Category: Classes

Writerly Life Post

One thing that made me feel very accomplished this year was when I finished writing my research paper. It made me feel accomplished because I worked for a long time on it, and I worked really hard on it. Finishing the paper made me feel good inside. One thing that challenged me about writing was finding out what protest and resistance did to help the colonies because you have to think a lot outside the box because if you look at it one way, it only hindered the colonies, so you have to think to find ways in which it helped the colonies. That is what I think challenged me and was good for me about writing.

Eye Drawing

 

For making the eye  we learned about value, and how to add value to your drawing. You add value by putting graphite on the paper and blending it. You blend it by using a blending stump. You can see where I added graphite in some places by seeing the darker lines. One thing that I should mention about this drawing is that I did it mostly with my weak hand. This is important because it made it harder for me to draw the drawing. It also made it harder because I had way less control and precision. Those are important for drawing details. I like my overall drawing, but I would like to change the inside of the eye. I believe I could have been way more precise.

 

 

 

Shabanu forced to marry Rahim-Sahib… but only for money?

I, Shabanu, have been betrothed to Rahim-Sahib. I was gonna be married to Murad, but when Hamir died Phulan was gonna be married to Murad. So now, I won’t be married to Murad, but to Rahim-Sahib, who is a rich person who is buying me over. I will be his fourth and last wife, because the Koran states that a man can have four wives at a time. I am forced to marry him because he bought me.

“”Shabanu,” says Dadi. “He already has bought you. He paid more than a fair price for a troublesome girl like you.””page 196.

He paid a bride price so now they are betrothed and will marry. Even though I need to marry him, he is 55. He could be my grandfather.  I am so mad at father for doing this to me.

This is the cover of the book.

Shabanu, watching Phulan marry in contempt

I, Shabanu am the maddest person when Hamir dies. Everyone is rich and happy, but I wanted to marry Murad, who is marrying Phulan now. She is so lucky. Our life would have been perfect, but Nazir Muhammad ruined it all. The wedding preparations moved ahead. The last thing I wanted to do was to help, but I had to help. Otherwise Dadi would have been mad. He used me to get rich. But that is the role of women in our religion and country. To obey and help the men, or rulers, of our family.

“I’d as soon dump the henna left standing in the ceramic bowls over Phulan as dress her in jewels and silk to marry Murad.”page 218

from Thinglink OY

Being a mean Monk

In the medieval pageant, I got to be a monk that was very grumpy. It was a lot of fun because I got to curse and be very rude. I even got to send my mom, dad, sister, and aunt away because I accused them of being a witch. I never actually finished my monologue because people left after I told them about my day, or I made them go away. Another thing that was funny was I asked people if I needed to explain what a bowl was. Some people even said yes!

2nd trimester Humanities

This is Farin and I’s drawing of an Oasis. We did this because we had to illustrate a Vocabulary word and define it on a poster. Farin and I chose Oasis which as you can see is a small green spot in a desert usually having a spring or well. Most Arabian settlements/cities were built on an Oasis.

HONY final draft

Friday, jan 5, 2020:

I am Jim, and Tommy has challenged me to a fight on the playground. This is not the first time that I will fight him, he fights me every friday and wins. I hate him so much. I don’t want everyone to laugh and call me a coward if I don’t show up. I enter the playground and the whole school is there.

“Ready to get beaten to a pulp, kid,” Tommy says. That gets me red-faced because we are the same age.

Everybody laughs and says,

“Fight fight fight fight,”

Tommy punches me and I get knocked prone. He kicks me and everyone laughs and jeers. He steps on my face and my nose starts to bleed. He kicks me again and I get knocked unconscious. I then afterwards decided that I would stop letting him kick me around and I reached into his bag later and was surprised to find a diary. I then decided to hand out photocopied pages of his diary. Not the best action for an 18 year old, but at least it is some way to rebel.

 

Monday, jan 9, 2020:

“Free secrets,” I call out to everyone.

“Why do you give these out?” asks my archenemy Tommy.

“To create discord and hate of course,” I say in a tone that no one will recognize.

He does not know that the secrets I am giving out are his.

“Here, a free secret,” I say and hand him a secret about his best friend.

When he beat me up on Friday I accidentally reached into his bag and grabbed his diary.

Then I got some other secrets by stalking people and going into their kitchens. The rest I got by setting up network of security cameras in people’s houses. I set up the cameras when I was stalking people and now I have around 5000 secrets on paper and I get more every day. I have 2 copies of every secret so I do not lose any. I now know that at least 20% of my neighborhood is plotting to take over the world someday.

 

later:

Time to check the feed on Tommy’s house. WHAAAAAAAAAATTTTTTTTTTT!!!!!!!!! There are robots. They have guns too.

“Good, unleash them to take over the world,” says Tommy.

“Yes, master,” says some random dude. (Obviously Tommy’s servant.)

“The first target will be the school,” orders Tommy.

“Yes, master,” says the other person.

I must form a plan. I cannot tell the police because the police will arrest me for stalking people. I call my friend Timmy and tell him the situation. I tell him to meet me at the machine gun shop. I go in.

He is already there.

“I would like to buy 2 machine guns and 1,000,000 bullets please,” I say.

“That will be $100,”says the cashier.

I hand him the money and we leave the shop. Then we went to the jetpack shop and bought 2 jetpacks for $20.

“Alright, let’s ambush him outside the school,” I say.

“We should probably buy some grenades,” he says.

“Good thinking,” I agree.

So I go to the arms shop and get many types of grenades. (the grenades are in the hand of the arm) I have to pay $90 and this is getting pretty expensive. But we are ready.

 

Tuesday, jan 10, 2020

We wake up at 5 0’clock and do some scouting. We are ready to shoot Tommy. He comes to school with around 100 robots.

“Open fire,”I yell and we start shooting.

The robots step in front of Tommy and we do nothing to the robots. I throw a grenade and red stuff comes down his leg, his belly, and it soaks his clothes. He clenches his fists and says, “Destroy him now,”

Two of the robots turn to me and aim.

“Throw the grenades,”I tell Timmy.

He turns to me, smiling evilly. I throw a smoke grenade and run away.

“Leave him,”says Tommy.

“Okay,” says Timmy casually.

I think that I should probably buy a rocket launcher but I don’t. I go check on the feed of Tommy’s house. Plenty of police there, but everyone is talking about how they will become powerful once Tommy becomes king of the world. They are all weird in my opinion. Tommy will just destroy them later. He does not want to get caught so this is what he does with the police. I tell my mom about everything that happened. I call Tommy from a phone booth.

“Hello, Tommy speaking,” says Tommy.

“Have you really thought everything through,” I ask.”I mean about taking over the world?”

“Of course,”

“What will you do with all the paperwork?”

“I will make my minions do it,”

“What about warring nations?”

“When I am king, there will be no wars,”

“If famine strikes a country, what will you do?”

“Maybe I will do nothing,”

“Then you will have a whole country rise against you, because they have nothing left to lose,”

“Then I will destroy them,”

“In which case you will have the neighbors fighting over the remains,”

Then he hangs up. Well, that didn’t work. I look around and see a tank. The guns are all aimed at me. Bummer, I think to myself. I throw a grenade at the tank that electrocutes it and kills everyone inside. Yes! Let’s go! I one-shotted a tank.Then I feel something like a brick hit my back. I feel warm blood gushing down my back. I turn around and see a sniper on a rooftop. I throw a grenade onto the roof and crawl away with the strength I have left. I go into my house and ask my father, (who is a doctor) to heal me. He injects me with something and I black out. Next thing I know, I wake up and cannot move. I can feel myself slipping away.

“Oh look, he woke up,” my dad calls to my mom.

“Oh, sweetie, you woke up,”she says,”the bullet punctured your lung, so you do not have long to live,”

“Way to calm me down,”I say in a voice so soft so she can barely hear me.

I am trying to stay awake but there is only so much I can do. My eyelids feel like 100-pound weights.

“We’ve always loved you,” they say.

I am almost at the permanent rest. My eyelids are open, barely. I try to keep them open, but fail.

I go into a deep slumber for eternity. Now, you may think Jim, you are dead, how can you be dead and tell this story? My parents apparently went to some guy who knows witchcraft and resurrected me for five days. He can only go on for five days because that is how long he can sleep for. So I wrote this story in my last 5 days on earth. Goodbye world. 🙁

When I was revising this piece I was asked what is the difference between revising and editing? Revising is when you add a new character or a scene, and make a big change. Editing is when you make grammar or spelling corrections, so you make small changes.

My revision goal was to add a scene at the beginning about why the characters hated each other. I achieved this goal, so yay! I think now the whole story makes sense now.

Knight Monologue

The king is before me. I am in a grand room. Will I die? I do not want to be killed on crusade or in battle. What is my fate? My armor is heavy. I can feel the sweat running freely down my back. I am excited, happy, anxious, nervous, and regretting my life decisions. Hopefully I won’t die. I feel the sword, and the king has tapped me with it. I feel the sweat more where he touches me. I do not want to go on Crusade. Crusade is going out and conquering places where God is not worshipped. I highly regret all my life choices. It is my first time holding my sword, as a knight. It’s terrible to be me. My family was all knights, making me a knight automatically. I hate being a knight. I want to say stop, to stop the ceremony, but I don’t, because that would be disrespectful. Why? I feel like I am signing my death warrant. Hello, heaven or hell.

“Rise, sir knight,” says the king.

The ceremony is over. I am a knight. A bloody knight. I don’t have the heart to kill.

I am scared about Crusade. I am scared I will take mercy and not kill everyone. Especially on innocents. Why do I have to be a knight? “God, please take mercy on me and don’t send me on Crusade.” I pray. I realize I am still on my knees after he said “rise, sir knight.” How embarrassing. I rise to my feet feeling bad for myself. Then everyone starts cheering. I force a smile onto my face. I try to hide my feelings. I feel like why am I even doing this?

Descriptions using adjectives in french

When I was creating my Halloween picture I learned about was how to write a sentence in French using regular and irregular adjectives. There are 2 possible placements of an adjective, before the noun or after the noun. If it follows the BAGS rule then it goes before the noun, and anything else goes after the noun. The bags rule are adjectives that refer to beauty, age, goodness, and size.

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