For this project there were many steps. The first step is writing a letter.

1 The letter

We had to write a letter to someone we would like to interview. In the letter we had to ask when we could interview them and if we could. I chose to wright to Dan I had read a little bit of a Who The Heck Are You? about him and I wanted to learn more.

2 The Questions

After I wrote the letter I had to come up with questions to ask during the interview. This was hard because I had to avoid yes or no questions. Here are the questions I asked:

1. Where did you grow up?
2. What did you want to grow up to be when you were a kid?
3. Did you get into a lot of trouble when you were a kid?
4. What was your experience in school like?
5. What did you study in college?
6. Did you get into the college you wanted to?
7. What did you do before you worked a LREI?
8. How long have you worked at LREI?
9. What is your favorite part about working here?
10. What was the most embarrassing thing that happened to you? 

3 The Interview

When I was done coming up with questions I had the interview. Some of the questions go answers that were too short. I also had to come up follow up questions. I thought it would be hard to come up with questions on the spot but it turned out easier than I thought. During the interview I was kind of nervous but it turned out well.

4 Step two

After the interview I went on, to step two. Step two is where I had to find all the important parts and divide them into the beginning, middle and end. I also had to come up with a grabber statement. A grabber statement is a sentence at the begging that grabs the reader’s attention. This was hard for me because I wanted to make it interesting, but not give away anything. Once I had put all of the finished step two I moved on to start my draft.

5 The Draft

In my draft I hd to find away to write everything I wanted. This was a little hard because I had to make it interesting but make it all fit. Once I had finished a whole page we started to peer edit. Peer Editing is easier than self editing because it’s not my own writing and easier to spot things. When I finished the whole thing we had a publishing party.

6 Finished

Here is my writing:

Who The Heck Are You?

by Ruby Wexler

When you’re the oldest of four you have great responsibility, apparently not for Dan.

Dan Bobrowski, fifth and sixth grade science teacher reveals his life. From getting in trouble to surfing in Hawaii Dan goes on an adventure that create the science teacher we had today.   

Dan was born in Michigan but moved to North Carolina when he was nine. He is the oldest of four kids. Having three siblings is very hard. When he was young, Dan wanted to be a farmer. He loved plants and found them very interesting. Later on in his life he wanted to be a dentist. Dan wanting to be a dentist was surprising because now he is a science teacher. Though being a farmer has kind of carried on through his life until now. Dreaming of what he wanted to be was not the only thing that he did… Dan was a troublemaker.

One of the things he and his siblings did was convince his babysitter to play hide and seek. This doesn’t seem too bad except Dan had a plan. He convinced his babysitter to hide under the porch which had a door and deadbolt lock on the outside. When she was inside he lock her in. Then they made her promise to give them all sorts of stuff. When she got out she told their parents and they didn’t get any of the stuff.

“That got me grounded for the longest.”

Dan loved school. He liked all of his subjects.

“If you would of asked me back then I would of said recess or lunch was my favorite. But actually I liked all my subjects I just didn’t want to admit it“.

He had very good grades. Dan’s teachers thought he was a good kid even though sometimes he wasn’t.

When it came to getting into college Dan got into his first choice. At the University of North Carolina Dan studied biology and chemistry. He did some pretty wacky things in college. One day a guy down the hall from him went around shaving people’s heads. Dan thought that it would be cool to shave his head completely bald.

“I wore a lot of hats that week”.

That was a bad idea.

After college Dan went to Hawaii worked a science teacher for two years. In Hawaii Dan learned new things and had some cool experiences. He learned to surf the blue waves of the North Pacific Ocean. Every day after he was done teaching for the day Dan would go and surf. Surfing wasn’t the only thing Dan did in Hawaii. Dan is very athletic and loves to run. He ran in two marathons. Dan did all of this well also coaching an eighth grade basketball team. When he was done in Hawaii Dan came to New York.

In New York he got a job teaching at LREI. This is his third year here. He really likes the community. How we all do things together and everyone gets to use their strengths.

“The basketball teams, and we all go on field trips.”

In science class Dan comes up with creative ways to teach. He also is a coach for the intramural basketball teams. Dan also has gerbils, he likes to keep track of their genes so he can figure out what their parents genes are. But Dan doesn’t live at school like he sometimes says.

Out of school Dan likes to run. He has mileages goals that he tries to meet. And Dan like to hang out with friends. That’s Dan Bobrowski the Middle school science teacher.

In humanities we just finished a book called Parzival. Parzival is a book about a boy who doesn’t know his own name. He sets out on journey to learn about the world, and goes on an amazing adventure. When we finished the book we had to write a essay about it. We learned how to do a essay but didn’t feel fully sure I was ready. Even though there was a prompt for each sentence and there was a choice of topics it seemed confusing, I like to free write and  am still working on other kinds of writing like essays there are so many thing to do and requirements that I get confused.

First we had to the come up with the thesis statement then we had to the body paragraphs which had a topic sentence, evidence, explanation, analysis then a conclusion. My thesis was Parzival goes on a journey and becomes king by his own free will because he is kind, brave, and determined. For each body paragraph we had to use one of the qualities to show how he became king. We couldn’t use the same words over and over again like for brave I had to come up with a different word for brave each time. Writing the Parzival essay was a challenge for me but I got throught it.

Here it is:

Free Will

By Ruby  

Would you be who you are without free will? Without free will everyone would just sit around and wait for fate and nothing would happen. In the book, Parzival, by Katherine Paterson, a young boy named Parzival starts to grow up not knowing about the world or even his own name, but then he chooses to go find out who he is. Parzival goes on a journey and becomes king by his own free will because he is kind, brave, and determined.

Parzival becomes king because he is caring to those around him. On page 41, after Parzival wins a battle for the kingdom, he makes sure that everyone has food instead of taking the feast he is offered. He fought a battle for a kingdom that he just came upon, then shared the feast. This shows that he is very kind. No one tells him what to do, he makes his own choices. Not only was he caring, but Parzival also never gives up.

Parzival rises to power because he’s determined. On page 49 he finds his way up Wild Mountain. He was told of a place that needed help so he was determined to be chivalrous and make things right. Parzival made his way up Wild Mountain without help but at the top it was more wild there was a mystery but there was a position he had to ask  Not only was Parzival decisive he’s adventurous.

Parzival took the throne as a result of free will and his bravery. On a lot of pages he is brave but one but on page 35 he showed his bravery. On 35 he offers to fight for a kingdom that he didn’t know. This shows that he is very brave to go fight against a king that was destroying a kingdom that he had just come upon. Without Parzival’s bravery, he never would have become king.

Parzival made lots of choices of his own free will. Without his choices he would never get anywhere or do any of the great things he did to become a great king and hero. Parzival helped many people with just being brave, kind and determined. Malala believed she could do something and she had her own qualities to help people. Malala is someone is fights for female education she wrote a book about it, and she got shot in the head and she won the Nobel Prize.