Category: English Literacy

 

To Kill a Mockingbird Book Review

To Kill a Mockingbird, the title of this book already catches my attention. Whenever, I search on google about the book to read, best novel, or book must read before die, the result amazed me, there would always be To Kill a Mockingbird on the list. I always wonder what makes this book really special.

Some influences throughout Harper Lee’s life inspired her to write To Kill a Mockingbird. The book was published in July, 11th 1960, it is 59 years old (2019) already. However, there are a lot of people who still reading this book. What makes it so special? Harper Lee must makes a  lot of really great plans, outlines, and a lot of deep thinking to write this one special book. When she said Mockingbird, she does not only mean Mockingbird, but she could mean a million things. 

Since this book is really highly recommended from a lot of people, I decided to pick it as my novel study. The book is a lot about racism, discrimination, and society. I could not tell when I started to read it. There are a lot of scenes when Scout (narrator), Jem (Scout’s brother), and Dill (Scout’s neighbor’s relative) having a lot of fun with their childhood life. “We’re askin’ him real politely to come out sometimes and tell us what he does in there- we said we wouldn’t hurt him and we’d buy him ice cream,” Dill said. After reading that’s scene, I could not forget how adorable they are and keep saying those lines over and over again. It also reminds me of when I was younger doing silly things, that kids would do. Almost at the end of the first half of the book is when I realize that the book is about racism. Francis called Atticus, “nigger lover” just because he is Tom Robinson’s lawyer.

To know more what’s happening in this breathtaking book, read To Kill a Mockingbird. Harper Lee means more than what’s in the book. You must read it before you DIE.

The theme of this round is happiness. In this round, we learned what happiness is, and how to achieve happiness. We read a lot of article and our final assessment is to write how to be happy when in life circumstance. I decided to write How to be happy when you have a lot of homework because, to me personally, I think that a lot of Liger Students have a lot of homework, and sometime they need happiness while they need to deal with all of their homework. 

How to be Happy When You Have a Lot of Homework

   When you study at college, high school or even middle school, you will find yourself getting busy with lots and lots of homework. A study from a researcher found out that less than 1 % of students said that homework is not a stressor (Levy, 2017). This means you might be one of the other 99%, who have been stressed with homework. Below are the three strategies that you can use to be happy when you have a lot of homework and start to enjoy doing it.

Listening to Music

If you are a big fan of music, this solution can help you not to be stressed while doing your homework. Researchers explain that music makes people more productive (“Music-an Aid to Productivity”, 1972). “music can make the task seem less boring, and it can also increase arousal and alertness” ( Cantor, 2013). Before you start doing your homework, first, create a playlist of your favorite songs or from your favorite artists. After you have your own playlist full of your favorite songs, put your headphones on. Then adjust the right volume for yourself. * It shouldn’t be over 60%.  Now you can enjoy doing your homework with music accompany your heart and your head. As Angely Rose -student at Liger leadership Academy- tests out the strategy of listening to music, “It helps me to find beauty in the hard work, and helps me relax while coping with the stress of work. As the result it makes me happy to work” she said. It seems like listening to music has a really big impact on working.  I encourage you to give music a try.

Move to a different environment

Sometimes, you are not in the right place to do your homework. A lot of books, technology devices, and the crowded area cannot help you to have your homework done easily. Being outdoors would be the best choice for you. First, find a fresh place that is surrounded by nature. Then the fresh air, bird sound, green tree, and blossom flowers can vanish your stress and it finds you the real happiness even though you have a lot of homework. According to a Forbes writer, Andrea Loubier, wrote an article “How Offices Are Innovating To Improve Our Happiness, Productivity And Well Being” mention that one of the four main factors that can boost our productivities, health and happiness is nature.  Nature can increase our productivity by 15 %. Since nature is a great source for us to boost our productivity, Apple, one of the biggest company created a new office design called, “Apple Park” that surrounded by over 10, 000 tree ready to help their employee to be productive with their work”(Loubier, 2017). The color green from nature help us to calm down. Moreover, the diversity of other color surrounds in nature produce us productivity and relaxedness. So if stress out while doing your work, move to a different environment.

Grab a Cold Drink

When you are stress, sleepy or bored, would you like to go and grab a cold drink or cold water? The same thing when you are stress with a lot of homework. First, take a break, then wash your face, a shower would be great for you too.  “Just like taking a cold shower releases body stress, drinking cold water has the same effect on your body by working on the immunity. ” (2018). Next, go and grab a glass of cold water or grab your favorite drink from the refrigerator. Take a sip of the cold drink, and “Ahhh” you would feel fresh and ready to get back to work on your homework. Now you can do your homework happily without stress.

   Next time when you do feel like part of your body sore because of stress          while doing your homework, just do one of these three strategies, then you would feel better and ready to get back working on your homework. No more stress, while doing homework.  

On the third round of our English literacy class, we focused on identity as our theme. I also learned about who I am. Well, everyone would love to know about themselves, so do I. On the second week of our round, we were writing poetry about where we are from. To me, writing poetry is a great idea. Below is I am from poetry written by me. Basically, it explains where I am from and what defines who I am.

I am from

I am from my favorite person and my first love

With the hair oil, I can see the sunshine

I am from the chalk & marker on the board

In a box with big monsters

But I had my mom and dad at that time

I am from my grama morning bread and coffee

That wakes me up all day long

From the scorched rice and spicy fish sauce

The taste tamarind

With the smell of fresh rice but crunchy

Also from the sweat eyes because of Koku

I am from the white blood cell

From my doctor grandpa’s magic

 

I am from the bike

From the fail and get up

Break my knee and tare my clothes apart

I am from the sparkling rainbow living thing in a jar

Once I can’t breath

The legs up the sky and face in the water

I am from the boss of the boss team

Also the fight for the right club

Blood on white clothes

No need any opinion because I did it just for the right

I am from “ Can I try”

And “ I get it ”

The pen chewer

That’s what I call myself

 

I am from the lion and the tiger scholar

The greatest academy of all

I am from the change agent group

That is cleaning and training to be the glossy diamond

I am from the theatre

The mirror actress

But the opportunity sucker

I am from the write, recite and express club

I am from the I-can-do-it

And I’ll-try mindset

 

I am from the root of a tree

The hero and heroine  that I haven’t seen

I am from the small eye

White skin, and the little meow meow blood

But I am the lion and I’ll roar

By Reaksmey Date 16th January 2018

 

Starting the third year at Liger, it seemed a little different and more delightful. The first round in English Literacy class, we would have English literacy class start with daily positive affirmation. Doing positive affirmation empower us to have positive thoughts from negative thoughts over time. The themes that we taking in English literacy this first round was root words and history of English language/etymology. We received homework packets, which are the introduction with some exercise with the root words every week for this round. On Monday we usually took a little quiz about our root words. On the third week, our root word was talked about “I just gotta know”. One of the three root words from “I just gotta know” was mem, which means mindful, recall that is originally from Latin. To discuss the root words, our facilitator, Hannah asked to write a personal narrative that describes the memory that I’ve had with my family members. I wrote about the time that I could feel my younger sister in my mother’s belly. I decided to write about this memory because I have changed my mind from thinking selfishly to love and be kind to my younger sister. Here is my personal narrative writing.  

                                                The Time I Can feel You

A memory that is meaningful and unforgettable to me? Well, I can’t forget the time that I felt my sister in my mother’s belly though. It was a really breathtaking experience, that I should remember. So, the time I can feel her is my unerasable memory.

It made me feel so nervous to have a sibling because “I need to share my love my time and also my parent to that person”, that what I always thought when started to know that my mom was pregnant. Something engaging happened in one day of 365 days in 2011, I started to feel someone who has not seen this gigantic world yet. That person was a girl who lived in my mom’s stomach. I would say it was my first time to experience this cool thing because I could not find this kind of thing in every woman’s stomach. In that evening, I sat near my mom, so she could tell me a fairy tale. However, something has made her speak improperly. I heard a fairy tale told with a sound bouncing up and down like a nonworking CD. Later on, my mom grabbed my hand softly, then put it on her stomach. I started to feel my sister moving around in my mom’s belly. I was so surprised, then I took my hand back off. After a while, I tried to play with my sister. I know that she would know who I am, so she started to play with me back. She moved around a small space, and I tried to guess where she was. It seemed like there was a fish trying to get out of the balloon. It was also similar to playing hide and seek in the different world.

That moment, that feeling makes me love my sister more and it always makes me feel that my sister always loves me. “ I will love my sister forever, ever!” I promised myself.