Letters About Literature

Jack Bryant

1301 E Walnut St.

Carbondale, Illinois 62901

Dear Jules Verne,

            Hello I am currently a student at Carbondale Community High School. This year in English class my teacher our teacher has assigned us the task of having a blog and keeping up with it weekly.  This is what brings me to be writing you a letter at this time. As a little added extra to the blogging assignment our teacher told us we were to write a letter to the author of one of the books we read this quarter and I enjoyed your book more out of the two. The book made me catch myself thinking that I would enjoy doing something similar to Phileas Fogg. When I read this book I think of Phileas just having the life, being an inventor who is very wealthy and can just do what he wants when he wants. The reason this sounds interesting to me is because I myself would like to become so sort of engineer or inventor. Through my childhood I have always taken much joy into putting things together and building things whether if it was from my imagination or from the set of instruction that came with the appliance that I was allowed to put together. But this is what probably makes me so interested in the book itself. 

   Something the book showed me about the world today that I have never taken much thought into was how many advancements in technology we have had. Before reading this book I’m sure any kid would think, “Wow, 80 days? That is forever! I could get around the world in 24 hours in an air plane.” But they forget to think about how fast 80 days really is for that time period.  In your book you speak of how Phileas travels around the world by all different types of transportation, including the train, steamer, carriage, and even hot air balloon when really all of those things today have a bigger better form of that transportation or just have major improvements. The train has gotten much faster and it can travel much farther than what it used to be able to. The steamer has been replaced by the luxury cruise liner. The carriage has of course been replaced by the car and the blimp by the air plane. So the world of transportation has changed dramatically which I don’t usually think about. 

   What really surprised me about myself while I was reading this book was about how interested I was in a book written over 100 years ago. I am not a big fan of books as it is so I wasn’t sure how I was going to like a book. So I was unsure about how I was going to like a book that did not speak modern day slang but it was quite the opposite. This different form of English actually kept me more interested in the book because in a way it was more entertaining to me. Sometimes around the house, my brother sister and I go around saying “Indubitably” to everything and so it was funny when I actually read words like that in the book. So thank you Mr. Verne, for writing such a good book that kept me entertained and interested.

                                                                                                Sincerely,

                                                                                                            Your reader

My Feelings of the 21st Century Classroom

Over the years there has definitely been some changes. Most of these changes were of course for the best but they effect more than just what people think. With the inventions of blogging, tweeting, facebooking, and skyping, the modern English class itself has changed. I'm sure ten years ago there were not many classes (if any) that were assigned to just go blog about a book that they got to pick out themselves and read it when they wanted to read it. But with this assignment, my teacher gave us the option to post our blogs on Facebook or even tweet about them to get extra credit for our blogs. I really enjoy this activity of blogging because mostly every week we get to get out of the classroom just to go blog, which I am getting more and more comfortable with. I have never enjoyed just sitting down and reading because I was forced to do it all through grade school which was not very fun. But now I can choose a book from the Read For a Lifetime list and read when I have the time to.

The activity of blogging overall is great. Every week in the first quarter we were given a different blog to do that required us to go more in depth with our blog and we had to truly know what we were talking about. This quarter was not that much more different except that after the first two blogs we got to choose what we wanted to do for our blogs which I enjoyed because it made me feel like I had more freedom then just following this weekly assignment for my blog. This assignment is also different then if we would've been just doing something boring like sitting in the class room and reading aloud because then you are forced to read something you might not want to read. Also, this quarter we had the ability to Skype a completely different school across the state. Unfortunately we never did this activity which is alright but it would've been something different. As time goes on I'm sure the English classroom will continue to change just hopefully for the better with different activities like blogging.

Round Two! Vlog!

Enlightening Music

http://youtu.be/6q2mFiN7GIc

The song that I chose to embed into my blog was one i actually just discovered or at least haven't heard in a while called "Gambler" by Kenny Rogers. At first I was just looking to find a song that could fit well enough with my book so I could use it, but then after I got lucky enough to find this song I found that it fit perfectly with situations Nailer was in. Along with matching well with Nailer I also just really enjoy the song. I myself learned from it and sense I also enjoy playing poker, I got what he was trying to say. In the song it says "you got to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em, know when to walk away, and know when to run." I feel that Nailer does a good job of this in the novel because he understands the difference in situations between fate/luck and when he actually needs to strategize.

The situation that I mostly imagine Nailer in when i hear this song is when he is in the air ducts collecting wire. This of course is Nailer's job in the book which puts him in hazardous situations most of the time. In these old air ducts he is confronted with these situations where he has to decide whether to keep going, give up, or just simply decide what he has is enough and turn around and head back. Also in the song it is said "You never count your money when you're sitting at the table. They'll be time enough for countin when the dealins done". This can also be used to connect to Nailer in the air ducts because there is no time to see how much wire you actually have because those ducts could break any second so there is plenty of time for you to do it when you get out. In the beginning of the book, the ducts do just that and break and Nailer falls into an oil pit where he is forced to the decision of risking his life and sinking under the oil to find a way out. That was just one of those times where he chose fate/luck over anything else.

Ship Breaker in Pictures

I read the book Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi for the Second Quarter

The book takes place on the coast.

The old coasts are now flooded.

Copper wire is the wanted item is the wrecked ships.

In the book they have to crawl through air ducts to get the copper wire.

All workers are indentured servants.

The crews always have to work together.

This is how I imagine Nailer

Nailer's dad

Nailer's mom who dies when Nailer is young.

There is barely any known oil in the time of the book.

There are a lot of drug problems.

All workers live in poverty.

Nailer gets stuck in a room full of oil and is considered lucky for finding it when he gets out.

The only thing the pit bosses cared about was money.

They have to work fast, because there are storms that wipe out their work place.

This is what the crews work on.

Critiquing My Fellow Class Mates

Alex Kippenbrock-
Kippy, Kippy, Kippy... you are certainly the pot calling the kettle black. Although I am behind on my blogs you are as well, but I see you put in some work and i applaud you for that. I would like to point out that you said you took full responsibility for not having you're vlog uploaded but yet you still blamed me for it... do i sense some jealousy that you don't have an incredible phone like I do? But enough of that onto you're actual blog. I agree with you that it was weird how our Animoto's were graded but i now understand what Mrs. Hayes wants and I hope you do as well. I myself was really excited for the video chatting with the students from other schools but it's a shame we did not get to do that this quarter. I have also looked at your blog in the past to help me understand the book I am now reading sense you read it last quarter and you have been very helpful! I look forward to seeing the rest of your blogs when they are finished!

Jacob Garwin-
Greetings Jacob, I am here to tell you all the things you don't know about your own blog! Alright so where shall we start? Something that Mrs. Hayes told me at the beginning of the second quarter that I did right was my grammar. I capitalized my I's and the letters after the periods. Here it does not look like you did so. In the blog above it where you were commenting on people's blogs it looks as though you did it though which tells me you were just lazy starting off the second quarter which is alright you just need to fix it! Another thing I noticed was that this was only one paragraph long. This is just not acceptable to Mrs. Hayes and Mr. Lukes so you Mr. Garwin need to fix it ASAP. But enough of being a Negative Nancy, I much enjoyed your 1st quarter blogs and am sorry to hear about the grade you received. But like you said, just forget about the grade you got then, and worry about the second quarter grade! I of course will try and do the same.

Macie Wheeler-
Hello Macie! Let me just congratulate you on getting an A on the first quarter blogs! I am really jealous right now seeing as how i did not get such a good grade and that i am not as good as blogger as you are. I am really happy to see that you are able to but your upbeat attitude into your blogs in some way or another especially in your vlog. I also, had the same problem you did which was not having long enough paragraphs. This was very hard for me to do last quarter because I really didn't know what i was doing, but it looks like you got through the blogs just fine anyway! But if you do find yourself getting distracted a lot I would get checked for ADD and I hope you were able to pay attention up till now. Oh well Macie, best of luck to you with the 2nd quarter blogs! Keep up the good work!