment that he received during one of his first convictions and his life after conviction, marring Sally Lavin. It also exposes John Button’s crime of truancy, and his move from the UK to Australia.
As the protagonist, Taylor leads a life far from the ordinary, and gains matures and gains worldly knowledge through a journey most couldn't dream of. Deciding to leave her home in Pittman County, Kentucky she was the one to get away, both in mind and body. The culture of where she grew up didn't fit her personality, and she decided she wouldn't let herself fall into the life of the other people in her town. She bought a car and hit the road, with no plan or destination to adhere to. This journey shows the type of personality she possesses, and throughout the journey how it advances. Taylor was already quite an admirable person, and she already possessed many good traits. She was already independent and knew there was more to see in the world than what there was in Pittman County. She knew that there was room for improvement and infinite things to learn in the world, she just didn't know what they were. Sadly, most of what she lea...
In the beginning of the story the main character, Fever Crumb, is rational and reasonable. “Then there was her hair, or rather, lack of hair. The order was keen to hurry humankind into the future, and they believed that hair was unnecessary. Fever shaved her head every other morning.” (8). This quote shows how Fever is rational because she removes things from her life that have more to do with comfort and beauty, which she believes to be irrational, than have to do with usefulness. Fever has been sheltered from irrational things for most of her life so when she is thrust into the city of normal people she doesn't understand why they have or do irrational things. In the end of the book she doesn’t have the same disapproval of irrational things as she does in the beginning. “Fever touched her fuzzy scalp, and tried out a smile. “I’m planning to grow it out.”(324) This shows that Fever doesn’t mind irrational things anymore. Her shaved head was a symbol that she did not fall victim to comfort and beauty but now she is growing her hair back. Initially when Fever interacts with other people she is usually not shy and she will tell them if they are doing something irrational unless she can sense that it has a lot of meaning to them but by the end she no longer cares.
In the novel, Beauty by Robin Mc Kinley, the family of a wealthy merchant looses their wealth when the shipment boats get lost at sea. There are three daughters named Hope, Grace, and Honour, whom is nicknamed Beauty, and a father. The family is forced to move to the country and start a life more modest than accustomed. After the family adapts to country life, one of the older sisters gets married to an iron worker who used to work at the shipyard owned by the father. They have babies. Life goes on in the country.
Each person has a place that calls to them, a house, plot of land, town, a place that one can call home. It fundamentally changes a person, becoming a part of who they are. The old summer cabins, the bedroom that was always comfortable, the library that always had a good book ready. The places that inspire a sense of nostalgic happiness, a place where nothing can go wrong.
Traditions, heritage and culture are three of the most important aspects of Chinese culture. Passed down from mother to daughter, these traditions are expected to carry on for years to come. In Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club, daughters Waverly, Lena, Rose and June thoughts about their culture are congested by Americanization while on their quests towards self-actualization. Each daughter struggles to find balance between Chinese heritage and American values through marriage and professional careers.
The book that I found interesting to read and write about for this class was The Cocaine Kids; The Inside Story of a Teenage Drug Ring, by Terry Williams, published in the year 1989. Deciding what book to read for this class was rather difficult for me, I had purchased and started reading two other books before noticing they weren’t that compelling and fascinating. Then I finally came across The Cocaine Kids. What I found most intriguing after reading just the introduction was that Williams wasn’t trying to support any particular theory. I liked the fact that he was an open-minded individual who desired answers to his questions.
In the essay “Everything Now” Signs of Life in the USA: Readings on Popular Culture for Writers, author Steve McKevitt blames our unhappiness on having everything we need and want, given to us now. While his writing is compelling, he changes his main point as his conclusion doesn’t match his introduction. He uses “want versus need” (145) as a main point, but doesn’t agree what needs or wants are, and uses a psychological theory that is criticized for being simplistic and incomplete. McKevitt’s use of humor later in the essay doesn’t fit with the subject of the article and comes across almost satirical. Ultimately, this essay is ineffective because the author’s main point is inconsistent and poorly conveyed.
Throughout a lifetime, one can run through many different personalities that transform constantly due to experience and growing maturity, whether he or she becomes the quiet, brooding type, or tries out being the wild, party maniac. Richard Yates examines acting and role-playing—recurring themes throughout the ages—in his fictional novel Revolutionary Road. Frank and April Wheeler, a young couple living miserably in suburbia, experience relationship difficulties as their desire to escape grows. Despite their search for something different, the couple’s lack of communication causes their planned move to Europe to fall through. Frank and April Wheeler play roles not only in their individual searches for identity, but also in their search for a healthy couple identity; however, the more the Wheelers hide behind their desired roles, the more they lose sense of their true selves as individuals and as a pair.
The next book I read was The Giver by Lois Lowry which I actually bought a couple years ago at a book fair. It sat on my shelf for two years then it was recommended to me again, so this time I read it. I ended up liking it so much I contacted the author via email and asked if she would ever consider selling the movie rights. She replied and said that the movie rights have been sold and there’s a movie in the making. The story is about a boy named Jonas living in the perfect utopia where there is no war, no crime, and no hate. The ceremony of twelve’s is very soon and that is the most important ceremony of all; it is when your assignment or job for life is decided. Little does Jonas know that he is about to receive the most important assignment of all. Shortly after the assignment is given he meets The Giver. This sci-fi book is one of the best books I’ve read and is also a Newberry Award winning book.
Sidewalk is a book written by Mitchell Duneier, an American sociology professor at Princeton University, in 1999; where the book has gained a lot of favorable reviews, leading its winning the Los Angeles Times Book prize and C. Wright Mills Award. Similarly, the book had become a classic in urban studies, especially due to the interesting methodology, which was used by Duneier while he was conducting his research. The book is based on observations, participant observation and interviews, which gave the author the ability to live and interact with the book and magazine vendors on daily bases. Although, this gave him an insight into the life of the sidewalk, many methodological issues have concerned scholars and students of sociology since the day this book was published. Duneier had admitted during the book that he couldn’t be completely subjective while conducting his research and writing his book due to his involvement and personal relationship with people who work and live at the sidewalk, which raise the question, whether the research is still relevant if the researcher is only giving us an objective outcome?
Who is the birthday party a rite of passage for, the birthday boy or his mother?
Powder, a short story written by Tobias Wolff, is about a boy and his father on a Christmas Eve outing. As the story unfolds, it appears to run deeper than only a story about a boy and his father on a simple adventure in the snow. It is an account of a boy and his father’s relationship, or maybe the lack of one. Powder is narrated by a grown-up version of the boy. In this tale, the roles of the boy and his father emerge completely opposite than what they are supposed to be but may prove to be entirely different from the reader’s first observation.
For my book I chose to read The Body by Stephen King. This novel is about four young boys taking a journey to find a body somewhere in the woods that is at the county line. This story is about more than just four boys going on an adventure its about them becoming closer to each other and learning real life lessons along the way. The four boys are all going into their first year of middle school so this is a time in their life when they learn things that will help them in life.