Extra Credit Blog: New Years Resoulution

A new year has come upon us, what would we look forward to? I for once thought that if I were to make ANY resolution, I wouldn't keep to that promise. But, I should try again shouldn't I? This year I plan to try to figure out, or have a single clue on what I would want to be when I grow up. On Tuesday, walking with my mother shopping for clothes, she suddenly stopped out of the blue and said " Ting, you should become a fashion designer when you grow up." Since I sill don't know what I want to be when I grow up, I would open up to any suggestions. But, I don't really get what shes going to...saying that I should be a dentist when I become a adult last year, then this year now say that I should be a fashion designer. But, if I were to pick I would want to be a fashion designer. Thing is, I'm pretty sure that fashion designing would be very difficult, plus the fact that I don't think I can sew For now, I'll just keep the thought of learning anything and try to have different jobs to keep me interesting. I personally don't like the fact of thinking a job as a job and that I must do it. More like I would want to be someone who does things willingly and not think, " Oh my! I have to do this and that etc..."

   I thought that a fashion designer would be hard due to the fact of experiencing sewing during 8th grade. Besides I do not think that my artistic skills are good enough, too lazy I guess? Also, the drama that I am watching is called " Tokyo Juliet" is based on fashion designing. I know this sounds really weird, one would think " Why would a drama affect a dream of what you want to be?" I don't know either I just want to experience the life a fashion designer for a day. Dentist? I don't even know if I can get the basics down. I'll just let myself fly to where ever it wants to go to in the future.

Animal Farm Project: Greed for Power

Greed for Power

By: Ting Liao

Animal Farm was once Manor Farm,

but the rebellion changed the animal's fate

the rebellion lead by Snowball

but later Napoleon took over.

Claiming that all animals were equal,

Then why oh why did the pigs

get more than what other animals get

and put above the other animals on the farm?

The windmill, once succeeded was then destroyed

by nature but was blamed on Snowball

if Snowball was the one that came up with the idea

then why oh why would he destroy it?

Rules state that an animal would not behave or participate in any human like thing

then why did Napoleon start trading with their neighboring farm?

Did the animals see what was coming their way?

If they did, they should've formed a rebellion.

"Beasts of England" once a honored song

taught by Old Major then banished from the animals

What would they expect when the symbol

of courage led them to where they were today, banished?

As Napoleon slowly acted as a human being,

what would the animals in the farm think?

Of course, they wouldn't dare rebel, but for once

I thought, what would happen if they rebel.

As they say, as one experiences something,

they will want more.

In this scenario, Napoleon got a taste of power

and later he wanted more power.

As one animal want more power,

the system of treating every one equally is broken.

Poetry Out Loud: Solitude

   So, at first when my english teacher told us to choose a poem from the website poetryoutloud.org, I was clueless on which poem I should recite and remember. There were so many poems that I just randomly picked the ones that had a pretty good tittle. As I looked at the ones that I picked, I saw that they were the ones that I didn't like or didn't make sense to me. Then I scroll down the page and thought about the meaning of the title and found " Solitude" by: Ella Wheeler Wilcox. When I looked at the poem I was freaked out if I could remember any poem by memory at all. Tonight, I took a look at the poem and tried to memorize it by memory and it didn't work really well. But, then I could recite from memory.

   I don't think I have to do many gestures for my poem. Probably I would do gestures sometime in the stanza to show the meaning of that line. But, what I 'm afraid is that I would tense up when I am in front of my classmates and forget my lines. For example, I can put my hand out when the at the part " Sing, and the hills will answer". Also, I can change the pitch or type of voice that I'm using to recite the poem. That is because for every positive thing there's a negative thing that is said about the subject.

   In the poem " Solitude" by Ella Wheeler Wilcox, I feel that she explains the negative and positive things about life and the reaction that we will get if this is the emotion that we show. I really like this poem, because I really agree with the opinions that are stated in the poem. What ever attitude and emotion that you produce on the outside will determine the reaction that you will get from people around. However, there are some people that actually get the opposite reaction of what they expect. For example, there could be a student that wants to get along with her/his classmates. In order to do that they try to be kind to them, but the reaction from their classmates could turn out to be a good or bad one. It varies because of how each person's mind process the emotion or feelings that is given to them.

FIve Part Paragraph Extra Credit

   So far one fourth of the school year has passed during my time at school in my English class, I found that I have developed a little bit on the things I needed to work on. There was one major thing that I needed to work on. That was to stay on topic, looking back on what I said about improvements, I saw that I need to work on my commentaries. I feel that I have improved throughout the year as I got to understand more in depth of a commentary about a concrete detail. Then, there was the transitions that I needed to improve on. I feel that I didn't really improve that much on this skill. But, I think that I should expand my vocabulary more than it is now to help pick transitions. Lastly, the flow of my writing, because to me it flows but when other people read it they say that it doesn't really flow. I think that I have seen why that is, by looking at the essay in another person's eye. Although, I haven't polish my writing skills much, I hope to make more improvements as the school year goes on.

Poetry Out Loud Activites

Part I: Website Cruising

1. "The Metal and The Flower" By: P.K. Page

2. " A Dream Within A Dream" By: Edgar Allan Poe

3. " Fairy Tale Logic" A.E. Stall

4. "Solitude" By: Ella Wheeler Wilcox; "The City of Sleep" By: Rudyard Kipling

Part II:What Do You Think?

Out of the five poems that I read, I thought that the poem that I liked best was Solitude. That is because inside everyone of us, there is a part of our soul that is in solitude. Although most humans don't admit, they are lonely somewhere within themselves. Only one's self can tell, not other people unless you show that on a very large scale. I didn't like the poem called " Fairy- Tale Logic" because I didn't really understand the poem and it seemed so confusing. I would probably study " Solitude" because Wilcox tells the positive side of things but then she also tells the negative side of it too. I don't know if in the eyes of others I connect with the poem, but I feel like I myself do connect with the poem. That is because, usually I would be more interested sitting in the sidelines and watch and if I do join in then I wouldn't want to join in so much. Opinion wise I would feel relax if I were alone, but I would also feel weird having no one near me. In big crowds I would rather be with someone rather than alone. But, if I needed to do something, I would do the task alone since it will be faster.

Part III:Scoring Criteria

I think that based on the " Evaluation Criteria and Tips" PDF document, I think that the two things that will be the easiest would be the ability to not act out the poem and showing that I can connect with the poem. That is because I think that I am more of a still person unless I am bored then I will move around a lot. The two things that I think will be more difficult will be the ability to not only look at the judge but at other people too. Also, the ability to speak loud because to me I already sound like I am yelling when I try to talk loud. But, people end up saying that they can barely hear me.Plus I would be worried about my accuracy when saying the words. For Example, they say that words sometimes get marked down because the recitation is wrong. For me, I feel like I have a Chinese accent so some people don't really understand what I am saying. Because to them it sounds different from what I hear myself say.

Part VI: Videos

Stanley Andrew Jackson: I thought that this poem was successful, because I could feel from his voice the tone of the poem. Also, if I were to just read the poem off something, I wouldn't understand a clue that the poem is about. But when someone actually puts emotions and feelings into the words that it give the audience a sense of what is being said.

Allison Strong: I think that Allison Strong was successful because of the way she recited the poem. Although she was a female you could hear that she was reciting off the poem as a male. It wasn't just the pitch of the voice she is using.But, the feeling that she sent out with the words she said.

Part V:Summary

After spending some time on Poetry Out Loud, I didn't think that the website would have that less. From what I imagined, I thought that there were more selections. I looked at a poem judged by the tittle and when I click to read the poem, it wasn't as good as I thought it was. Maybe it was because I didn't look deep enough to find the meaning of the poem but I didn't really like most of the poems that I looked at. I'm really nervous about the competition, because I'd get embarrassed reciting a poem in front of everyone and my voice isn't very loud. I am planning to memorize " Solitude" because I think that I can remember something better if I can relate to what it means.

Something Interesting

In our discussion "Lobsters" by Howard Nemerov, I heard some interesting ideas and insights that I didn't notice about the poem. For example, when someone mentioned " As he crawls over the shell of a dream resembling himself." At first, I didn't pay much attention to what the poem meant and what that line meant. But, when someone mentioned that part, I started to think what did that line meant. The first thought was that the lobster was just crawling over a rock or something. As we started discussing about that line, we go our heads together and figured out that it means that the lobster is walking over another lobster that is like himself. So it's like a bunch of lobsters just crawling over each other. 

I admit, I'm not much of a person to look deep into a poem. After we had our discussion, I felt that the poem "Lobsters" was the poet's way of explaining how beautiful the lobster is in a somber tone. But, the poet also compares humans to lobsters as if humans weren't as beautiful. Although the poet was describing the lobsters as if they are at a much higher beauty scale than us humans, they are somewhat similar to humans. Like humans they are waiting wonder when their time will come to an end. Usually we humans don't think about these things. But, when in the last two lines " Thinking: There's something underneath the world. The fame beneath the pot that boils the water". It sparks our thoughts about when will our time end? Is there more than what we see and experience right?

5 part paragraph

During the last few weeks that I listened to my peer's paper read aloud, I found that many of the papers had the same things to work on. For example,I found that some of the papers had plot summary in them before or after their quote. Then there were people who had a little bit of problem with one or two mistakes on conventions. Other than that, I don't seem to find anything that my peers needed to work on. Although I thought that there could be a better hook in the topic sentences. On the other hand few people had to work on their concrete details and commentary. There were some commentaries that were kind of plot summaries and not their own thought about the concrete details. Also, the commentaries didn't really tie in with the concrete details.


On my own five part paragraph essay, I found that I had many things to work on. What hit me the worst was how my paper didn't flow easily. I could polish how I worded my sentences and how my sentences were structured. Also,  I can go back and choose better transitions for each point that I was making. My commentaries seemed to waver from what my concrete detail was trying to prove. Maybe I can find better concrete details to support my idea so that I could write more about the topic and I can go deeper on what I was discussing about in my essay.