Monday, September 26, 2016

Aria: Richard Rodriguez

This is a quotes post
After reading through this article by Richard Rodriguez i have a new understanding a respect for children and people who come from different cultural backgrounds. This article sheds light on the ups and downs of not speaking the native language of the class room and how it can affect a child's learning and their family.
"Because I wrongly imagined that English was intrinsically a public language and Spanish an intrinsically private one, I had easily noted the difference between classroom language and the language of home."
 Richard/Ricardo was himself as an outsider in the english world/classroom. But on the other hand he saw his Spanish roots as a warm welcoming language to comfort him and give him an escape from the english speaking world. He had connect the languages to the different locations it was used. So english was associated with the classroom, where Spanish was connected to home and family. I feel that this is a very hard thing for a child to deal with, making it hard for Richard to interact outside of his home life.
"From the doorway of another room, spying the visitors, i noted the incongruity-the clash of two worlds, the faces and voices of school intruding upon the familiar setting of home."
When Richard witnesses this encounter of his two worlds colliding, I feel there is some concern that his life is about to change. His perfect comfort of home being attacked by the outside language displayed as the nuns from school.
"But the special feeling of closeness at home was diminishing by then. Gone was the desperate, urgent, intense feeling of being home; rare was the experience of feeling myself individualized by family intimates."
Thought the progress of learning the english and becoming familiar with it, the family started to deteriorate. Their roots set in Spanish where no longer being recognized, which created a language barrier between the parents and children. This also created less of a need to rush back to the comfort of home where there had become a permanent silence.
So I concluded after reading this article that it is very important to recognize that these children have two identities, as Richard Rodriguez states in his text. These teachers don't recognize the importance of the children's native toung. It what connects them to their family as well as their roots. They should not feel ashamed of where they come from, or pressured to leave it behind. I strongly believe that these children should be encouraged to share their language and roots within the classroom, to teach the other students a little about where they come from. This will also show the children there is nothing wrong with coming from a different place, and create a greater interest or longing to learn more about there classmates second identity.

Sunday, September 18, 2016

Amazing Grace by J. Kozol

After reading this article by J. Kozol I was a little lost so i went online to look for a more visual aid.

After I watched this video I could picture what I was reading a whole lot better. So for this journal entry I'm going to be doing a hyper link approach. This writing discuss the poverty and segregation of the bronx of New York around 1995. During this time the living situation for the people of color was very hard. Throughout the article she discusses how they lived and how you could tell from a young age how the area affected the development of these children. AIDs had a massive impact on the community along with crack and heroin. But even though these horrible diseases and addictions have the top priority of this community there is still hope. I loved this part that i had to put it in here.

"But he was too cold to move his

mouth! He couldn't talk!"

"How did you know that he was hungry if he couldn't

talk?"

"He pointed to my pizza."
"What did you do?" "I gave him some!"

"Were your parents mad at you?"

He looks surprised by this. "Why would they be mad?"
he asks. "God told us, 'Share!' "


This young boy defiantly has his heart and his morals in the right place, his mother defiantly raised him right. This part warmed my heart even with all the bad in his community he still has a heart of gold. While reading this article i connected it to the article by Kristof. This article is a great example of his views on how your environment and family effects you. But on the other had i still feel that people can do anything or be anything they can put there mind to even if they don't have everything. 

Tuesday, September 13, 2016

Nicholas Kristof: Land of Limitations?

I chose to take the quote approach to this reading blog today. Here are some quotes that I felt were very important in this article by Nicholas Kristof. 
“We are a nation of haves and soon-to-haves, of people who have made it and of people who will make it." I believe that is quote from the article most likely is a more positive twist on "have and have nots." Its showing that our nation is a place of success and good fortune, unlike some of the nations where people come from. This gives people hope for a greater future and life in America. This is relevant to the text because it is giving an example about how Kristof's father felt about this nation, as well as what brought Rubio's father over. This quote was the vision of these two men in their journey to America. 
"School might have been an escalator to a better life." This quote from the text is talking about Rick and how school could have helped him move up in the world, to make a name for himself. This is relevant to the text because its talking about the social latter and a way that could have been a step up. 
“The chance of a person who was born to a family in the bottom 10 percent of the income distribution rising to the top 10 percent as an adult is about the same as the chance that a dad who is 5 feet 6 inches tall having a son who grows up to be over 6 feet 1 inch tall.” This quote is very strait forward in its meaning. It is basically telling us that people of lower class most likely will not rise up the social later and become as successful as people who are more privileged. i disagree with is quote very much. I believe that if you try hard enough and have the enbition to achieve your goals you can do anything you set your mind to. But this quote is relevant to this article because its touching of the fact that there is a social latter that we have to climb to make it in this nation. 

Monday, September 12, 2016

Another fun fact about me

This is my dog piper.
He is one of my favorite family members.
We spend our days together hiking, playing soccer, and laying around doing nothing.
I don't know what i would do without this dog. 
He is truly royalty 

He is also very photo genic 







Hello there my name is Heather if you did not already know that. 
Here is one thing you may not know about me...
I am a bit of a photographer. 
These pictures below are some of my favorite shots.

The one above was taken July of this year in NC (kitty hawk) durning a heat storm. 
The picture below is taken the morning after also in NC (kitty hawk.
This shot above was taken in January of this year, as well as the one bellow (sunset) 
picture below taken at Roger Williams college 
Above picture taken in NC
below picture taken in Stowe VT
Below picture taken in NC
This picture below was taken in Ledyard CT 
This picture is also taken from the same heat storm as the first picture 

Hope you enjoyed