Blog post due 4/18/13

In the book Hatchet by Gary Paulsen, Brian, a 13 year old boy, crashes in a plane in the Canadian wilderness.  The author tells this story of a boy who must survive with only the clothes he had on and a hatchet. Brian was on his way to spend the summer with his father in Canada when the plane he was in went down. During Brian’s time alone in the woods he discovers he had a lot more strength to survive then he originally thought. For instance, when he goes looking for food and he finds berries, they make him really sick. He also shows a lot of strength when he survives several porcupine needles to his leg. After time, Brian learns how to survive in the wilderness by himself.  

A day after the crash Brian is starving and doesn’t know what to do. He decides to go for a walk to see if there is anything to eat around the lake. He walks around the lake and is going to give up when he finds a bush of berries. He is so hungry that he just started eating the berries right off the bush until he was full. That night he wakes up with a horrible pain in his stomach and throws up all the berries. This makes Brian a stronger person because it teaches him to be more careful of what you do and eat in the wild. After this Brian uses what he learned to wait until he found something, such as raspberries, that he knew he could eat.

One night Brian wakes up in the middle of the night because there is something coming closer and closer to him. Then something touches his leg so he decides to try and kick it. The creature was a porcupine and ends up sticking Brian with 8 quills in his leg. Brian is so scared and hurt that he is afraid to touch the wound or move in fear that the animal could still be there. In the morning Brian ends up going out of his little shelter to see the quills in his leg. He quickly decides to pull them out before the wound gets infected. This shows how strong Brian is because most people wouldn’t pull the quills out themselves.  Since Brian was all alone he had to face the challenges all by himself.

            In all brain shows a lot of strength after the plane crash. He was stranded in the middle of nowhere with just a hatchet and he survived. This story kind of reminds me of military training because that is exactly what some military branches do as basic training. Except the training doesn’t go on for 54 days like Brian had to.

March 21 Blog Post.

John, candidate 117, the commanding officer of the Spartan super soldiers, is faced with a new mission. One, which holds the fate of humanities future in its success or loose. If John and his man fail this mission the human race will be put into extinction by a new alien race seeking to destroy. That race is the covenant. But first John and his men must finish their training with one last mission, which no one Know what is going to happen in.

I feel that this mission is going to actually be a real mission not being controlled by the UNCS. I also predict that men will be lost. I believe this because Chief Mendez said “Project MJOLNIR will make the Spartans into something. . . new. Something I could never forge them into,” (Nylund122). This made me think that this mission was going to be real because he could never kill one of the Spartans to bring them together. That would forge something of them it would forge a team. If this was the case the death of the comrade not only would forge a team, but a strong brotherhood between the men.

I believe this would be the last mission in training because it would prepare the Spartans for the brutality of war. It would also prepare the Spartans for the hard part about war, Death.  Especially If a Spartan died on the mission because then it would be prepared for the death of one of their own. Another thing the Mission would prepare the Spartans for is being behind enemy lines like in real war without help. So the mission overall I feel is going to prepare all the Spartans for War.

If the mission is what I think it is then the mission will be especially useful for the Spartans leader, John. I think this because it will show him that men will be lost and there is nothing he can do about it except go on with the mission and not let them die in vain. Now John already knows how it feels to lose his men because after the experiment that enhanced his and the Spartans bodies he lost men. The experiment went wrong and men die. I think losing men in front of him on the battle field will be different and will really prepare him for war by teaching him to move on.

In all I feel that the final mission of training will prepare the Spartans for the brutality of war. I also believe that the mission will get the men ready for Death. It also will make John commanding officer of the Spartans a better leader by showing him that men will die and the mission still has to go on. Most of all though I believe this mission will bring the Spartans closer together as a team and as brothers.       

N.F. Post

          In the Article  Bioethics and cloning the author which wasn't given talks about how there is a big argument on whether or not Cloning is acceptable. groups have been made to disuse the topic and come up with questions for scientists.Those groups are called Bioethics. Questions are being raised about changing a babies  eye, hair, skin color, height and sex. today there are some countries that do not allow cloning to take place and others that do allow it. scientist still need to follow routine and make sure what the are doing is OK and wont hurt anything.
           I thought this article was very good and gave a nice topic overview of cloning. I also thought that it was surprising that all countries don't get together and decide all together whether the world should or should not clone. personally i would say that in some cases cloning is good and others bad. for instance i think cloning would be except able if cloning was used to fix problems the baby may have. but i think it is wrong to use cloning to hurt or effect the baby in life.

Article Cite
ProQuest Staff. "Topic Overview: Bioethics and Cloning." ProQuest LLC. 2013: n.pag. SIRS Issues Researcher. Web. 06 Mar 2013.

HALO The Fall of Reach by Eric Nylund

                  In “HALO The Fall of Reach" by Eric Nylund, although I didn't get that far into the book the main idea is clear. From the very beginning you can see that John a kid from Reach was born to be a strong leader. It all started when Dr. Catherine Halsey a U.N.S.C. scientist goes to secretly interview Candidate 117 (John) for her top secret experiment right before kidnapping him. From there John and a group of 70 other kids go through agonizing military training. Dr. Halsey then does her experiment to enhance the kid’s growth, reflexes, muscles, bone strength, and knowledge complicity. Dr. Halsey ends up making the perfect supper soldiers. That are tested and trained even more brutally in the next couple of weeks. At the end of all this john is made the commanding officer of the remaining 30 soldiers.

           To me John is the perfect leader; he cares and helps his team from the very beginning. In every training mission with teams John put his team before himself. For instance, when all 70 candidates were told to hike to a spot on a map to be picked up by a Pelican (plane). Commander Mendez told everyone that the last one to the Pelican would have to stay behind. John told his men that if anyone was getting left behind it was going to be him. This shows how John is a good leader because it shows how he puts his men before him. It also shows John is a good leader because he won’t leave one of his men behind. Finally, it shows that John is a good leader because he knows how to boost the morale of his men.

           Another example of how John is a good Commanding Officer is how he cares when he loses men. For instance when he lost about 40 out of 70 of his men due to affects of Dr. Halsey body inclement experiment. When his men died he felt as if he had lost a part of himself and when he doctors were moving the permanently crippled men he made sure they would still get a chance to serve their country in some way. As John said, "That's all we want, a chance to serve,"(Nylund 55). This proves John is a good Commanding Officer because he really cares about his men and what happens to them. John would probably rather die than loose men, which is what a good Commander would do for his men.

Non-Fiction Post

 Chasing Lincoln’s Killer by James L. Swanson tells the story of how Lincoln was shot and killed. It also tells the story of what happened to John Wilkes Booth after he shot Lincoln. Booth shot and killed Lincoln because he was mad that the Confederacy had lost the war. As an actor, Booth knew the whole layout of the theater that Lincoln was going to attend a show in. Booth also knew the show well, and that made it easier to plan the murder. From the title it is clear that this book tells us a lot about the hunt for Booth and his associates.

This book was really suspenseful and keeps the reader on the edge of his seat. In the book, the first thing Swanson talks about is how Booth shot Lincoln. He starts out by telling the reader how Booth got to the theater and up the back way to Lincoln’s box. After that he explains how Booth snuck into the room and shot Lincoln in the back of the head with a small pistol. When he tried to get away he was tackled by Major Henry Rathbone who realized what Booth had done. Not thinking, Booth jumped out of the box onto the stage where he stood up and said “Sic simper tyrannis!” which is “the state motto of Virginia: ‘Thus always to tyrants’” (Swanson 43).  The details Swanson adds make the book exciting because you don’t know what is going to happen next. The descriptions make the reader wonder what it was like in the theater that night.

Swanson includes pictures that make the reader want to know more about the events that happen in this book. For example, Swanson includes pictures from news papers from back in 1865. One specific news paper is the National Police Gazette from April 22, 1865 which shows drawings of how Lincoln was shot and what people did after he was shot. It also shows drawings of the attempted assassination of Secretary of State William H. Seward in his bed (56). Seeing these images helps the reader get a better picture of what really happened and the surrounding time period. These images also give us an idea of the people and the time because of what they were wearing and where they were. It also show s how people back then would learn about what happened through drawings  since there were no TV’s.

This book makes me wonder what the time was like. Also after reading this book I want to see Lincoln, the movie. This book makes me think how terrible the assassination of the president was, especially since he freed the slaves

Non-Fiction RR

In the article, “The Fury of Fire,” the author, Kristin Lewis, wants the reader to know how wildfires spread and what they do. The author describes what it is like to be in a wildfire. The author also talks about what life is like after a wildfire. The article shows the reader how destructive and frightening wildfires are.

Kristin Lewis writes about a kid named Kevin Conaway and his family whose town was caught in a wildfire. In San Diego County back in 2003, two wildfires were started by people, one accidentally and another on purpose. When I read this it makes me think how important it is to be careful when I am in a forest. In the article, “The Fury of Fire,” Lewis says, “wildfires can move at speeds of up to 60 miles per hour” (Lewis 5). Lewis also describes how hot a wildfire can get – 2600 degrees. Lewis’s details make the reader aware of how horrible a wildfire could be especially since it could be 2600 degrees before the fire gets to you. The article shows the reader how hard it is to escape a wildfire since wildfire can move 10 times as fast as a normal person can run.

The second half of the article explains how Kevin’s town was affected. Lewis tells how Kevin’s house was spared from the fire but other parts of the town were not so lucky. Lewis describes the scene. “As the Conaway’s drove onto their street, Kevin saw a blackened hillside. But their house was ok” (Lewis 6). Hundreds of other homes in Kevin’s neighborhood were damaged. After Kevin got back to his house they started helping to clean up the town. They also gave out supplies and blankets to people who lost their homes. This crisis is similar to Hurricane Sandy because people came together to help their neighbors rebuild their homes and made sure they had enough food and clothing.      

After reading this article, I understand how terrible wildfires can be. I now know how wildfires can spread and kill people really fast. I also learned what it is like to be in a wildfire from Kevin’s story. This article makes the reader aware of how wildfires are started so they can be prevented.

Works Cited

 Lewis, Kristin. “The Fury of Fire.” Scholastic Action. 8 October 2012: 4-6. Print. 

Blog Post Due on the 17th

In the book Peak by Ronald Smith, the author started the book in an interesting way. He did that by having the main character write the story as if he is explaining what happened to him in the last couple of months. Peak, is a 14 year old, who loves mountain climbing and tries to climb a skyscraper in New York and gets caught. From there he goes to court and ends up getting parole and has to go live with his dad who he never sees. His dad brought Peak to Mount Everest where Josh, Peak’s dad, had to bring a climbing party up the mountain. That was not all Josh planned to do. He planned on getting Peak to the top so he could be the youngest person to the top which would get more business for Josh’s mountain climbing company.

            I thought the author’s way of starting the book was a good idea. It made you wonder why a kid was writing about what happened to him in the past year. It also made you wonder why he was writing about it in the back of a van driving away from Mount Everest. The best part was how the author explained why he was writing in the back of a van slowly. He did this by first explaining the why he was writing in the beginning. He first described what Peak’s teacher said he needed to do to pass 8^th grade, which ended up being a writing assignment on anything he wanted to write about. Then in the middle and end he explained why he was in a van driving away from Mount Everest. He did this by bringing Peak and his dad to Mount Everest. The way the author wrote the book was interesting.