Maslow’s Hierarchy

Maslow's Hierarchy works against the characters in the book I'm reading " The Night Triology" because of how the Jews are slowly stripped of their needs to succeed in life. First the published numerous racial slurs in the newspapers on a daily basis degrading the Jews and making them feel lower then ever one else. The felt that the weren't part of the German culture or any culture by the way and felt that other peoples love and affection didn't exist between them. Next, the Jews were removed from their homes and placed into ghettos where they had to scavenge for food and water. By doing this, this placed the Jews into closer danger, but the could do nothing about it. Slowly, the Nazi's and other hatred people starved, and made the Jews walk miles to the train tracks to be shipped off to concentration camps to be executed or work for very long hours. Elie is a young boy in Hungary when this is all happening and him and his family must go through the grueling pains. What I just explained is a great example of a real life situation of Maslow's Hierarchy in effect.

Sneetches Allegorical

A "fix-it-up chappie" named Sylvester McMonkey McBean appears and offers the Sneetches without stars the chance to have them with his Star-On machine, for three dollars. This treatment is instantly popular among the non- starred upsets the original star-bellied Sneetches because they are afraid that they are going to lose their special status. McBean then tells them about his Star-Off machine, costing ten dollars, and the Sneetches who originally had stars happily pay the money to have them removed in order to remain special. McBean allows the recently starred Sneetches through this machine as well. This escalates in chaos, with the Sneetches running from one machine to the next. This continues until the Sneetches are without any money and McBean leaves as a really a rich man. The Sneetches learn from this experience that neither plain-belly nor star-belly Sneetches are superior, and they are able to get along and become friends. I believe that this short story is a very good example of discrimination between races and cultures. This shows real life racism, political divisions, class divides and one cannot fail to think that if everyone was forced to read The Sneetches the world would contain rather less injustice.

HUGE, BIG, LARGE QUESTION

My big question for Miss Peregrines Home for Peculiar Children: Is it worth giving up everything you had for something you want more? I think this is a big question because this is pretty much Jacobs ultimate decision. Back home he didn't really like the life he was living. He had a job he hated, he only had one friend, his family drove him crazy, and his grandfather that everyone thought was crazy had just died. So he didn't really have a whole lot to look forward to if he went back home. At Miss Peregrine's though he was wanted. He had tons of friends that actually understood him. He had Emma, who was the closest thing he ever had to a girlfriend. The people there actually cared about him. He felt like he actually belonged there. So he had to make a decision whether he would go back home to his family or stay at MissPeregrine's. You would think the decision was easy considering the pros and cons. It really wasn't though. His parents did care about him. They would be devastated if he just left them without telling them why or where he went. His dad would feel like it was his fault. Jacob knew he couldn't go home though. He had nothing there for him and the wights and hollowgasts would be after him for sure. He had to figure out some way to tell his dad. First he tried writing him a letter, but knew is dad would just think he was crazy. He ended up having some help from his friends from MissPeregrine's. They came to their room and tried showing Jacobs dad that he wasn't making all the stuff up and that his grandpas stories were true. Jacobs dad just thought he was dreaming and went back to bed. Jacob ended up leaving him a letter and a photo of Jacobs grandpa with Emma so he would know everything was real.

"The Rime of the Ancient Mariner"

Imagination is one characteristic of romantic literature that is in this poem. In the poem, the Mariners ship mates died, then all of the sudden they came back to life and started working the ship. This couldn't happen in real life. There's also the part about the Mariner killing the bird with his crossbow. All that bad stuff that happened wouldn't happen just because he killed a bird. Another characteristic is idealism. It has idealism in it because it has to do with spirits a lot in this poem. The spirit loved the bird that the Mariner killed. The spirit then became angry, and the spirit was the one causing all the things to happen.
I think the theme of this poem is that when you try to fix something that you're guilty about. I believe this is true because the Mariner shot the bird and after that, him and all of the people on the ship were stuck out in the middle of the ocean and all dying of thirst. He was the only one that didn't die and he had to live with that guilt. He then started praying and they were things other than just himself. After he started praying, angels helped him control the ship and it ended up saving his life.

Miss P's Home For Peculiar Children

I just started reading Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children. So far what is happening is that a boy named Jacob works at a Smart Aid which is a chain pharmacy store owned by his uncle. He constantly is trying to get fired, but can never manage to do so. The one day he was working he got paged on the overhead speaker that he had a call on line 2. He went back to the backroom where he picked up the phone and it was his grandpa having a panic attack. His grandpa couldn't find the key and told Jacob that he wasn't safe. Come to find out his grandpa has dementia and Jacob's family would go along with what he said. Also, the key that he was talking about was a key to his chest that he had in his garage that carried loads of weapons. Big enough to supply a large militia. Jacob's father had taken that key, afraid his grandpa would harm himself. Jacob called his father after this conversation and his father told him to go check on him. Jacob's friend Ricky then came and picked him up and they headed towards the grandpas house. Once they got there, Jacob went up to the front door and rang the door bell, but no one came to the door. So he thought maybe the door bell had been broken, so he began knocking on the door. Still no one came to the door. Jacob went and found the hidden key and let himself into the house. Once in the house, Jacob could see that his grandpa had ransacked the place. He went through every drawer and even flipped over furniture, but one thing was missing. It was his grandpa. Jacob went through the whole house and couldn't manage to find him. He proceeded on going outside to the forest the separates the two subdivisions. He found a flashlight lying in the backyard and picked it up and went into the woods while Ricky went back to his car and grabbed a .22 rifle. Jacob went through the woods and came upon his grandpa lying face down in the dirt in the forest. He flipped him over on his back and his grandpa told him to go to the island that he would be safe there.
One question I have so far is what could of killed Jacob's grandpa. Kind of creepy that he was afraid and telling Jacob he wouldn't be safe and is found lying bleeding to death in the woods. This book is one of the best suspense books that I have ever read and would recommend that everyone read it.

Denison's Theme

I would identify the theme of my book as trying to catch a dream. John Denison's dream or "goal" was to try and find a cheaper and more efficient way to deliver supplies to remote villages and mines in the Northwest Territories, beyond the Arctic Circle. Edith Iglauer, the author of the book, points out many times throughout the book how determined John was to construct this road. He has encountered many obstacles constructing this road like putting thousands of dollars into trucks and trailers and having them sink to the bottom of a lake. Or the year before, having his whole garage burn down, but still be able to get back up on his feet and come back to do what he loves. John and his crew not only successfully built and constructed a road of ice, but made it for the next five decades to come. This was an amazing feat of its day, making John the first man to transport goods by tractor & trailer successfully through the most rugged and harsh climates in the world. In order to accomplish a feat like this, you would have to be such a determined and hard- headed man, chasing after that dream, not for the fame and glory, but for the better of human welfare.

The main protagonist in my choose novel Denison's Ice Road is John Denison. John Denison's role is to take his crew of 10 - 12 guys on a long grueling trip of about 320 miles north, past the Arctic circle, past where no man dares to guy, where the sun shines for 4 hours a day, where the temperatures reach 60 below on a daily basis just to supply small villages and mines with vital supplies such as food, fuel, equipment & lumber. I question that comes to mind about this book is how a 50 ton load could possibly make it across ice? Just think if it weren't for John and his brave crew, the north would not have what they have today. If we think about the whole world in general and how fortunate we are to have truckers to bring everything to us. " If you got it, a trucker brought it."

The book that I'm currently reading is called Denison's Ice Road. It is a book about a man named John Denison who was the first to construct a network of hodge podge ice roads throughout the Canadian wilderness to supply remote mines and villages. I just started the book, but have gained a real interest in it. The one question that I have about this book is " How could the ice support such a load like that." John said he wouldn't started driving on the ice until there was at least 18 in of ice. You would also need about 36 in of ice to support a hundred ton load.

Education Reform

Ken Robinson & Dan Meyer both provide good topics on how school needs to be changed from like a factory set- up to a individual set- up. Ken points out that school should be based on a agriculture style. This method would let students discovery their individualism. This way will be a longer, drawn out method, but in the end, it will let students be themselves, not the same like schools are trying to make.

I absolutely agree with them. Many people are starting to turn this idea of individualism and turn away from the idea of a factory set- up, cranking out the same part as fast as the can. Being a student, I can see how schools are making us read the same book as everyone else and writing the same paper as everyone else. Everything that we do is the same as everyone else. I would like to choose a non- fictional documentary such as a WWII book or something like that and write about what effects war have on the future generations. Everyone learns and expresses their feelings in a different way, and schools should respect their way. The following videos are where I came up with my opinion about school reform and hope you enjoyed them as much as me.

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/dan_meyer_math_curriculum_makeover.html
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/sir_ken_robinson_bring_on_the_revolution.html