TU Tuesday - Local

Determine a theme or central idea of a text and analyze in detail its development over the course of the text.
http://www.timesunion.com/local/article/Potential-threat-slows-down-trial-3386810.php
In Schenectady there are two men who are suspects of the murder of an 11-year-old boy and his brother. The trial ended yesterday when, "a potential juror told the judge he overheard a supporter of one of the defendants mention "taking out jurors," according to an attorney in the case." One of the men named Kody Pierce's lawyer responded by saying, "I don't think they were making realistic threats that they were going to hurt anyone." " The two men are charged with attempted murder, first-degree assault and second-degree criminal possession of a weapon." I think the main theme or central idea of the article is for one, murder. It is explained throughout the article. Also, the main point that the trial had to end and they have to find new jurors is a big central idea. "It was then that one of the potential jurors raised his hand and later revealed in chambers that a group of three males and a female had said something about "taking out jurors" as the potential jurors were lined up waiting to go through security, Gaylord said. Gaylord said he then made a motion for the judge to dismiss the entire panel. The judge agreed and all were sent home about 1:30 p.m." This is a crazy story and it concerns me that this occured localy. The theme starts out as murder but then switches/developes into threatening and loyalty. They had to figure out which jurors had been threatened and who would actually tell them. In the end they were dismissed and are now searching for new jurors.

Guest Speaker: Janine Cammarata

Poise: Mrs. Cammarata looked very comfortable speaking to our class. She didn't look nervous at all and in my opinion looked confident in her books and accomplishments. Some specific examples was when she was reading parts of her book out loud she was clear and steardy and looked very comfortable.
Clarity: I thought Mrs. Cammarata was very clear. When she read excerpts from her book she did it at an even pace so that it was easy to understand. For example, I thought that when answering questions she was answering them honestly and was not using big words to make ditractions.
Volume: She had just the right tone. From where I was sitting I could hear her perfectly which is important. Specifically when she was doing the create character activity I could still hear her even when people were shouting out answers or details.
Information: Mrs. Cammarata didn't include too much detail I think because she didn't want to give away anything important in her book. The information she did give was enough to make her book very enticing for me to read. I'm glad we got a copy. An example was she brought in pictures of what some of the warriors looked like in the book and read descriptions of the characters. I think that information helped her reach her key points.
Organization: She was very organized and her presentation flowed very nicely. She never went off on a tangent. Everything she brought up related to her book somehow. For example she brought up her son Nick and explained how he helped her with ideas for the second book.
I enjoyed having Mrs. Cammarata speak to our class. I thought our class asked many questions, was respectful, and got involved. I liked gettiong involved in the create character activity. It was a lot of fun! I think you should invite her back for next year because i think she did a good job and students will be appealed to her fantasy books. I would like you to invite more speakers to our class. It was alot of fun and really helps me find books im interested in.

TU Tuesday - Guest Speaker

http://www.highlandpub.com/Chapter1.pdf

Janine Cammarata is a writer who writes mostly medieval literature. She became a writer when she was in grad school when her teacher told her she should write novels. In school Janine had a high interest in Celtic folklore. She liked how it incorporated nature and how it included strong female characters. Janine includes her love of fantasy, mythology, and martial arts in her novels. In October of 2008 Janine’s son, Nick passed away from Leukemia. Janine is the president of Nick’s Fight to be Healed Foundation, Inc., which supports pediatric blood cancer patients. The money earned from her books go to the foundation. Today Janine lives in upstate New York. Janine is a unique author. She enjoys reading books that “move her” and make her use her imagination. Her favorite author is Marion Zimmer Bradley. Janine cares a lot about her family and believes strongly that you should always keep them close. After reading Warriors Within I learned that Janine puts a lot of emotion in her stories. Janine has been through a lot because her son passed away and she uses it in her stories. “Tipped off about a drug exchange, Senior Narcotics Officers Jack Sommers and Frank Goodale raced to a local dry cleaner in New York City.” The chapter explains that there are two officers that have been partners for years and how they go on a drug raid and one is shot. “Frank Goodale woke up and saw his partner of 30 years lying in a congealing pool of blood.” When one of the officers, Frank awakens he realizes that his partner had been shot and calls an ambulance. In the end, “Jack Sommers died that night.” The ending explains how Jack’s two daughters Shannon and Michaela deal with the death of their loving father. Janine uses emotion through out her novel. “Shannon and Michaela just sat on either side of their father’s bed, not knowing what to do. Shannon cried and held her father’s cold hand, while Michaela watched her, not wanting to see their father’s face.” I feel as if in some of the things Janine wrote it is really herself at the hospital and Jack is her son. There’s no question this woman adds emotion and drama to the story. The story is breathtaking and brings goose bumps to my arms as I feel like I’m standing right there watching this all happen in front of me.

My questions and comments for Janine are:

Is it easy to pull the emotions out and write it into a story?

Where did you get the idea for Warriors Within?

How do you come up with the titles for your books?

How do you come up with the characters names for your novels?

Comments: I love the way you add emotion to your stories and make the reader paint a picture of what’s going on in their head along with the detailed descriptions of the characters. I can really invision them.

Q=Quiznos

Quiznos are all over the place and the one ive been to is on Columbia Turnpike In East Greenbush. I stopped there fonce before when I was doing a basketball tournament. Quiznos is mainly a sub restaurant but they sell many other foods. They are sorta like Subway. Quiznos interior is a normal sub shops interior. They have a couple tables, cheap paintings on the walls, and an area to stand in line and order your food. The drawback of Quiznos is that its not the type of restaurant where you go and sit and they take your order. It's more for people that want to pick up food fast and that are in a hurry. The positive thing about Quiznos is that they have a big menu with a lot of choices. They have a variety of subs, soups, desserts, sandwhiches, and salads. They also serve breakfast sandwhiches! Quiznos has many choices for their subs. They have a variety of dressings and toppings. When I went to Quiznos I had their Chicken Noodle soup which was delicious and one of their subs. Their subs are delicious and savory. The biggest drawback of Quiznos when I went was they had bad counter service. I remember waiting for a long time just for someone to come to the counter and take our order. Price wise I think Quiznos is a rip off. For one of their signature subs it costs around nine dollars! Quiznos is located in a popular are with many popular shops nearby. Overall, I would not recommend Quiznos. Your better off going to Panera or Subway.

Valentines Day

1. Imagine a world where everyone loved their neighbor as much as they loved themselves. What would it be like to live in such a world? How would families and communities be changed?

I think that if we lived in a world where everyone loved each other as much as they loved themselves that there would be a huge difference. In a good change there would be no hate or arguing and there probably wouldn't be any wars and everything would be peaceful. If we loved our neighbors as much as we loved ourselves I don't think there would be things such as poverty in the world either. In a negative effect, if everyone loved each other like that that would just be plain creepy. There would be no "emotions." How would we find our special loved one and get married if we loved everyone. A world with no hate in my opinion  would eventually turn bad eventually. I think it's important  for us as humans to go through heart breaks, fights and other things because it makes us stronger and even more "human." Communities would probably be clean and happy and families would be loving all the time. A world like that isn't necessarily bad but it's not good. Society needs a balance or eventually it will crumble.

My Blog Idea

Since Valentines day is around the corner I thought it would be cool to do a Valentines day themed blog! Since we've already done a I am Thankful for turkey picture assignment I thought we could "spice it up" and do a heart picture. What you do is first find something you love(it can be anything). It can be food or any object around your house. For example, if you like money you can make a heart out of quarters. The only rule is you can't just draw a heart on paper. I chose apple jacks because I simply just love apple jacks! Then you make a heart out of the thing you love. The next step is you fill in the heart with things you love. On the outside of the heart you write the things you hate or dislike. I chose this because we haven't done what we love and I think it's fun because valentines day is around the corner. I think that this blog will be beneficial to our class because it can make people realize all the things they have and how lucky they are to get to love those things. It was interesting to me when making this to see your likes and dislikes and how they compare or differ from each other. Here is my example:

TU TUESDAY- TANKA

The article was about how the Japanese coastline turned into a disaster because of a earthquake and tsunami. In Japan they have a annual Imperial Palace poetry contest and "the theme for this year's reading of "tanka," or traditional five-line Japanese poems that date back to the shogun periods, was "shore." People wrote poems about the disaster and the effect it had on them and their loved ones and a couple of them were chosen to be read aloud in front of emperor Akihito and his family.

"Emperor Akihito, Empress , their two sons and other royalty in gowns sat silently inside a large room in the palace, as a choir of several men around a table read each of the 10 winning works in singsong, dragged-out tones." One of the poems said, "This reality, Feels so heavy on my shoulders."I think the theme is reality. All these people from Japan feel as if the earthquake was surreal and they can't believe it happened. The article is explaining reality and showing how people reacted to it.

 

Read more: http://www.timesunion.com/news/article/Poems-on-Japan-disaster-win-Palace-poetry-contest-2477420.php#ixzz1lie5cJMe        

     Faith

5Hand in hand we can
7Make a difference in lives
5You need faith and hope
7That something good will come out
7Of this attrocious monster