"Laughing Heart"

Hack To School

1. This class is about communication, understanding, having a voice.

 2. In my opinion, the easiest thing in this class are the journals.

 3. The hardest part of the class is memorization.

 4. I've learned a lot about the world, in other words, reality. Dr. Preston makes me realize and think about what goes around in the world or how things work. Why things work the way they do and what we benefit from everything. I've also learned a few things about my classmates, for example, the game we once played in class. We all had to write something important, personal, or interesting about ourselves and we had to guess what fact went with who.

 5. My Big Question is, Why is the world always judging?

Commmunication Strategies Of A Hacker

diction= collective of words written
tone= the author's attitude towards the audience, topic or characters
syntax= a way words are placed together
Prose= words in paragraphs not being poetry...a natural flow of speech

diction...teenager and criminal; the way the author refers to his readers and giving different meanings to those two words the choice to write

syntax... "they're all alike"
         -keeps referring to the same line over and over again at the end of each paragraph

tone... argues between himself, writes about his 'other voice'
         -talks to both kids and adults

apathetique= nice....diction
"did you, in ur three-piece..."

syntax.....he's writing behalf on us teenagers but wants adults...?

Today I Asked a Question...

As we grow older why do we stop asking questions?
Today in class we discussed our journal topic... While writing about the topic Dr. Preston mentioned a lot of important and true facts. For example, "learning is physically and emotionally good for us... it eliminates depression." I never knew that learning reduced or eliminated the amount of depression... I was honestly surprised about that. Another, thing that he had mentioned was, "In school, we're rewarded for answering a question, not for asking one." And I honestly do agree with this because when you answer a question right a teacher gives you credit. When asking one they may answer but they won't give you credit for it... I mean they may not give us points for asking a question but they mostly take our question to consideration.

You Are Not Entitled to Your Opinion

You're not entitled to your opinion. What does 'entitled' mean? Well, entitled is believing in one's privileges. Being entitled to our opinions means no one has the right to stop you from thinking or saying what you want. We've grown to be "entitled to our opinion" other than being told we're not. After hearing that we can say whatever we want for quite a long time and then randomly being told we can't.... surprises us and we think that person is crazy. Some may say that they are entitled to their own opinion due to the first amendment; congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances. Perhaps, some may say that their opinion doesn't matter. They may think that because they think that someone else's opinion will out loud or outshine theirs. Being entitled or to not be entitled to my opinion doesn't really matter t me. Is it weird, maybe, but what I know for a fact is that I have opinions. I have and give judgments... we all do. And to me having judgments and opinions is more than enough because I know us humans all think differently whether we're entitled to them or not.

Socratic Seminar Pt. 2: The Right to Your Opinion

• Well, what is an opinion? 

An opinion is something you hold to your self. We're all entitled to our own opinion.

• Like Dr. Preston mentioned about someone's favorite color being blue and your friend's being yellow... You may go back and forth about which color is better but the conversation is then cut. By one of you saying, "Well you're entitled to your own opinion." Because the negativity was then cut short and while discussing which was better it ended there.
• When shutting someone's opinion they feel hurt and emotional
• limbic area: governs our emotions
• being gentle on the people, being easy on the people, and really hard on the problem
• syllogism- the simplest form of argument
• Money is nothing than a system of agreements
• claiming a right to our opinion doesn't get us closer to the truth, it stops conversations it's not technically true because we are not automatically entitled to someones else's agreement... it entitles them.... because we depend on shared opinion...                               
• a lot of things that are "sacred" they're not.... a lot of things that we think that are "sacred" are not... 
• In local parentis- in place of the parents
• the legal principle that allows school administrators to act in place of the parents... that's why they can enforce dress code........ schools have a school dress code policy
• USE YOUR POWERS FOR GOOD
• Our brains are BRILLIANT but our bodies are DUMB
• when we give our opinion it isn't just us saying what we think but we provide evidence and use logic to present it.... not just how we say but how we show

Why is love important?

In yesterday's Socratic Seminar we discussed our journal topic. Why is love such an important theme in music, poetry, short stories, novels, and movies? Why are people so interested in love--and so often, so bad at loving?
One of my classmates had mentioned that love is something we grow up having. For example, we experience love when we're first born and held by our parents.

I agree with what my classmate had said but in my opinion, I don't think we grow from just being held by our parents. I believe that there's more to it.
We don't just grow and then magically know how to love. We grow from that first hug we received and learn how to love on the way.

A lot of people say 'love' is a strong word... It may be but then why do we say we love something.

Big Question(s):
Is love something we really need in life?
Why is love important?
What is love?

Being loved and loving someone is an ingredient of human survival. It may not be much of a  human necessity like oxygen, food, water, etc.  But love does satisfy the emotional needs of humans. To some of us, it may make us feel good about our selves. Love is important because we can then have relationships with people and turn to them when we need a push.

Love? Love is about caring for someone, wanting to be there for them, supporting them, and helping them grow. It means caring about someone else's happiness, problems, and struggles other than one's own.

Now I Remember

The method that I used to memorize the poem "Richard Cory" was taking it apart paragraph by paragraph. I'd memorize the first paragraph and repeat it about 2-3 times. After I'd have it down I would move onto the second para. and go back to the first and put what I knew together. So my steps were technically just read, repeat, review, read, repeat, review, etc. I tried the mirror, it didn't help me. Writing it down also didn't help, neither did recording myself and hearing it after. But well it's different for everyone.

Richard Cory Poem

The Socratic Method

There were many interesting facts that drew my attention. One of these facts was how the Socratic Method works, It works by having a negative mindset and being the 'devil's advocate'. The Socratic Method is bad as much as it may seem, the negative mindset helps build up a conversation. It also helps teachers to get a view of how much understanding there is in the subject that was taught.

Keep Pushing Forward

Hey,
Well, to start off with I'm a regular teenager trying new things out like any other. First things first...I'm a newly incoming junior at Santa Maria High School. As a junior pressure is brought onto us, not just for being role models but for also being expected to know a lot. Being close to the end of high school brings a lot of emotions to play.
What has kept me pushing forward through these past two years have been the comments and comparisons that have been thrown at me. (I have 4 siblings; 2 older brothers, a sister, and a little brother) They'd say that I'd become like my sister (21), my older brother (27), or that I wouldn't be able to get as far as my other brother (25).
These past and upcoming years I want to show those who said I couldn't that I most certainly can. I wanna show them, I made it through thanks to all the negative comments they gave. Proving someone wrong is a really good feeling. All I want to say is keep pushing forward, we can't let others put us down. There'll always, always be something or someone that'll give you strength or help us through those struggles.