creative poem project: what is a good friend

http://youtu.be/fnO7EdXLEWc

Final Poem Analysis on What Is A Good Friend

                                                What is a good friend
     In everyone’s life, everyone could meet many types of people, whoever have the same habit with you, or has the opposite personality with you. Everyone could feel lonely when their good friends are not accompanying with them. People do not like the time when there’s no one chatting with them, I have this feeling either. When I graduated from my primary school to middle school, I did not want to go middle school because there’s no one I am familiar with, I wanted to stay in my primary school due to my good friends who were in my primary school and they accompanied me when I felt boring. And when I went to my middle school or my high school, I still missed my friends who accompanied me in my primary school. Nowadays I live in America and I begin to think about one question that what means good friend and how many good friends do I have? Until I read one poem "What Is A Friend" by Barbara M. Zellner that focuses on the thought from the speaker on the relationship between good friend and himself in order to show the importance of having good friends which give me a clear understanding of good friends.
 
    In the poem, the title of this poem is a question that asks readers that what is a good friend, which the writer does not want to tell the readers first about his opinion on good friends, he wants the readers to consider about it and after readers think about the meaning of the good friends, then they could begin reading the poem. For every beginning sentence in every stanza, the speaker writes “ A good friend is someone” , which gives readers a question that does the speaker’s opinion on good friends is as same as mine? No one knows, so they would continue to read the poem. In the first and stanza, it talks about that “ A good friend is someone who cares about you.” and “ A good friend is someone who is willing to help you.”  These two beginning sentences make the readers understand what should their good friends do for them. However, in the third stanza, the speaker changes his style, he says that “ A good friend is someone you can talk to.”  This time, the speaker does not tell the readers what can their good friends do for them, he wants the readers to know that when they are down when they are in trouble, they could find their good friends and talk to them. The third stanza likes a conclusion of before two stanzas, speaker wants the readers to understand deeply about the importance of good friends. In the fourth stanza, “ A good friend is someone who will come and stop you from taking your life.”  A good friend needs to take care of you and make you feel positive towards your life, that’s what a good friend needs to do. Moreover, your good friend will share his experience with you because you are the good friends, he wants to you have some purpose in your life. So in the end, the speaker uses” A good friend will come and sit down to show you all of the good things to live for.” That is what a good friend should do for his good friend. In the speaker’s view, a good friend needs to have sympathy, should be eager to help others and be patient from the speaker’s eye, this is his answer on the meaning of good friend.
 
    For the structure of this poem, it is very interesting because the beginning sentences in every stanza are the same, “ A good friend is someone”. and also there are four lines in every stanza except the last one stanza. For the repetition of the good friend, the speaker would want us to think about our good friend first, then he could introduce his best friend to us. But the speaker does not use consonance or assonance in it because the speaker just wants to tell us about his good friend, which the speaker does not want us to think about this is a poem when we are reading it, he wants to us to play with his good friend, so he uses the free verse to write down this poem. Moreover, because of the free verse, this poem does not contain the rhyme scheme in it. The speaker just wants us to read and feel this poem freely. However, the speaker uses a lot of repetitions in this poem. Just now I said the speaker uses “ A good friend is someone” in the beginning sentences of every stanza.  But the title of this poem is called “ What is a good friend” and in the last stanza of this poem, the speaker just uses one sentence to conclude all the meaning of good friend. He says that” That is What a Good Friend Is.” This sentence is a conclusion of all the meaning of good friend. The speaker wants to remind you that when you meet your good friend, this poem should help you to figure out that is he or she your good friend or not.  I think this poem is very realistic, it does not include any hyperbole in it. It includes all the life experience of the speaker on the meaning of the good friends. In general, even though this poem does not have many figurative languages in it, but due to the free verse,  people would feel relaxed and cheerful when they are reading this poem. The repletion of the good friend does not make readers feel annoyed, in the opposite, every time people would ask themselves that what is their definition of good friends and who are their good friends. This poem gives me a new thinking toward the good friends. And the reason why I like it is due to its repeating ask question for himself, which would take a new inspiration every time the readers read it.

Thesis statement

The poem "What Is A Friend" by Barbara M. Zellner focus on the thought from speaker on the relationship between good friend and himself in order to show the importance of having good friends.

Poem peer review ( For Marinda's poem analysis)

Yichen.Li
English II (IS)
Jennifer Guarino
05.23.2016

Sonnets 18 was written in old English, which means it was hard to read and understand for a student whose first language is not English, but from Marinda's poem analysis, she clearly showed that she had already finished reading and understanding about this poem. From the structure part, I love the way she divided each paragraph that every paragraph contained a special main idea, for the first paragraph, she explained the background information of Shakespeare and the poem, which was very helpful for the readers to understand Shakespeare and the poem, Sonnets 18 deeply.  In the second paragraph, she interpreted the poem, however, she did not take many examples to explain the poem, she just used one example and she added many summaries in the second paragraph in order to make the readers clearly understand her idea. In the third paragraph, she analyzed the whole paragraph, this part I think she did it very well because the in this paragraph she used a lot of evidence to support her analysis, compared with the second paragraph, which is necessary to use examples to analysis this poem's structure and ideas from the speaker. Moreover, there is another thing Marinda did very well that is the connections between each paragraph. The connection between the first paragraph and the second paragraph is the speaker, Shakespeare. And the connection between second paragraph and third paragraph is the content of Sonnets 18. 

Even though there are many shiny points in Marinda's poem analysis, however, there are still something she needs to improve. The first one is the unclear thesis statement, she writes down so many things in the first paragraph, but in this paragraph, it contains both introduction part and analysis part, which means she needs to review her first paragraph in order to let the readers clearly understand her organization of this poem from the first paragraph. Second, about the surface meaning of the poem,   she just simply talked about the meaning of the poem and the reason why Shakespeare wrote down this poem, but due to it was written in old English, she may give more examples from the poem to show Shakespeare's sadness toward to his lover. Third, on the analysis part, before I said she needs to change her first paragraph due to there are many information in it, which contains the introduction and analysis parts. So if she moves the first paragraph's analysis to the third paragraph, which seems there are so much information in the third paragraph that let the readers know. But her analysis part did very well because of the giving examples and the management of the paragraph. The only thing she needs to improve from my opinion is the organization of the third paragraph. Marinda used the choice that was to analyze the poem by each category, for example, she analyzed the poem by the order of comparison, personification, simile, metaphor, and repetition. I do not want to say it was not good but it would make me feel confused when I read the analysis of the poem even though she gave many examples to support her analysis., but for me, I think the good way to do it is to analyze the poem from the beginning to the end. Because of the second paragraph, she talked about the meaning of the poem by the order, which would help the readers to understand both her poem surface meaning and her analysis more clearly. 

I accidentally Went into A Fairytale.

As time goes by, there are many things changed in my life. And I like writing some reviews in order to help me remember things easily, the most favorite thing I like to write down is about the movie review because directors always paid their whole efforts on the their products, which should be written down in order to help me to remember them in the future. 

Today I went into a music show called “Comedy Tonight that combined both singing and telling stories. I was very interesting about this music show because of the past experience because if the shows were not excellent, Ms. Guarino would not recommend us to watch. And in the past, Ms. Guarino was the director of the whole show, however this time, the scripts and actions are all made by students, which give me more interests to watch it because we are students and we may hold the same opinions on something. And also this time the show was not composed by one story that goes through the whole time. this show contained more than 18 programs that have in different contents. I was very exciting to see the whole show.

The first part of the show was very interesting and I loved the connections between each stories and the singing. In this part, I love the “Well, That’s Unfortunate”, William did such a great job on performing a person who received the monopoly money and he began to question himself. The most exciting part was then he talked with John who performed his boss that William was trying to explain to John that why he was late. At that time, I likes the influence from John’s words and also I loved William’s facial expression, which I told Johnny that I would be laughed about his facial expression at lease one week.  But be honesty, I liked the second part, especially for the” John Jiang, the Latte Boy” and “ Rebuttal” and also for the “ Morning Meeting Gone Wrong”, these two comic opera stimulated the atmosphere to go to the high point. John was a good person who can inspire the spot atmosphere lively, what ever he played the salesperson in Starbucks or the fake Dykeman. And also their stage art performance deeply attracts me from the show, except the laugh from Mr. Porter, I would image that i wander in a cafeteria and a Thursday morning meeting. However even they showed their best on the show, I could also see some sweat prickled across every actors’ head. Because of the hot temperature in the black box, they needed to overcome the pressure both from the audience and the damp and hot. But their effort made up the whole show interesting and connective. I would say that when the lights came on, I had a little loss because I wanted to watch the show a little longer and their performance really attracted me. 

When I came in the black box, the day does not get black. However after I finished watching the show, the day totally becomes black. I felt that I went into a fair tale that spent a day in it. This world had no connection with the outside real world. I was isolated with the real world. In this three hours I experienced many incredible stories and listened a lot of pleasant music in there that were all created by the students. I missed this stage because of this valuable and memorable time and also I was appreciated that they brought so much fun to the audience. 

Poem analysis

                                           What is a good friend
     In everyone’s life, everyone could meet many types of people, whoever have the same habit with you, or has the opposite personality with you. Everyone could feel lonely when their good friends are not accompanying with them. People do not like the time when there’s no one chatting with them, I have this feeling either. When I graduated from my primary school to middle school, I did not want to go middle school because there’s no one I am familiar with, I wanted to stay in my primary school due to my good friends who were in my primary school and they accompanied me when I felt boring. And when I went to my middle school or my high school, I still missed my friends who accompanied me in my primary school. Nowadays I live in America and I begin to think about one question that what means good friend and how many good friends do I have? Until I read one poem "What Is A Friend" by Barbara M. Zellner that focus on the thought from speaker on the relationship between good friend and himself in order to show the importance of having good friends which gives me a clear understanding of good friends.
 
    In the poem, the title of this poem is a question that asks readers that what is a good friend, which the writer does not want to tell the readers first about his opinion on good friends, he wants the readers to consider about it and after readers think about the meaning of the good friends, then they could begin reading the poem. For every beginning sentence in every stanza, the speaker writes “ A good friend is someone” , which gives readers a question that does the speaker’s opinion on good friends is as same as mine? No one knows, so they would continue to read the poem. In the first and stanza, it talks about that “ A good friend is someone who cares about you.” and “ A good friend is someone who is willing to help you.”  These two beginning sentences make the readers understand what should their good friends do for them. However, in the third stanza, the speaker changes his style, he says that “ A good friend is someone you can talk to.”  This time, the speaker does not tell the readers what can their good friends do for them, he wants the readers to know that when they are down when they are in trouble, they could find their good friends and talk to them. The third stanza likes a conclusion of before two stanzas, speaker wants the readers to understand deeply about the importance of good friends. In the fourth stanza, “ A good friend is someone who will come and stop you from taking your life.”  A good friend needs to take care of you and make you feel positive towards your life, that’s what a good friend needs to do. Moreover, your good friend will share his experience with you because you are the good friends, he wants to you have some purpose in your life. So in the end, the speaker uses” A good friend will come and sit down to show you all of the good things to live for.” That is what a good friend should do for his good friend. In the speaker’s view, a good friend needs to have sympathy, should be eager to help others and be patient from the speaker’s eye, this is his answer on the meaning of good friend.
 
    For the structure of this poem, it is very interesting because the beginning sentences in every stanza are the same, “ A good friend is someone”. and also there are four lines in every stanza except the last one stanza. For the repetition of the good friend, the speaker would want us to think about our good friend first, then he could introduce his best friend to us. But the speaker does not use consonance or assonance in it because the speaker just wants to tell us about his good friend, which the speaker does not want us to think about this is a poem when we are reading it, he wants to us to play with his good friend, so he uses the free verse to write down this poem. Moreover, because of the free verse, this poem does not contain the rhyme scheme in it. The speaker just wants us to read and feel this poem freely. However, the speaker uses a lot of repetitions in this poem. Just now I said the speaker uses “ A good friend is someone” in the beginning sentences of every stanza.  But the title of this poem is called “ What is a good friend” and in the last stanza of this poem, the speaker just uses one sentence to conclude all the meaning of good friend. He says that” That is What a Good Friend Is.” This sentence is a conclusion of all the meaning of good friend. The speaker wants to remind you that when you meet your good friend, this poem should help you to figure out that is he or she your good friend or not.  I think this poem is very realistic, it does not include any hyperbole in it. It includes all the life experience of the speaker on the meaning of the good friends. In general, even though this poem does not have many figurative languages in it, but due to the free verse,  people would feel relaxed and cheerful when they are reading this poem. The repletion of the good friend does not make readers feel annoyed, in the opposite, every time people would ask themselves that what is their definition of good friends and who are their good friends. This poem gives me a new thinking toward the good friends. And the reason why I like it is due to its repeating asking question for himself, which would take a new inspiration every time you read it.







Yichen.Li's poem what is a good friend

http://youtu.be/PQdCFM9YkNk

Background music and tone.

http://youtu.be/CNfTy_2R_Jg
This poem style is yearning, seems that the writer remembered his good friend and he wanted to tell everyone what does a good friend mean. The writer expressed his own feeling in this poem.  So for this poem, I can not use the lively and happy background music to illustrate writer's opinion, but I could use some background music that did not have very fast rhyme and has some lyric parts in it in order to show author's dismay and yearning about his good friends.  Harry Potter's background music is my best choice. There are many background music show the lyric and yearning. So I prefer to use this one.

What Is A Friend

© Barbara M. Zellner

Published on October 2007

A good friend is someone
who cares about you
they are someone who will be
there when you're down

A good friend is someone
who's willing to help you
when you are in a little trouble
that's hard to get out

A good friend is someone
who you can talk to
and trust with your problems
in not telling anyone else

A good friend is someone
who will come and stop
you from taking your life
and sit down to show you
all of the good things
to live for

That's What A Good Friend Is

Source: http://www.familyfriendpoems.com/poem/a-good-friend #FamilyFriendPoems

Found poem

Next day would be the funeral
Mom and I got everything ready for Funeral
Dad went to hospital to take Kellyanne back.
Williamson family was not ratter.

Mom bought new black suits,
We went to the funeral 
Decorated it with flowers.
Then priest came and talked 
About the procedure.

I wanted to tell Kellyanne that
I did make a funeral for them. 
she would have a big smile
She would never be sick again.

Waited for people arriving was boring
I was nervous that how many people came.
Also nervous about Kellyanne's sick.
I got afraid about people won't turn up.
I became impatient

.

Shape poem

Find poems

Boarding students make up
Half of the school community
At Cheshire Academy.
Living on campus helps students
To learn
And grow in a positive community.
Five single-gender dormitories on campus,
Not only for student
But also for faculty members and their families.
Each dorm differs in design.
The majority of the room are
Designed for two students
Best way for preparing college.

Haiku

Birds singing on trees.
Enjoying sunshine and breeze.
Everyone loves spring

Poem review

Over hill, over dale,

Thorough bush, thorough brier,

Over park, over pale,

Thorough flood, thorough fire!

I do wander everywhere,

Swifter than the moon's sphere;

And I serve the Fairy Queen,

To dew her orbs upon the green;

The cowslips tall her pensioners be;

In their gold coats spots you see;

Those be rubies, fairy favours;

In those freckles live their savours;

I must go seek some dewdrops here,

And hang a pearl in every cowslip's ear. 

This is a poem from Shakespeare, it talks about the fairy queen daily life and how could the main character serve the Fairy Queen. Which the main character endures many difficulties, goes everywhere in order to find the cowslip for the fairy. This works as a poem due to its rhyme and free verse. If you look at every end word, you may figure out that every word sounds the same.  And some of the sentences have both relations and same pronunciation, for example. Over hill, over dale. Over park, over pale.  These sentences separate into the different places of the poem, but at the same time, they convict the same thing that shows how hard the main character goes everywhere. Even though the author, Shakespeare did not use many sentences to write on it, but it gives the readers a feeling about the difficulty author faces towards when he serves the fairy. Especially this sentence, "Swifter than the moon's sphere". Shakespeare uses only several sentences to draw a character who goes through many difficulties in order to finish his duty. And the free verse, for the poem, it does not only limiting using the comma and period to separate the sentence. In this poem, he used an exclamation point and colon to separate the sentences, which make the whole poem become easier to understand and more connections in the poem that make the poem look more compact, which let the readers have more interests to read it. The reason why I love this poem due to its content and bright style, when I find out that this poem is from Shakespeare, I do not think it is fun, on the other hand, I think it is boring and hard to read. However, after I finish reading this poem, I do not think it is hard to understand what does Shakespeare want to tell us. Also, the content is interesting, he describes a person who faces many problems and difficulties, then he describes the clothing of the fairy and what does he want to serve for the fairy. It is an interesting poem and I wish everyone in our class can read it, and after you read it, you will find out that Shakespeare does not only want to describe the screen of the fairy, but also he describes a love between the average people and the fairy, in the last sentence, I must go seek some dewdrops here, and hang a pearl in every cowslip's ear. In this sentence, I could image a screen that a young person is looking hard for the dewdrops in order to show the fairy how good he is, which is amazing that the sentence tells me, even though he just uses only several words, but the imagination is the best part in it.

The poem from jerry

My neighbor’s daughter has created a city that everyone else cannot see. On an island to which you cannot swim, ruled by a noble princess and her athletic consort.
All the buildings are glass so that lies are impossible. Beneath the city they have buried certain words,which can never be spoken again, chiefly the word divorce which is eaten by maggots. When it rains you hear chimes, rabbits race through its suburbs. The name of the city is one you can almost pronounce

Poem

Over hill, over dale,
Thorough bush, thorough brier,
Over park, over pale,
Thorough flood, thorough fire!
I do wander everywhere,
Swifter than the moon's sphere;
And I serve the Fairy Queen,
To dew her orbs upon the green;
The cowslips tall her pensioners be;
In their gold coats spots you see;
Those be rubies, fairy favours;
In those freckles live their savours;
I must go seek some dewdrops here,
And hang a pearl in every cowslip's ear.

Why did I choose it?
Because this poem is not too long and not hard for me to understand it. In the before I always thought that the poem is composed by many difficult words and complicated sentences. Moreover, the beginning sentence makes me feel interesting to read it, every end word in every sentences sounds the same, which let me feel curious about what happens in this poem, so I choose it.
What do I like about it?
This first thing is about the rhyme, every end word in the beginning sentences sound the same, which makes me feel curious. Second, when the author wrote this poem, he did not use only comma and period to end the story, moreover, he used colon and exclamation mark to make the the every sentences in the poem more related with each other.
What is it about?
It is about a young person who is looking for fairy and dewdrops, and he endures many difficulties in order to find dewdrops for the fairy.

Reflection of creative project

Opals are valuable for everyone, I also got some expensive gifts from Pobby and Dingan. Ashmol got the opal and sold it in order to get a funeral for his sister, Kellyanne. I got the expensive gift that could help me to understand every character deeply. In the class time, we always talked about the plot that happened in the story, but I always had some confusion ab0out if Ashmol did not decide to go to the mine? What will happen?  Lillian and I had the same idea about creating a new game that relates to the book but adds our own thinking into it. Even though we thought it would be hard, but we wanted to do it perfectly. 

In the creative project, Lillian and I separated the work into three parts, the first part is the outline, especially what would we do for the creative project and how could we use this game to make the audience get both fun and deep understanding to the story Pobby and Dingan. So for the outline part, we did almost one class, before we wanted to do a monopoly because we wanted everyone in our class can participate in the game. But then we figured out that it was hard to make connections between the game and the story. Moreover, it was hard to make a game that could invite all the classmates to play it. So we used another class period to re-design the game, then Lilian had an idea that we could re-write the story, like giving more choices that do not come from the book and more results for the audience to choose how to end the story. That sounds interesting but also it is very hard to accomplish because if we add more choices in the story, then the whole story may change due to one choice the audience made. So we discussed a lot for this new, challenging project. Even though we knew that it would consume many of our time to finish it, but we could give the audience a different feeling to the story. That sounds interesting. So from that time, we knew that the outline was the most important part of our project, if we finish the outline, then the whole project would be finished about almost 90%. Because I wrote a fictional story before, so I did more work on the design story, every choice needs to be connected with single answer, it may give me some challenge on writing and thinking part because when you write the first choice you make, then after few questions, you may figure out that you need to change your choice in order to match with your solution. So it is hard for me to design the whole outline, I did not let Lillian do the outline part with me together. Because I thought that if we did the outline together, we may write the outline separately. I needed to make the whole story to have the connection, two people both did the outline part, which would not be a smart choice. If Lillian did the outline part first, so I would not change anything on her outline because I understand everyone has their own thinking way, it was hard for others to write the outline that depends on your thinking way. So Lillian also understood my idea, when I wrote the outline part, she read the whole book again in order to give me more useful choice to create that fictional world. After I finished wiring the outline, Lillian began to read my outline in order to revise it better and because she read the book again, she may give me more idea about how does Ashmol do the choice. Ashmol is a hard character for me to guess his personality, when there’s a choice in front of me, I was hard to write the solution that Ashmol may decide when he met the problem. Fortunately, there’s Lillian, during her revising time, she improved many faults that I made in writing Ashmol’s personality, and she made the whole story more naturally. When she was revising the outline, I began to play Minecraft in order to create a mine that could give the audience a better vision about this creative project. Imaginary was a good thinking way but it was hard for the audience to understand our idea, so sometimes we needed to directly show the audience that what were we trying to convict. After I finished the mine, Lillian also finished the outline. Then we create a powerpoint in order to make us easier to play this game. 

After we finished showing our creative project to the audience, we both felt happy and proud. But there are still something we did not do very well, especially in the outline part, we wanted to do a perfect job in the outline part, but there are still some leaks in it, like Leo’s question about where’s Kellyanne when Ashmol goes to the police station, we needed to think about every detail in the book in order to prevent the questions from the audience. And the time also is not enough, I think if I have two more days, I could create the whole story in the Minecraft, it would be more interesting to play in the class. However I still thought our project was very good, for the outline, I thought there’s no one in our class did more work on planning outline than us, and I thought every player in our class would say our project is interesting and not hard to understand.  

What will I do next

In the weekend, we finished almost about this project. We divided the project into two parts. The first part is design, the second part is finishing part. Now we are in the end of the first part. Because we created this new game that the players control the character's life, so in the past, we created the outline and many choices about the end of the story. In this weekend, we added more information about the plot and some scenes in the story in order to make it more realistic to the players, we want them to think they are. Ashmol when they are playing the game. If I describe the whole project is a dinosaur, now we finish about the skeleton of it, the next step we need to do is to add the appearance on it in order to make it better. So next step we will do is to put it into the PPT, on Monday and Tuesday, we will put it into PPT and revise the problems in it. And on Wednesday, in our group, we will try it one time in order to know how could make it more interesting.

Creative project

Yichen. Li and Lilian Xu
Monopoly about Pobby and DIngan.
In this creative project, me and Lillian will do an adventure game, it is different with other games because the participants decide the main character's life. We will make the game according to the book, but maybe we will add some choice when Ashmol is making the decisions. We will start the game when Ashmol lost Pobby and Dingan and the end will be the funeral. Also we would add more emotional plots in the story in order to show the grow of the Ashmol. However, there are something related. First, the goal of this adventure game is to win, in Pobby and Dingan, they also won, they won the trial. So in the first, we make our game's goal is to win the trial. And We create several steps, each step means something happens in the book. When we play the game, we won’t tell the the Ashmol's choice in the book, so we circle something important plots in the story, like when dad, Ashmol, and Kellyanne went to the mine, when dad was in jail, when dad was in court, when Ashmol found the opal, when they made funeral for Pobby and Dingan. These things connect the small plots into a big story. When we play on these specific steps, we will use note cards to explain why they are important. Second, in the adventure game, we enlarge the characteristic of Ashmol. Because he is the pain character, so we add some unique characteristics for him. When every time he meets a problem, his choice must be considered by the audience. Audience can decide the thing he does that or not. He just wants a happy family, in his mind, he’s so timid. But because of Kellyanne, he has to afford everything. And in the game, the family members will interact with Old Sid, Mr. Dan, and the residents in the Lighting Ridge, so every thing in the game would change by the audience decision. In the end, audience will know the grow of the Ashmol.
Even though this is a hard game to design, but we have the passion for doing it, I hope we could get a good result. And for the time I think until this Friday, me and Lillian will have a draft about this adventure game, then after one or two weeks we can finish it.

Thing with rare be precious

“The secret of an opal’s lies not in its substance but in its absences.” I felt so confused when I read this sentence first time. I thought that the charm of an opal is its appearance. Because of its colorful appearance and everyone is obsessed with glitter, so that’s why so many people go to mine in order to discover the opal and exchange for money. 

Like the Rex Williamson, Ashmol’s dad, he wanted to find more opals in order to become rich. He wanted everyone in the Lighting Ridge to be respected to him. Dad may not understand why opal’s appearance is less important than its absences.  The value of the opals is the dominant thing in his mind, the opal’s appearance decides how much it could be sold. However, for mom, she does not care about the opal forever. In her mind, her family and herself are the most important part of her life. When she argued with dad about Pobby and Dingan, if there’s no Ashmol, no one could know that Annie looked at her hometown and her ex-boyfriend in the midnight. When she knew that dad was in jail. She immediately went to the police, she did not think about how much money they would spend on this thing, she thought family is the top. So if mom did not care about the opal, she would not say that the opal’s substance or opal’s absences are the secret of the opal. Sometime I thought Kellyanne is same as mom’s personality, they did not care about the value of the opal, they put their friends and family on the top. So in the end I though Ashmol would say this sentence because he had an opal that was very colorful and it is as big as Pobby’s bellybutton, he knew it could sell a good price from its appearance. But because of Kellyanne, he finally exchanged this opal to a funeral. After the funeral, I thought Ashmol figured out that the opal is not the most important thing in his life, there are many different choices for him to earn money, then buy the ticket for his mom. Because he made the funeral, all the people in the Light Ridge came and they figured out that Rex is not a ratter. If he sold this opal, the only thing he could do is to buy a ticket for his mom, he could not make everyone figure out the truth. Even though he did not the opal for his mom, but that opal influent everyone in the Lighting Ridge. 

There are different meanings for the family members. For dad, opal means the wealth, he could get much money from the opal and enjoy the better lifestyle. For mom, opal does not have a clear meaning, in her eyes, a family is more important than opals. But for Ashmol, after the funeral, he would not say that opal is the most important thing. He had already sold one opal for a funeral. He found out that even though opal is valuable but can not buy the happiness and family. If there're more colors on the opal, they show how expensive this opal is. The reason why the absences are important because if Ashmol gave this opal to his dad, then they exchanged it for money, Kellyanne would not be happy, Old Sis would win the lawsuit and everyone in the Lighting Ridge would continue to think Williamson is the ratter. Because of the absences of the opal, they lost the wealth but get the happiness and safety. 

So because of the rare of the opals, that’s why it is so precious and attractive for everyone who lived in the Lighting Ridge, but for the people who had an opal before, they began to understand the charm of the opal is not the substance, but in its content. However, Ashmol understood it after he sold it. But for the whole family, there’s nothing more important than themselves, they learned love in this one month. 

Pobby and Dingan Quiz

Before Kellyanne got sick, Ashmol never believed Pobby and Dingan are real. He just thought that Pobby and Dingan destroyed his family, his father went to jail, mom missed England in the midnight, everyone lived in the Lighting Ridge thought his father was a ratter. So he was angry about these two invisible characters. However, as the plot moves, Kellyanne gets sick deeply. Ashmol begins to feel worried and self-condemned to Kellyanne, he thinks that if he finds Pobby and Dingan, all things would be solved. When his sister wants him to go to Sid in order to find Pobby and Dingan, the reason is just about Kellyanne's premonition, but Ashmol agrees and goes to the Sid. He does not want his sister to die thinking he is the kind of Ashmol who does not believe anything. In the Sid, there are many weird things stimulate Ashmol and make Ashmol more curious. When he stands outside of the Sid, he sees many stars in the sky, he remembers his father told him that every star on the sky, there must be one opal under the ground. He remembers one unbelievable thing that this land where Lighting Ridge is now was once covered by seawater and how all kinds of sea creatures had been found fossilized in the rock. This thing makes him consider that if that sea was once here where now there's nothing but dry land. He begins to think that if this amazing thing was true it was possible Pobby and Dingan were true too. He never thought Pobby and Dingan were real before. But due to his sister, he had no choice, in his mind that family is more important than anything else. The only thing he could do is to make the people in his neighborhood believe his father is not a ratter, then his family can go back to normal. When he remembers this weird and unbelievable thing, he automatically makes this thing relating to Pobby and Dingan, he wants to make himself convince about his own guess. This thing is important because this is Ashmol first time making himself believe Pobby and Dingan, he's trying to convince himself.
Annie, Mom.
Imagination and dream are important for everyone. If there's no imagination, human can not create so many creative things. People do not know what do they pursue for without dream. Especially in this book, even though we could not see our dreams and imagination clearly, they are our goals that support us to do everything. For Ashmol's Mom, Annie. In one night, Ashmol suddenly knew that his mom felt bored about her husband and her life. She wanted to go back to England because when she was in England, she had nothing to worry, she smiled happier. For Ashmol's dream, when he got the opal, he wanted to sell it in order to get some money for him to buy tickets for his mom to go to England. These two characters' dreams are unseen and they hide deeply, they never told others about their dreams, but Kellyanne, she achieved her dream, she had two good friends, she can eat with them and play with them. She smiled happily as same as Ashmol's mom smile when she was in England. Annie and Ashmol also want to get this emotion, Annie is lonely in Lighting Ridege, Ashmol does not have any good friend. Mom is more mature than Ashmol, so she understands Kellyanne and that's why she protects Kellyanne every time when father and Ashmol told Kellyanne that P&D are unreal because mom also wants to have this kind of friend.

Story

This break I did not go back to China, however I chose to go to Chicago in order to get involved in a program, which called CivicWeek Education. This education created by Northwestern university. I participated into the program's main direction is to discover Human rights and do some research on urban affairs. This was a big challenge for me because human right and urban affairs are not my strength, but due to this challenge, I chose to join in them in order to improve myself. In my  own opinion, I thought that I would meet a lot of problems in the future, how should I solve them? So this program gave me a chance to verify my ability. Also, this spring break is too short, just 17 days, I do not want to live with time difference in these 17 days. Due to the time difference, I have to sleep in the morning and wake at night.
In this program Human Rights & Urban Affairs, I did many meaningful things. For example, I went to Chicago Youth Center to play with kids whose parents did not have time to take care of them. Playing with children was very happy, but tired at the same time. Then I went to LAF, it is a company that helps the poverty to get the benefits. Many lawyers in this company talked to us about their job and what should they do in order to help others. Also we went to a shelter, it accepts all the people who want to stay there, whatever you are homeless or you have not money to rent a house. This agency are happy to help you. The similarity involves in these three agencies is that they are non profit agencies, their purpose is to help others rather than earning money.
Because I joined the program that contains human rights, so everyday we would talk about the influence of human rights. There is one question I think a lot. Does poverty against human rights? Because we talked about human rights, human rights mean liberty, freedom, free speech. However, poverty means homeless, helpless, hopeless. These two words' meanings are opposite. But should they be opposite or could they stay together? This is my problem until I went to a food bank. I went to there, cleaned their garden, cleaned their floor, and also I served food for the homeless people. I noticed one thing during my work time, every homeless person is happy to accept the food and they look neat. So I asked them why they are happy? One man answered me that even though he's homeless now, he had found a job to work. During this time he had no money to rent a house, so that's why he stays here, the reason why he is happy because he thought he had improved his life to become better. He enjoyed to purse his dream everyday. At that time, I figured out that poverty does not against human rights, they should stay to stay together. Human rights protect the poverty and poverty made the sense of human rights. So I thought expect many valuable experience in this program, the similarity between poverty and human rights is the biggest achievement for myself.

Picture about my imaginry firends

Pobby and DIngan are two imaginary friends of Kellyanne. Ashmol does not think that they live in the world, but I think this story is very interesting, maybe Pobby and Dingan live in the world, they live with Kellyanne and Ashmol together. However, they are invisible. Because in the reading, Page 371, which says that there is an old miner said he believed that Pobby and DIngan really existed and he would  look out for them as carefully as he could when he was walking around town. Every kid in this world has a hero dream, we want to save the world, but we are not lonely, there must be some friends accompanying with us. So Pobby and DIngan are the friends who accompany with her during her growth. They are positive, there is no fault around them, they are just two friends who can chat with Kellyanne to spend time. Ashmol just does not understand her way. Pobby is a male and Dingan is a female, which I get the information from the Opal Princess competition, Kellyanne and Dingan got the third prize, just female could get this award. And also Pobby and Dingan both speak English, they do not like wars so that is why Fat Walt pretended he found them, but he said they were shooting roos, actually they do not want to hurt others. It also explains why they do not eat meals, they are only kids, so they only eat Cherry Ripes and lollies. After much information, I begin to have a picture about Pobby and Dingan. Pobby is a silent boy, not really tall but he loves swing, when Kellyanne has free time, he would ask Kellyanne to play swing with him. However he hates Ashmol because every time he plays with Kellyanne, Ashmol would disturb them and slams his face. He does not want to say many words, so every time when Kellyanne argued with her parents about her unreal friends, Pobby does not say anything, he is almost crying, but when Kellyanne is looking at him, he would smile very quickly. For Dingan, in my mind, she is a very outgoing girl, she likes to sit with Kellyanne to eat breakfast with her, even though there’s no food they could eat. She is afraid about the swing, she always thinks that it is dangerous. So when Pobby and Kellyanne play the swing, she just looks them in a long distance. Because she is a girl, so she always wears the purple princess dress. They are not real for everyone except for Kellyanne, she is the only one in this world could chat with them, so I could feel that when dad lost Pobby and Dingan, how stress she would be. 

Vocabualry

Claim. Noun.

Me and Dad were relaxing after a hard afternoon’s work out at the claim.

Place where dad works with mine. 

Wobbling. Adj. 

The noise of a car drove into our ears and a four-wheel-drive police jeep came wobbling down the creamy red track that leads to our claim.

A sound fluctuate unsteadily.

Startled, verb.

My dad turned around, startled.

Excited my sudden things. To disturb by the surprise. 

Figment. Noun.

Pobby was a figment of her imaginings.

Fantastic idea

Rummaged. Verb. 

He rummaged through piles of rocks.

Search everywhere. Haphazardly

Ute. Noun.

Kellyanne glared at me through tears the way she did the time I slammed the door of the ute in Dingan’s face

A vehicle that travels over rough ground. 

Crackpot. Noun.

Lightning Ridge was full of flaming crackpots as far as I could see.

A person who is crazy.

Mello Yello. Noun.
“Pobby and Dingan aren’t dead,” I said, hiding my anger in a swig from my can of Mello Yello.

A soft drink.

Mates noun.

“I still say Kellyanne could do with some real-live mates,”

Friends

Opal. Noun.

My dad would come back from the opal mines covered in dust, his beard like the back end of a dog that’s shat all over its tail.

Mineral with colorful colors stone. Like gemstones.

Fairdinkum Adj.

There’s definitely something in that earth with the name Williamson on it!” “Fairdinkum?” His excitement always caught ahold of me.

honest or reliable

Imaginary. Adj.

I was as much a rockhound as the next kid, but I wasn’t crazy enough to talk to imaginary friends,

Not based on facts, dubious.

Grub noun.

She said they were quieter and better behaved than me and deserved the grub.

Food. Meals.

Fossilized. Adj.

Lucky Jes has taken out a million-dollar stone and a fossilized mammoth tooth with sun-flash in it.

to become a fossil. 

Mammoth noun.

Lucky Jes has taken out a million-dollar stone and a fossilized mammoth tooth with sun-flash in it.

Was an animal like elephant with long tusks and long hair. No longer exists. 

Real or imaginary

Yichen.Li
Mar. 3rd. 2016
English

Reading is a very interesting process. Yesterday I read a fictional book, which called " Pobby and Dingan ". This story's introduction seems so weird because it talks about that there are two main characters, one is Kellyanne and another one is Ashmol. Kellyanne has two invisible friends, and she always says that they are real. She acts that she could communicate with Pobby and Dingan. But Ashmol does not think they are real, me either. Because in the chapter 1, Ashmol told to his parents that “They never existed. Things that never existed can’t be dead. Right?”Which shows that Ashmol never believes there are two invisible friends around Kellyanne. Second, the newspaper, it describes the opal princesses that "Kellyanne Williamson (aged eight) and her invisible friend Dingan", for the reporters, they also do not believe that there's an invisible person in the world. Third, Ashmol's dad, in chapter two his dad pretends that he could see where are Pobby and Dingan, but his purpose is to separate Kellyanne with them, the author already says that Kellyanne is an smart person, but she needs to become normal. And when Kellyanne asks dad where are her friends, her dad points several places, but Kellyanne does not believe. And these two people are the imaginary friends of Kellyanne, she lives in a places full of holes and criminals and freaks.  She was just 8 years old, so she was easy to believe others, maybe she hears from others that Pobby and Dingan who are two heroes can protect the kids, so Kellyanne begins to image.
In conclusion, I think Pobby and Kellyanne are visional, they are only created by Kellyanne's fear.

Improvement

Writing is fun for me, I love the process when I write something. From my first draft to the final draft, I improve my content the most and I added many arguments in it. Every essay is a world, I need to use my thinking and my words to make it more specifically. In my first draft, I spent many times on summary, after I went to the writing center, I figured out that teachers wanted to know your analysis rather than the summary. Teachers were more familiar than you about the plot of the book, so the reason why they wanted to read your essay is to find your opinion to the book. So the difference between my first draft to my final draft is the content. I deleted a lot of summary and I added more quotations. Then I began to look my thesis statement and ending sentence, make them have some connections. So for my essay, it gradually becomes more specifically and more attractive for readers.

One of my favorite characters

Ti Moune's father is my favorite character.
Because he is one of the main character, and he adopted Ti Moune by four gods. His action went through the whole plot. He directly took the plot to continue. He was a brave character, when he found out that Daniel was dying, then he decided to find Daniel's parents in order to save Daniel. Even though it is far from the peasants' territory to the rich people's, he did not care. Even high he got trapped by the rich people. He always told to the Ti Moune give up, he knew how difficult Ti Moune wanted to marry with Daniel. And the James acted father as a real father who is mature and smart. He putted himself into this character. Even though he did not want to find Daniel's parents, but because his daughter begged him, he can not say no to his daughter. James acted this father very realistic. That is why I love this character so much.

Once on this island

Yichen.Li

English II (IS)

Once upon a time, Once on this island.

I can not believe that there will be a musical  that makes me almost cry. This musician calls “ Once on this island”. It changes from the story vision to this musical. I forget how long did I watch the drama about “Peter Pan”, at that time I could not believe that my friends could make a drama so interesting. So this time when I heard my friends will play a musical and they promised this time would be more interesting than last time. So immediately I ordered the ticket and wanted to see what would they play this musical. 

Before I watch this musical, in our english class we knew some plot in it in order to make us understand what happens in the story. So it tells a story because the people want to make a girl out of afraid from thunders.  The story they talk about there is an island where lives peasants and the rich at the same time, there are four gods on this island to protect the people, which are Asaka who is the mother of the earth, Agwe who is the god of water, Erzulie who is the goddess of love and also the papa Ge who is the god of death. The plot is a little bit simple for me, it likes the plot in the Korean Drama, the main female character, Ti Moune who comes from a poor family and her parents are both the peasants. Someday she found out the Daniel who is the rich person on this island got a car crash, he is dying. Ti Moune does not care about the opposition from her parents, she prayed for four gods in order to make Daniel recover. Finally the gods are touched by this girl’s love, so finally Daniel recovers, but he does not know who saves him. Then Ti Moune travels many places in order to find Daniel. Unfortunately when she finds out Daniel, she knows that Daniel was promised to another girl when he was young, so Ti Moune was depressed and she died from miss illness. It is a sad story and these two people are the star-crossed lovers. 

If I want to compare this musical to the Peter Pan, I would say that this musical is better than the latter. Because of several reasons. First, this one is a musical, the music is the main part in this performance. Our thinking is leading from the music. When the music is sad, we are sad, when the music is happy, we are happy. Before the performance, I saw the in the right corner of the stage, Mrs. Eunyoung DiGiacomo prepared for the music of this musical. In two hours, they can not have a rest, they need to give the actors and the audience the signals about what will happen. During entire show, I think they are the most tired people, and the result is good, everyone knows what happened and everyone enjoys the musical. Second, the actors. They are the best players! Ti Moune is the main character in this show, and her thinking, her action lead the audience to go through the plot. It is a very hard job because she needs to perform to the audience all time. And I saw in the end part, when she went to the party and found out that Daniel had already promised to another girl, she began to dance. At this moment, I saw she was very tired and sweated all over. She did her best, when the show ended, all the actors received the warmly applaud. Third, the details, the difference between the wealthy people and the peasants is their dress. Peasants dress so simple, but for the rich people, everyone is dressed in black suit and wear the shoes. The peasants do not wear shoes because they are poor and low hierarchy on that island. The floor is cold, but every actor does not care about that, they pay their all attentions on the performance. Which must be so valuable. And James, because he lives on the same floor with me, every day after studying hall he would practice. One day I asked him when will this performance begin, he said after one month. I was shocked. After Ms. Guarino explained to us about the plot of this musical and how hard it would be. I can not image how hard anybody tries. During this musical, they win. And everyone does their best. Before this musical, I did not totally trust them because I knew how hard the musical would be, maybe they would perform so chaos, but after the performance, I just can say: “ You guys are awesome!” It is a two hours performance, I could image that in the background, how stress they would be, but this show is very orderly and interesting. 

I finally understand why Ms. Guarino would have the confidence to tell us that everyone needs to watch this musical, it must be awesome. And because of Mrs. DiGiacomo, Ms. Guarino and all of the students strive and hard work, this show would be incredible amazing. I love this performance and I hope next performance. 

The experience of Writing Center

02.24.2016

Yichen.Li

English II (IS)

This was not my first time to go to writing center. In English class, because of my essays, I went there for several times. And also because of my writing class, I also needed to find Ms.Swift to revise my essays. Before, I was very disturbed because I always thought my essays were not good and I can not show my ability to Ms.Swift, but this time, I changed my mind because for this essay i revised for several times. Minh and Leo also gave their suggestions on it, so this time I was very confident to meet with Ms.Swift. 

When I went to the writing center, Ms.Swift was doing her work, so I did not disturb her. I just sat on a chair and began to re-read my essay in order to find some mistakes before Ms.Swift read my essay. At two or three minutes, Ms.Swift finished her work and sat in front of me. She did not read my paper immediately. First, she said to me that,” Yichen, I knew this essay needs to compare two stories, for the story Me and You, I knew every plot. But what about The Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows, I did not watch the movies, so can you explain for me in five sentences?” Then I began to think about how to summary the film into five sentences. I began to describe the plot,” Well, first time, Harry escaped from his school because his school was destroyed by the Death Eaters,” Suddenly Ms.Swift interrupted me, “Is this event connected to the growth of Harry?” I answered her,” No, not really. But because Harry leave the school, then he needed to find place to live and fight with Voldemort, then Ron made Harry become mature. “ Then she said,” Is Ron influence Harry, if it’s true, you do not need to explain why Harry leave school and how hard during his escape. This also suits in you first and second body paragraphs. I have already read yours when you were thinking about the summary. The summary is good, but actually it is too much summary. Ms.Guarino already knew what happened in this story, she knew every detail, the only thing she wants to read in your essay is your own thinking, your analysis. For example, the first paragraph, you always wrote about how bad Lorenzo was. These things Ms.Guarino already knew, these things you just needed to use four or five sentences to tell, then you needed to expand your analysis. You always paid attention on how bad Lorenzo was, but you did not give the quotations about it, you can add some quotations about what made Lorenzo self-centered. And in your second body paragraph, you tried to say that Lorenzo got love from Olivia, so Olivia influenced Lorenzo to become better. This part is good, you use quotations, summary and analysis in this paragraph, which is good. So in your four body paragraphs, you need to make your summary shorter and give more quotations to support your analysis.” Then she stopped, she took a paper for me, and began to draw something and began to explain for me, “ There is one person, he is lonely, he wants to be loved. But no one cares about him, suddenly there is another person takes the gift for him, the gift does not need to be treasure, it can be the understanding. For Me and You, in this story, Olivia did not give Lorenzo anything, when she recovered, she talked many funny things that were happened when she played with Lorenzo. These things may be normal, but for Lorenzo, he felt that his step sister still remembered the events that happened long times ago, he felt very happy. So that is the reason why Lorenzo become better after the ski week. For everyone who wants to become stronger, their secret or their equipment is the love. Which also connects with your thesis statement,”Love could change person from negative to positive.” So you also need to improve your end sentences stronger in order to support your thesis statement.”

I thought a lot after she finished her last sentence, she did not disturb me. And I thought a lot about who to revise my essay to become better. I also asked some questions about when should I use Italicize and the balance between summary and analysis. She explained to me detailed. After went to writing center, I changed a lot in my essay, and now I thought my essay is stronger. 

Revise of my essay

English II (IS)
Feb.24.2016

Writing is a very hard work for me because I always want to finish my products perfectly. So every time I finish my essay, whatever it is first draft  or second draft or final draft, I would read my essay first then I would figure out which part still should revise. Now I came to the second draft of my essay. I revised my outline, and make each paragraph connect with each others in order to make my essay better. Then I had no idea about how to revise my essay so I gave my essay to my friends and teachers. Everyone had different opinion so they must give me many useful advise for my essay. For teachers, they read many students' essays, so they could clearly figure out my writing style and also give me so useful grammar content. And my next step is not only that revise my body paragraphs, but also I would add some analysis to make the open and end sentences have more connections.
In my revision, I deleted my summary sentences in the paragraph that talks about Me and You, I began to find out that I did not need so many summary to support my idea. I could just use several sentences to talk about the story, then I could use quotations and my own analysis to make my paragraphs become stronger. The result of this change is that I felt my  first body paragraph that makes readers easier to read,  they can directly understand what do I want to say this paragraph.
I should still work on my body paragraphs first because I need to defense many summary in them in order to make my paragraphs refined but also have the attraction for readers to read. But my end paragraph I need to spend some time on it in order to make some connections with my title and my thesis statement. What power does love have. How would it connect with Lorenzo and Harry, these two questions I need to spend a lot of time on it.
My strength is my outline, I create an unique outline that is different with others. It does not only talk about Lorenzo and Harry's change, but also it talks about how do they change and why do they change. So these two elements would make my essay become more attractive for the readers.
My shortage is the balance between summary and analysis, when I wrote my essay, sometime I would be confused about what is summary and what is analysis, after I went to writing center. With Ms.Swift's help I deleted many redundant summary and added more quotations and analysis in my essay, but I still needed to find the balance between summary and analysis then I would make my every body paragraph become stronger and better.
The difficulty must be the paragraph of Harry, I did not only need to summary it, but also I had to catch some sentences from the film to show Harry's personality and change. And also the quotations are also hard for me. The easy part in this essay must be the Lorenzo's paragraph, because we talked a lot in class time so when I wrote the paragraph about Lorenzo's change, I have already decided what would I say and which part I need to use quotations to support.
The Grammar I improved a lot in this essay, before I went to writing center, my body paragraph and my open thesis statement I used past tense to write, after I went to writing center, I changed my tense to present tense because Ms.Swoft taught me that the essays almost write in present tense and she helped me to change many wrong grammar and punctuation in my story. She explained for me that when the sentence should stop, and when should use comma to add some information for this sentence. I am very thankful for Ms.Swift helping me to revise my essay,

Revised Essay

Yichen.Li
English II (IS)
                                    Love’s power on Lorenzo and Harry
In both the novel, Me and You by Niccolo Ammaniti and the film, Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows directed by David Yates , two main characters, Lorenzo and Harry changes from antisocial and self-centered boys to outgoing and caring boys because of their friends’ love.
In the story, Me and You,  Ammaniti describes how a good friendship could influence an introvert’s personality and how could it help that person to grow up. Because of his step sister. Olivia, Lorenzo who changes from introversion and Narcissistic disorder into a positive guy who loves the world and figures out he's one part of the world. Lorenzo always describes himself as better than others. In his middle school,he was confused about his position in the class so he began to mimic others. He was not an outgoing boy due to his parents. His dad had lots of work to do, so his dad could not take care of Lorenzo. And Lorenzo’s mom did not care about him. She just cared about herself. In this story, Lorenzo was a boy who was confused about his position in the society and in his family. Lorenzo compares himself to an insect,  “He can not hurt you, he is a nice insect, but dressed up as a wasp, the birds, the lizards even human beings fear him. ….. Here’s what I had to do. Imitate the dangerous ones.”( Ammaniti 36) This is how he lives in this world. He tries to be a dangerous person in order to protect himself. But by the end of the novel, he had changed his idea and personality from a Narcissistic disorder boy into an outgoing and positive boy. In the end, he described himself again,  "I danced I felt something I’d never felt before. I knew that beyond that door the world was waiting for me and that I would be able to talk to the others like I was one of them." ( Ammaniti, 143) After he escaped from the fear. he was that boy who had Narcissistic disorder and centralized, he became positive and had his hope to the future.
Before the ski week, Lorenzo was an self-centered teenager who rejects others and he did not feel love from his parents. “ I camouflaged myself like a stick insect on dry branches….Nobody bothered me… Everyone was out of place there, they all spoke different languages and looked like they were just passing through. The girls kept to themselves and the guys played football on the big field opposite the school...But my parents weren’t satisfied. I had to have friends” (Ammaniti 32). Between hang out with friends in ski week and stays in the dark basement, he chooses to hide in the basement when his parents think he enjoys the ski week.   But for Olivia, she is a drug addict, she needs money to spend and to sleep until she recovers. So they both remembered that cellar when Lorenzo first met with Olivia. He described he did not like his half sister. At the midnight, when Olivia was standing out of the door, she asked Lorenzo to open the door and Lorenzo disagreed. Then Olivia threatened Lorenzo to open the door, now Lorenzo did not make friendship with Olivia. So the time Lorenzo began to change was after Olivia pretended she was Alessia’s mom in order to solve Lorenzo mom’s suspect. At that time, Lorenzo did not feel hatred and anger to his sister. But when he saw his sister slumped against the wall and vomited something. He began to feel sympathy for his half sister. Before we knew that Lorenzo felt sympathy for his dad when Lorenzo read the letters from Olivia to his dad. Lorenzo was a boy who was very stubborn. He pretended he did not care about anything but in fact, when his mom was called bitch by a giant man, he felt helpless. When his dad was rejected by his half-sister, he felt sympathy for his dad. Now, when his half-sister was lying on the ground and she needed him to take care of her, Lorenzo began to feel sympathy again. He could not say no to his relations. During the time when Lorenzo and Olivia stayed at the cellar, Lorenzo changed a lot, but Olivia did not teach him anything. Lorenzo just figured out that when he helped Olivia, at the same time he also helped himself to go out of the fear and hatred. There’s an evidence that showed his growth, “ He tidied up the cellar. Kill the mutant and he finished everything. Started reading Salem’s Lot again. Reading about vampiric metamorphoses” (Ammaniti 135).  This was a change for Lorenzo after he lived a long time with Olivia. I did not want to say that Olivia taught Lorenzo how to behave. Just because of Lorenzo, himself, during this Ski week, he changed a lot. Olivia was just a catalyst for Lorenzo to become independent.
The good friendship can solve any negative things. Especially happened in the Harry Potter and the Death Hallows, Harry changed from a silent boy into a brave and positive partner who wants to protect his friends by his best friends Ron's help. In the film, Harry's college was conquered by the death eaters, so they ran away from there and set out on a new journey. During this journey, they faced many problems, inside problems and outside problems. The outside problem is that they faced Voldemort. But Harry was not that timid one. When he faced Voldemort, he's no longer afraid of the enemy, he figured out his mission was that defends his friends from harm. There is a word that is best description for Harry, which is warrior. Even though he had a tragic life experience, he was antisocial, now he grows up to a boy with outgoing and helpful personality. And there also are some inside problems, for example, when the Ron was influenced by the Horcrux, he did not totally believe Harry and Hermione, so after an argument, he leave alone. And another one problem is in the headmaster's office, when Harry had the memory of Snape, he found out he had some connections with Voldemort, so Voldemort can not destroy him. So he began to change his idea and was eager for protecting his friends. Despite many challenges he met when he escaped from the Death Eaters when he faced with Voldemort and he could fight with Voldemort. Even though in the end he failed, he had already shown his change to the audience, he was not that boy who was timid.

In the before, I always thought that Harry’s change was due to Voldemort. Because of Voldemort, Harry had to face anything then he became independent. However, Ron, Hermione and Harry both faced with Voldemort, but why just Harry changed? This was a question for me before. When I reviewed Harry’s life experience, I knew that he was abundant from his parents, so that’s why he did not talk a lot, always silent and don't trust others. When Harry met Ron who is a lively child. Ron’s personality deeply influenced Harry. Even though Ron always did something wrong with his passion, but if there’s no Ron who accompanied with Harry, even though Harry could get protection from his professor and his friends, he could not grow up. Ron’s optimistic was the thing that Harry does not have.He was not a loner on the way of growth, he had his friends to accompany with him. Like what I did say when Ron broke out with Harry and Hermione because of some contradictions, finally Ron figured out that he can not leave without them, so in the most dangerous time, he came back. Even Hermione said that she would not forgive Ron, but when Ron came back, she already forgave Ron. At the same time Harry also figured out that. Even though Ron was very extreme, Harry needed to learn some from Ron because growth was to complete ourselves. Ron met many friends, but finally, he understood that the most important friend for him is Harry. They both had something that each other was a lack of. Harry was the lack of passion, also, Ron was the lack of self-confidence. After this escape, their friendship became stronger. Which was the result that their professor Dumbledore wanted to see.

Briefly, it can be said that these two totally different stories created two types of plots, the similarity between them is the growth of the main characters. For Me and You, Olivia and Lorenzo, they were the sibling relationships. But for Harry and Ron, they were just friendship. And a person who helped the main characters changed and developed, they were also had different personalities, Olivia was inflated and centralized, she did not put anything on her mind. For Ron, I always described he liked a knight, selfless, brave, passion and impulsion. Lorenzo was smarter than others so when there’s a brutal girl joined into his life, he did not have any choice, the only way he could choose is to accept Olivia and also help himself. But for Harry, his life experience was not good, he was the lack of love, he did not have confidence. These reasons limited his talent, so Ron appeared, Ron influenced Harry a lot but just in the “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows”, the first time they cooperated with others in order to protect themselves without any protection from their professors. For these two stories, even though they have many difference, but the main topic is that the main characters become stronger due to someone.  Olivia and Ron both give Lorenzo and Harry nothing in real. But both of them give the main characters understanding. For Olivia, she talked the play time with Lorenzo in their childhood to Lorenzo, which made Lorenzo felt love. For Ron, everytime he stood in front of the Harry in order to protect him, which also made Harry feel love. Finally two main characters become mature and feel love from their friends. Even these two stories are different, both two authors wanted to tell the importance of growth, they used two different ways to tell which are very valuable for readers.

My favorite sentence

In the end, he described himself again,  "I danced I felt something I’d never felt before. I knew that beyond that door the world was waiting for me and that I would be able to talk to the others like I was one of them." ( Ammaniti, 143) After he escaped from the fear, he was not the boy who had Narcissistic disorder and centralized, he became positive and had his hope to the future.

This is my favorite sentence, I use both quotation and summary at the same time, I think this sentence is very strong for readers to feel Lornezo's feelings, the quotation describes Lorenzo's action, and the summary shows Lorenzo's feeling, which is the reason why it becomes my favorite sentence.

The real first draft

Yichen.Li

English II (IS)

              Love’s power on Lorenzo and Harry

In both the novels Me and You and the film Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows, two main characters, Lorenzo and Harry changed from the antisocial and self-centered boys to the outgoing and caring boys. because of their friends’ love. 

In the story Me and You, the author described that how a good friendship could influence an introversive person's personality and how could it help that person to grow up. The plot was similar that also happened on Lorenzo who changed from introversion and Narcissistic disorder boy into a positive guy who loves the world and figured out he's one part of the world by Olivia. Before Lorenzo was a negative boy who did not want to talk with others. Always described himself who was better than others. In his middle school,he was confused about his position in the class so he began to mimic others. He was not an outgoing boy due to his parents, his dad had lots of work to do, so his dad could not take of Lorenzo. And Lorenzo’s mom did not care about Lorenzo, she just cared about herself. In this story, Lorenzo was a boy who was confused about his position in the society and in his family. In the story, he used an insect who could mimic others to describe himself. “He can not hurt you, he is a nice insect, but dressed up as a wasp, the birds, the lizards even human beings fear him. ….. Here’s what I had to do. Imitate the dangerous ones.”( Ammaniti 36) This was his thinking about how to live in this world, he held a negative thinking to this world and he mimic himself into a dangerous person in order to protect himself. But by the end of the novel, he had changed his idea and personality from a Narcissistic disorder boy into an outgoing and positive boy. In the end, he described himself again,  "I danced I felt something I’d never felt before. I knew that beyond that door the world was waiting for me and that I would be able to talk to the others like I was one of them." ( Ammaniti, 143) After he escaped from the fear. he was that boy who had Narcissistic disorder and centralized, he became positive and had his hope to the future.

Lorenzo and Olivia met just because of an accident. Lorenzo wanted to find a place for him to live in the Ski week, Olivia needed money to spend. So they both remembered that cellar when Lorenzo first met with Olivia. He described he did not like his half sister. At the midnight, when Olivia was standing out of the door, she asked Lorenzo to open the door and Lorenzo disagreed. Then Olivia threatened Lorenzo to open the door, now Lorenzo did not make friendship with Olivia. So the time Lorenzo began to change was after Olivia pretended she was Alessia’s mom in order to solve Lorenzo mom’s suspect. At that time, Lorenzo did not feel hatred and angry to his sister. But when he saw his sister slumped against the wall and vomited something. He began to feel sympathy for his half sister. Before we knew that Lorenzo felt sympathy for his dad when Lorenzo read the letters from Olivia to his dad. Lorenzo was a boy who was very stubborn. He pretended he did not care about anything but in fact, when his mom was called bitch by a giant man, he felt helpless. When his dad was rejected by his half-sister, he felt sympathy for his dad. Now, when his half-sister was lying on the ground and she needed him to take care of her, Lorenzo began to feel sympathy again. He could not say no to his relations. During the time when Lorenzo and Olivia stayed at the cellar, Lorenzo changed a lot, but Olivia did not teach him anything. Lorenzo just figured out that when he helped Olivia, at the same time he also helped himself to go out of the fear and hatred. There’s an evidence that showed his growth, “ He tidied up the cellar. Kill the mutant and he finished everything. Started reading Salem’s Lot again. Reading about vampiric metamorphoses.”  This was a development for Lorenzo after he lived a long time with Olivia. I did not want to say that Olivia taught Lorenzo how to behave. Just because of Lorenzo, himself, during this Ski week, he changed a lot. Olivia was just a catalyst for Lorenzo to become independent. 

The good friendship can solve any negative things. Especially happened in the Harry Potter and the Death Hallows, Harry changed from a silent boy into a brave and positive partner who wants to protect his friends by his best friends Ron's help. When he faced Voldemort, he's no longer afraid of the enemy, he figured out his mission was that defends his friends from harm. So I use warrior this word to describe Harry and I think this word is the best suitable word to Harry. Even though he had a tragic life experience, he was antisocial, now he grows up to a boy with outgoing and helpful personality. Despite many challenges he met when he escaped from the Death Eaters when he faced with Voldemort and he could fight with Voldemort. Even though in the end he failed, he had already shown his change to the audience, he was not that boy who was timid. 

In the before, I always thought that Harry’s change was due to Voldemort. Because of Voldemort, Harry had to face anything then he became independent. However, Ron, Hermione and Harry both faced with Voldemort, but why just Harry changed? This was a question for me before. When I reviewed Harry’s life experience, I knew that he was abundant from his parents, so that’s why he did not talk a lot, always silent and don't trust others. When Harry met Ron who is a lively child. Ron’s personality deeply influenced Harry. Even though Ron always did something wrong with his passion, but if there’s no Ron who accompanied with Harry, even though Harry could get protect from his professor and his friends, he could not grow up. Ron’s optimistic was Harry lack of. He was never a loner on the way of growth, he had his friends to accompany with him. Like what I did say when Ron broke out with Harry and Hermione because of some contradictions, finally Ron figured out that he can not leave without them, Harry also figured out that. Even though Ron was very extreme, Harry needed to learn some from Ron because growth was to complete ourselves. Ron met many friends, but finally, he understood that the most important friend for him is Harry. They both had something that each other was a lack of. Harry was the lack of passion, also, Ron was the lack of self-confidence. After this escape, their friendship became stronger. Which was the result that their professor Dumbledore wanted to see. 

    Briefly, it can be said that these two totally different stories created two types of plots, the similarity between them is the growth of the main characters. For Me and You, Olivia and Lorenzo, they were the sibling relationships. But for Harry and Ron, they were just friendship. And a person who helped the main characters changed and developed, they were also had different personalities, Olivia was inflated and centralized, she did not put anything on her mind. For Ron, I always described he liked a knight, selfless, brave, passion and impulsion. Lorenzo was smarter than others so when there’s a brutal girl joined into his life, he did not have any choice, the only way he could choose is to accept Olivia and also help himself. But for Harry, his life experience was not good, he was the lack of love, he did not have confidence. These reasons limited his talent, so Ron appeared, Ron influenced Harry a lot but just in the “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows”, the first time they cooperated with others in order to protect themselves without any protection from their professors. Two stories are different, but the two authors both wanted to tell the importance of growth, they used two different ways to tell which are very valuable for readers.