Category: Humanities

Final Giver Essay

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Name: Kaya                                             Humanities

7th Grade                                                                         The Giver

The Giver’s World: How the People see it… Or don’t see it

In The Giver by Lois Lowry, Jonas lives in a utopia… or does he?Jonas has followed the rules ever since he was born until he is told that the rules are a thing from the past. He became the apprentice of the Giver. He discovered the cruelty and the happiness of the past. His life changed forever, but his friends don’t feel the pain or the love and don’t know how to relate. Jonas has feelings that are slipping out. Jonas’s society is a dystopia because people are ignorant to the rules, have no knowledge of the world around them, and are forced to be obedient.

The community is ignorant and kept in the dark by a higher power known as the Elders. Most of the community is oblivious to the way the Elders control people. The Elders keep them obedient with rituals each day. One of those rituals is that everyone is assigned a job. On pg.105 of The Giver, Lowry writes, “Oh, your instructors are well trained. They know their scientific facts. Everyone is well trained for his job.” This shows how the community makes sure that everybody has the perfect job for them. Something that they are good at and will be successful with. The Elders watch every child from a young age strategically opening doors into their future. They do all of this to create a utopia. Many people in the community don’t know about pain and emotion do to the pill they take. The community is ignorant and don’t know how pain feels except for the Giver and now, Jonas.

Knowledge is very important but, not many people in Jonas’s community have it. In this utopia, only a small amount of people have knowledge. Most just follow the rules given to them. On page 78, in The Giver, “And punishment for disobedience-” This shows that the community has to be obedient. They don’t have a choice to be truly free because they are obedient. There are so many rules to follow that nobody can feel free. Therefore much of the community are not aware of being imprisoned by rules.

This society is not a utopia because the people are ignorant, they have no freedom of choice and the community is shut out and locked away in this world they call a utopia. A utopia is a place where everybody knows the truth, where the truth is happiness, where everybody is held at the same standard. In Jonas’s community none of these things are relevant in his world. They are kept ignorant and don’t know what the penalties are for being different. This is a community where people are brainwashed and told to be obedient to the endless rules. This world is far from a perfect, infact it is simply a fantasy image.

Giver Essay 2016

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Outline for GIVER LITERARY ESSAY

Themes: Ignorance v. Knowledge

Paragraph #1: Introductory Paragraph (GIT)

Grabber Statement (G): In the Giver by Lois Lowry Jonas lives in a utopia… or does he?

Introduce Plot Summary (I): In the Giver, Jonas has followed the rules ever since he was born until he is told that the rules are a thing from the past. He became the “apprentice” of the Giver. He dicovered the cruelty and the happiness of the past. His life changed forever, but his friends don’t feel the pain or the love and don’t know how to relate. Jonas has feelings that are slipping out.

Thesis Statement (T): Jonas’s society is a dystopia because people are ignorant to the rules and are forced to be obedient.

_________________________________________________________________________

Paragraph #2: Thematic Analysis

Topic Sentence (T): The community is ignorant and kept in the dark by a higher power known as the Elders.

Explanatory Sentence (E): Most of the community is oblivious to the way the Elders control people. The Elders keep them obedient with rituals each day.

Evidence (E): One of those rituals is that everyone is assigned a job. On pg.105 of the Giver, Lowry writes, “Oh, your instructors are well trained. They know their scientific facts. Everyone is well trained for his job.”

Analysis (A): This shows how the community makes sure that everybody has the perfect job for them. Something that they are good at and will be successful with. The Elders watch every child from a young age strategically opening doors into their future. They do all of this to create a utopia. Many people in the community don’t know about pain and emotion do to the pill they take.

Concluding/ Transition (C): The community is ignorant and don’t know how pain feels except for the Giver and now, Jonas.

__________________________________________________________________________

Paragraph #3: Thematic Analysis Continued

Topic Sentence (T): Knowledge is very important but, not many people in Jonas’s community have it.

Explanatory Sentence (E): In this utopia, only a small amount of people have knowledge. Most just follow the rules given to them.

Evidence (E): On page 78, in the Giver, Lois Lowry, “And punishment for disobedience-”

Analysis (A): This shows that the community has to be obedient. They don’t have a choice to be truly free because they are obedient. There are so many rules to follow that nobody can let go.

Concluding/ Transition (C): Therefore many are not aware of being improsoned by rules.

__________________________________________________________________________

Paragraph #4: Concluding Paragraph (ROC)

Reflection of Thesis (R): This society is not a utopia becuase the people are ignorant, they have no freedom of choice and the community is shut out and locked away in this world they call a utopia, which it is not.

Concluding Sentence– Comparisons and Connections (C): A utopia is a place where everybody knows the truth, where the truth is happiness, where everybody is held at the same standard. In Jonas’s community none of these things are relevant in his world. They are kept ignorant and don’t know what the penalties are for being different. This is a community where people are brainwashed and told to be obedient to the endless rules. This world is far from a perfect, infact it is simply a fantasy image.

Poems

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The creeping trees

Trees reach up and up,

Until they touch the  gray sky,

they will keep reaching.

 

The hoof of a horse

Horse

Hooves fly

over the ground

and through the forest

run.

Wind flys through the air,

unseen and mysterious,

it will blow you away.

For both poems the inspiration was nature. The first one, “the creeping trees” is a haiku. For a haiku the first line is five syllables then seven then five again. Well I think there is a little bit of imagery, line breaks and rhythm. I am okay how my poems turned out. I proud because I think that they are simple and short but also represent something.

Humanitie’s Writing

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I love free writing and my most recent finished piece is here:

Tree

A tree. That is what I am. I feel the light breeze race through my branches. The birds are my friends. They sing and make homes on me. I live on dirt softened by the deer leaping by me. I live in the mountains and love where I am. In fact, that is all I need. I am tall enough to see up above the other trees. At night the stars twinkle on my branches and glow like fireflies on my leaves.

The winter was coming. The days ended early and the animals were gone. My leaves fell to the ground and covered the dirt around me. I heared growls of machines and rumbling of trucks. The knots on my wood tightened. The world went dark. I rolled side to side in a truck with locks holding the back closed. The truck stopped and my rolling slowed. Two men, both quite fat in overalls and  plaid jackets grabbed me. One of his hands was cold like ice and his face looked like a pink boar’s face. The man’s teeth were yellow, going on brown and his fingers cracked from the cold air. He lay me down and grabbed an axe that sparkled in the winter light. The man lifted the axe high above his head and let it fly down to hit my bark. I rolled a bit, he laid down his foot and lifted the axe again. He hit the top point of his leather boot. It missed his foot by a little and trimmed his sock. I rolled but one of my branches stopped me from getting away. I waited for the man to come back but he didn’t.

Man

The tree slipped away from my axe. My foot stuck out from my boot like a fox in a hole. I let the tree roll down and looked at my trimmed wool sock. I saw the unraveling. I walked with toes so cold you could see frost on them. The pair of boots I was wearing was the only pair that I had. I wasn’t happy, I wasn’t mad but the sorrow in my soul let a tear roll down my face. The tear dropped onto the ice and froze.

Tree

I waited for hours and felt my branches stiffen and fall. I heard the howling of dawn circling the sky. The night’s air was frigid and I could hear the stocking up on food inside me; so when the storms came they would have a surplus. The next morning I saw a white layer of snow covering most of me excluding my branches. I saw the mountain goats racing up the mountain in the distance. I waited some more and let the snow fall onto my surface. The sky went black with glimmering snow racing down. The man never came.

Man

I stayed in my little cabin and warmed up my toes by my fire. I made a mug of tea and watched it simmer. I sat down in my rocking chair and took out a book from the creaky wooden shelf. Its dust coated my wrinkled hand. I opened a chest and took out a hand woven blanket. I put the book back and threw the blanket on the ground. Then I lay down on my bed and fell asleep. At midnight I sit up abruptly and coughed up my breath.

Tree

I saw another man. He picked me up. He had rosy cheeks and blue eyes like a mountain stream. The man’s hair was light brown. You could see his breath. It  looked like a cloud in the air, rolling out of his mouth and disappearing. A big dog followed him, a foxhound. It pranced along his side and looked around for game. The man leaned me against his 1950 Chevrelot truck. He grabbed a hook and connected a trailer. He put me in it and locked the back. His hound jumped in the front of the truck and so did he. The truck’s engine rumbled and let out a puff of smoke making it hard to see the mountains in the background. I felt lost. The truck’s wheels started to roll. The spot where metal hit my hard wood bark was chipped and it banged against the back, denting it. The chips of bark fell into the grooves of the truck. The truck stopped and caused one more dent in the back. The man put me down. I rolled and managed to see the other man; the one that looked a like a boar. He signaled the same man to come. The man dropped me and let the bark crack and peel off. I heard the strong oaks surrounding us laugh at the man’s hasty actions. It felt like he knocked the wind out of me as I had the same feeling that humans do when gasping for air.

Man

I called my nephew. He dropped the tree and trotted over. The man panted and seemed to be out of shape. The fat man gave the nephew his axe. The nephew raised the axe high and let it fall. The sound of metal on wood was hollow. It echoed through the forest and gave him chills. He chipped and hacked at my wood until I was reduced to 8 pieces of lumber. The wind whistled and managed to release a whisper that tickled the ears of anything near by.

Tree

The man straightened the rocks in a ring. Inside the ring was ash and charcoal. It was black, white and grey. Pieces of newspaper flapped back and forth with the wind. The man grabbed a match and lit the paper on fire. The flames rose, letting off heat and then vanished. The wind picked up the newspaper and ripped it into shreds. The man grabbed two pieces of me. He threw me in the fire! I burned with noises inside me screaming in my ears. The sap bubbled out turning into nothing. My bark fell off hissing in the fire. The fire rose up and the man kept throwing more pieces of wood. They landed hard on top of me. Sparks flew off and landed on the man’s jeans. I burned until I was black and as useless as the newspaper. I flew and landed in the field on the grass next to a deer. Then I vanished too, just like the flames.

∴ ∴ ∴

 

 

Ashokan

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At Ashokan I went canoeing and saw a baby turtle. I learned a lot when we did the survival class. My group made a lean to and it was covered in bark and leaves. On the first day I found a toad and saw a snake. When I was canoeing I crashed into a branch. My arms got really tired. When I went blacksmithing I made a fire poker. Thsi year we got to do blacksmithing and the ropes course.

Beowulf Annotation Summary

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Annotating Beowulf was hard because most of the book is important so I tried not to underline everything. I really like the book but annotating is also really hard because of the chapter summary you have to do when you finish the chapter. You have to write one sentence to summarize when your done. It is challenging because their is not just one piece of information in the chapter there is a lot of it and you really have to think about what you want the chapter summary to be. That is why I think annotating is a challenge.  FullSizeRender

Kaya Free Writing

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There is a farm. The farm is in England, it has some sheep and a horse. A girl lives there with her step-dad, younger stepbrother, and step-mom. The girl is tall and slim. She has blue eyes, dark brown hair, a freckled face and reins in her hand. She rushes to the stable and puts the reins on the horse. She gets on and the horse and starts to walk. The horse rears and gallops to a path in the forest. The horse does not stop and continues to gallop through creeks and mud. Then the horse halts at an old cottage up in the mountains, it has moss on the roof and in the cupboard a jar of berry preserves and some french bread.

 

Then the girl walks to the back of the cottage where there stands a garden. A smile slips out of her mouth as she bends down to get a bucket of oats sitting against the house. She walks back into the house reaching for a pot and fills it with water. She puts half the bucket of oats in the hot water and gives the rest to the horse. The horse digs it’s mouth into the bowl of dry oats. The girl walks to one of the many trees blocking the bright sun. She picks an apple off the tree, takes a bite, then throws it to her horse. She goes to sit down but then hears something hit the ground and people screeching in terror.

 

The girl jumps on the horse and gallops back towards her farm. The land has dirt erupting out of the ground. The ground shakes every once in a while. Then in the distance there is a airplane bomber coming closer. The girl gets the horse to gallop to the house. The girl jumps off the horse and rushes to the house. She grabs her dad’s saddlebag and stuffs in a handkerchief, a few teabags, three apples, carrots and a bag of oats. She scouts the house and finds her dad and mom dead. She looks for her brother and finds him in her room now destroyed and dirty. She grabs his hand and he shakes. He is scared. He opens his mouth to talk but nothing comes out. She leads him outside. She lifts him onto her horse and gets on too. She runs toward the town. When she gets to the town she grabs her brother and puts him on the boat to New York. She canters to the middle of town where the army is gathered for new recruits and horses. Two men come close and grab the reins and halter. They push her off onto the cobblestone walkway. She screams at them, then two other men come and grab her arms to hold her back. She tries to break out of their tightening grip. But they stand their ground and drop her arms.

 

The horse puts up a fight and kicks its back legs up. Then the army men load the girl’s horse into a horse trailer. The bombing has stopped temporarily. The girl stands up and walks behind the army men. She hears them say that they are headed to France because it is a border of Germany. She goes to the train station and gets a ticket for the next train to France. That night the girl is back at home packing food and her mother’s book which is called, Life in Upstate NY, which is where she sent her brother.

 

When morning came she gets up and ran to the train station. The girl got on and took a deep breath and sat on the worn out leather booth. She decides to lay down on the couchette. She is tired, but she knows she has to get her horse back. She does not have a choice, her horse was everything, no, is everything. The train ride is longer than usual, the usual time is three to four hours but now it is eight hours. Finally, when the train ride is over she runs off the train eating some oats. When she gets off she sees army men everywhere. She looks for the horse trailer but no luck. The girl barely has any money, she spent most of it on the train ride to France. She has a little left, enough for two days of food, water and shelter. But again, she does have emergency money that she hid in her old broken down boots. She walks through the army men squeezing by so slightly. Then she see an auction for horses they could not use. She heard bidding and yelling. The girl looked in the ring for her horse but she did not see him. She knew she would not see him. He is probably the best horse they have. Her horse is young, fast, smart and strong. Four things they want in a horse. The girl is tired so she decides to rent an army cot. It is a hard so-called bed, the leather is cold on her sore feet.

 

The next morning the girl wakes up and runs outside to sit on a bench and eat some oats and an apple. She heard the steps of horses on cobblestone so she pushed through the crowd and saw horses coming down in a line. She sees many horses go down but none where the one she is looking for so far. She stays to look at all the horses anyway. But then a miracle happens. She hears a horse in the back acting up. The girl rushes down to that horse. They have the horse on the ground. A man says hold him steady, and takes out a small pocket knife. Then the girl yells at him saying, “I will take that horse.” The man looks at her in confusion but recognizes her from England and says to give the horse to the girl. The man puts the knife away and starts to walk toward an extra horse. Then the girl says thank you. Then the girl throws her horse an apple relieved that he is back. Next, a trip to Upstate NY to get her brother back.

 

 

History Cards

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1. Describe the activity we did in Social Studies on Friday. (It’s the activity pictured.) Use the word “chronological”.

2. Describe any confusions your group had while first putting the events in chronological order.

3. Describe what you learned by putting these events in order.

photo

1. We got a pile of cards to put in chronological order, [random cards] and we were put in groups of 3,4 and/or 5.

2. When we were told to check with another group that group switched something that was not supposed to be switched and that confused our group.

3. I felt like our group knew everything before when we watched the video so it was not challenging and I do not feel like I learned anything new.