I write to........

I write to practice my English writing and English. Since my first language is not English, I don't know a lot of vocabularies. Sometimes, when people talked to me with some difficult vocabularies, I couldn't answer. While I am writing every time, I would check the dictionary. Dictionary "taught" me a lot of new words. Then I write them down. I would also check for same meaning different words so my passage will be more interesting. Writing helps me a lot to increase my knowledge towards English. Writing is very important since I have to write essays for University or even for my future career.

Creating a blog

I haven't been using blogs for ages. What I shared in my blog when I was young were things happened in my daily life. This is the first time I'm using a blog to share my work, reflections and views. This is a new experience for me and I really like it. I hope to share more with you guys and everyone's blogs are amazing that I've learned something new again from you all :)

I QUIT!!

Mr. Round was really brave to tell us what is happening to the public schools. Schools should not be treating students like they are robots. They have to eat, they have to communicate with each others, they have so much to learn in school, and not only texts. As they said, they were making the children lifelong learners, why would the school system change to such horrible things?

Students are not going to school to learn how to write a test and get into Universities. Even they know how to take a test and get perfect marks, they still don't understand deep in the contents. If they don't understand, how can they survive for four years of University study? School should have thought of it.

I hate how school treats students like they are not a normal being. They need to learn by their whole life. Schools should have use the students and parents' perspective and to understand how they will think about this system. Lifelong learners should always be the way to teach the students.

Education?

Education is for everyone in any generations. Everything happens in our daily lives is an education. Things happen for a reason, we always learn something in what happened. Education is not just for children academically or other activities after school, but even for elderly, also be educated everyday.

Lightbulb Moments

                  English made a lot of lightbulb moments in my life. My father is good at English. He speaks well, write well, read well. When the first time I got back to Hong Kong from Canada for Christmas holiday, my father tried to speak English with me. He kept saying that my English improved a lot. I was really happy hearing this.
                  There was a foreigner visiting Hong Kong and didn't know where to go. He asked me and I used complete sentence to answer him. When I was young, I could just say a little bit of vocabularies, but now I can speak full sentence which I felt proud of myself
                   English really helps me a lot and I have more self-confidence. I feel really grateful that people knowing my improvement.

I am from...

Book Poem

I am from a weird but interesting factory,

The first and only child winning,

And got the prize.

Living in the factory happily forever.

I am from the a stupid family,

Thinking I am an idiot.

But I write, I read, I am smart.

Parents are arrested, leaving me with my best teacher.

I am from a Magical School.

With the highest power,

And my two best friends,

Fighting for peace.

I am from the wardrobe,

That can go to another space.

The Great Lion King,

Killed the evil Witch.

I am from the tragic car crash of my parents.

Living with my Grandmother,

And learnt how to recognize witches,

To become the killer of the Witches.

I am from my mother’s stomach,

Were runt and helped the farmer’s daughter.

The spider’s web saved me,

And win to become famous.

I am from the field,

Have a dream of settling down on a piece of land,

And to touch the soft rabbit.

Accidentally break a woman’s neck,

By touching her hair and scared by her scream.

Dear you...

Dear Matilda,

            Hello Matilda, I am Audrey. I am writing you this letter to say goodbye to you. You are the first character in a book I’ve liked and the first book I read since I was Grade 4.

            I remember I have read Matilda for at least 10 times when I was young because I admire your braveness and your smartness. You parents were the worst parents I’ve ever seen in my life. They didn’t care about you and didn’t understand you. They were being rude to you by calling you idiot. However, you won’t get mad by them, you tricked them. You were so brave because I could never do that to my parents. I always wish I could be as brave as you, but I couldn’t until I turned 14. In the past, I did whatever they wanted me to do. I really want to be as smart as you! You were only 4 years old but you knew how to read a book that I think it is difficult and too much for me to read. I tried hard to read but I was still not interested in reading. My parents forced me to read, so I did not understand what were the novels talking about because I did not want to read them. Even though I knew that reading is important and helpful for improving my English, I still refused reading. My parents and teacher said I am smart, but I don’t think I am. So I treated you as my example. Reading is not boring for me now. At least I can finish the book and understand clearly what the author wanted to show us. I will not reject reading anymore. Reading really made my English improve a lot.

            I have to thank you that you have come into my life. I am glad that you’ve changed me. It is sad that you are leaving. You have affected me so much. I will never forget about you and how you have changed me to a better person. I will do even better in the rest of my life. Thank you so much and hope to see you in our next life.

Your Sincerely,

Audrey

Learning English without imagination?

              

                         I disagree that American literature classics have to be replaced by insulation manuals and plant inventories in US classrooms by 2014. By reading fictions, students can find more fun than reading “informational texts” so that they won’t get bored in class. Most of the fictions are some pictures that the authors made them up, so students have more opportunity to imagine the images of the moments. This is a good way to train the students to imagine because if we want to understand something, we have to have a snapshot in our mind so that we can know what it is talking about clearly. There are themes for every book. By finding the themes out we will know more about the purpose of the author. In the passage, it mentioned about Jamie Highfill, a teacher from high school said, "I'm afraid we are taking out all imaginative reading and creativity in our English classes.” Being creative is really important to students. Schools cannot just use non-fictions texts to ensure that kids can get a job in the future. English is important, it is a international language, but we don’t learn it just to get a job. We learn it also to train our imagination and creativity. Many programs in university needs imagination and creativity to study. For example, art. If you are not creative, you have no imagination; you cannot finish a piece of art that is good, interesting but tells people the purpose of it.

            This is not a good idea to ensure students getting a job in the future. Our world is full of art. We should be more creative and imagine more so we can find out more things around us. 

Memorable. (incomplete)

4) Compile list of details, phrases, moment, etc. from the first list.

Matilda:

-       Matilda, a genius girl.

-       Wealthy parents oblivious to their daughter’s prodigious skills and view her as foolish and idiotic.

-       Sweet, loving schoolteacher Miss Jennifer Honey.

-       Parents running from police, Matilda lives with Miss Honey.

Of Mice and Men:

-       Two migrant field workers in California during the Great Depression.

-       George Milton and Lennie Small 

The Books!

1) Quick snapshot/list of novels, plays, poetry, characters, settings:

Death of the Salesman

The Reader

Lord of the flies

Macbeth

Charlotte’s Web

Charlie in the Chocolate Factory

The Witches

Nardia

Matilda

Of mice and men

The Twelfth Night

2) Reflect/Respond to this exposure

-       What was your experience?

-       What did you learn, feel?

-       Effects? (noun.)

-       Affect (verb.)

Matilda

Matilda is a book that I’ve read for many times when I was in elementary school. I didn’t really like to read. However, I started to like it when I first read it. Matilda is a genius and brave girl. She has started reading since she was two. Her family thinks she is a freak and idiot because she read books every second, everyday. I wanted to be the same as her because I didn’t like to read books. I felt like I wasn’t being a good student and not smart enough2. This was the first book I read that I really liked. I always feel proud of myself that I’ve started reading book because of Matilda, and proud of myself that I’ve read Matilda. It made me started like to read stories and novels.

Of Mice and Men

This is a book that I read in Grade 10. It is a touching, sad and adventureful story. I’ve learnt the friendship between the two men that are suffering from poverty. I felt really bad when I saw them having living difficulties and when one of them died. It affects me a lot because I put a high value on friendships.

3) What is the value of this exposure? Why is English the only mandatory course throughout all grades in high school?

First of all, English is a international language. Everyone needs to know English so to communicate with people from other countries. Secondly, by reading English books, we can find out themes that the authors want to show us that are connected to our life. Students can understand more about lives by the stories even some of them are not real, but sometimes things can happen like the stories dramatically. English books are easier to show the feelings of the characters. Most of the characters from books are human beings like us. We can always feel the same. That can also affect us to know how others lives can be.