Two days ago, an inspirational speaker named Kevin Laue came to our school and gave a speech to 4th-7th graders in the auditorium. Kevin is special because he only have 1 arm and a half. He is born on April 13, 1990, now he is 25 years old, his height is 6ft 11. He is an awesome basketball player. His dad is a race car driver. His parents divorced when he was 4 years old. Then, when he was 10, his dad died of cancer.

Kevin told us many stories about himself, but also, he told us lots of advice like: “Like the way you are”, “Don’t ever give up on anything”, “Work Hard”, “Don’t make excuses”, “Face the problem”, “I matter”, and “Believe in yourself”. These are lots and lots of fantastic advice.

Those advice could help me. For example, “Don’t ever give up”. It could help me through my school years, or even my whole life! Now, I’m practicing my piano for the piano contest in July. THe song is really hard and I always don’t want to practice. THis time, I could really use this advice. Another example is, “Like the way you are”. In school people are always gossiping and sometimes about people’s looks. When someone talks about the person’s looks, that person would feel really bad. but you just need to “Like the way you are”. Or, I am going to middle school next year. Of course, middle schoolers always thinks about looks, your appearance. People might think that they are different, and they hate themselves. But you are important, and that includes the “I matter” advice and have to “Like the way you are”.

I really think Kevin is positive. Even though he lost an arm, he still want to make his dream come true, and he did. He is now a basketball player. He is really popular and he changes people’s lives too. I really appreciate him to come to our school, or new auditorium and be the first important Inspiration Speaker. I would like to hear him talk again.

Here is the trailer of the movie Long Shot, which is talking about Kevin’s life:

In class, we wrote an essay about Island of the blue Dolphins. I chose to write about how Karana, the main character of the book, grow throughout the book.
Here is the book cover:

Here is my essay:

Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O’Dell, is a book based on a true story; however, O’Dell used his imaginations to create details. The book shows how Karana grows during different times.

Before the Aleuts came, Karana had jobs. She has a dad, Chief Chowig, the leader of the tribe, has an older sister, Ulape, and a younger brother, Ramo. They had no mom. Karana was still 12 years old then. They were all living happily until the Aleuts came….

After the Aleuts came, people died. They died because they had a battle. No family has not lost a father, husband, son, or brother. Karana, Ulape, and Ramo lost their father. Then the next leader of the tribe, Kimki, went to find a new land. When the ship came to pick them up to go to the land Kemki has found, Ramo was left on the island. Karana jumped into the water and swam towards the shore. They lived there for a few days, until Ramo got killed by a pack of wild dogs.

Karana lived alone on the island for about 18 years. Then, she was about 30 years old. During this time she tamed animals and she had a lot of animal here to hunt sea otters. She did not know what happen to her tribe until they told her that the ship sank. They brought her to Santa Barbara, but she soon died of a disease that was not familiar to her body.

I think Karana was really, really brave of living alone. I would not like to live alone and had lost my siblings and parents. I wish that she could have lived longer and know more about the world.

In class, we made a Powtoon video. The theme was “English First”. Here is my video I created about how a boy learn that English is important.

My favorite book for my Q3 book project is Dork Diaries #1: Tales From the Not-So-Fabulous Life. This is the diary of a 8th grader, Nikki J. Maxwell. If you want to know more about this book, see the powerpoint and my book poster for information. This is my powerpoint:

In class, we made an article of what we did in our Chinese New Year break. We made it in iPages and saved it as a PDF file. Here is my Chinese New Year Break Article:

Hope you like it!!

In class, we are now reading a book called, Number the Stars. WE had an assignment that is to write what Mrs. and Mr. Johansen are talking about when they are deciding how to help hide Ellen from the Nazis, because she is Jewish. Mrs. and Mr. Johansen are Annemarie’s parents and Ellen is Annemarie’s best friend. I made this document out of Gone Google Story Builder. My document is what Mrs. and Mr. Johansen talking about. Here is the link to it: http://goo.gl/HtF6NF.

This is a article about my Winter Break. Hope you like it!

In class we read, Dear Mrs. LaRue, Letters from Obedience School by Mark Teague. This is a picture below of the book:

We were learning about the VOICE trait for writing. This book demonstrates many types of voices. In my project I wrote an interview with Mrs. LaRue. I tried to demonstrate Mrs. LaRue speaking in many voices such as angry and fed up. You can read it below.

Allison: I am the interviewer for New York Times We has a guest here and it is
Mrs. LaRue!!
Mrs. LaRue: Hello, everybody!!
Allison: We’ve learned that your dog is in obedience school. Why?
Mrs. LaRue: Yes, Ike is very naughty. He once ate my chicken pie! Oh my!
Allison: Oh no! That is kind of weird.
Mrs. LaRue: Good you got the point.
Allison: What else did Ike do that made you very upset?
Mrs. LaRue: Tons. He howls at night when I’m not at home. Then that bothers my neighbors! He ripped my favorite camel hair coat while I’m crossing the street!
Allison: I guess you made the right choice to let Ike go to the obedience school.
Mrs. LaRue: Maybe not.
Allison: Why?
Mrs. LaRue: Because he said the obedience school was horrible and said he wanted to run away in his letters.
Allison: Uh oh!
Mrs. LaRue: He was very good when I first bought him. I just don’t know what has gotten into him. I’m getting so angry and fed up! That is why I sent him to obedience school. I kind of regret that I sent him because he is running away!!
Allison: Calm down, calm down.
Mrs. LaRue: Thanks.
Allison: Is there any more to share?
Mrs. LaRue: I think that is mostly it.
Allison: Thanks for sharing! Good-bye!
Mrs. LaRue: Good-bye!
Allison: Okay! See you next time!

In class, we read Midsummer Night’s Dream, but it is an easier version. I made a Wanted Poster for Puck. This is a picture of my project:

And below is a video that my teacher, Miss Chagaris, made.

Thank you!

This is the trailer of Cast Away:

This is a picture of the book Hatchet:

This is my essay:
The book Hatchet by Gary Paulsen and the movie Cast Away, starring Tom Hanks, are stories about survival. Hatchet is about a boy named Brian Robeson. He is 13 years old. Cast Away is about a man named Chuck Noland; he is about 30-35 years old. You could see the stories are talking about different things. However, they have similarities too. For example, both character missed their family; both characters explore, and finally, both characters show of display perseverance.

Both character missed their family and friends, but they showed the way they missed differently. For Brian, he dreamed about his mom, dad, and friends, after he was in the Canadian wilderness, after his plane crashed. His parents divorced and he feels that it was all because of his mom, so he was angry at her, but he realized he started to miss his family, including his mom. For Chuck, he really missed his fiancé, Kelly. After he was stranded in the tropical island after the plane crashed, he drew Kelly’s face all over his cave’s wall. He looked at her picture every single day, and that made him think he has to stay alive. I would miss my family and friends too, only if I were him.

Both characters explored and that helped them stay alive. For Chuck, he decided he has to eat something, or else he will starve to death. So, Chuck made a spear and sticks it into a crab and ate it raw. Even though he thinks it is very disgusting, he still ate it down. For Brian, he decided to eat the raw snap turtle eggs that he found in the sand. So, he poked a hole and drank the raw yolk down. I think that was really brave. I am afraid to eat those things raw.

Both characters show or display perseverance and mostly that helped them stay alive. For Brian, he tries again and again. When he was making fire, he never gives up. He was very happy and he says that fire was his friend. For Chuck, he made fire for a long time, and after he made fire, he was so happy. He was so happy he said, “I made fire!!!! Yeah!!! Look at what I’ve made!!!!! I made fire!!!” He used a leaf and did the SOS sign. He was calling the fire friend too.

Both the book Hatchet, by Gary Paulsen, and Cast Away, starring Tom Hanks, are both about survival stories. They were both stranded alone and used these character traits to help them: Family, Explore, and the most important Perseverance.