Test advice

Ok so I have 4 tests this week! I have no idea how to prepare for all of them. I would love some advice from anyone. I have math, social studies, science, and spanish all on the same day. Does anyone have some tips or advice on how to prepare?

The Giver play

One of the scenes in the book that I found very important was when the plane flew over the town. This scene was important because airplanes weren’t allowed to fly over the community and it introduced the reader to the main character, Jonas. Also when that plane flew over the town, every citizen was frightened. I was waiting for that scene to happen in the play, but it never did. When the cast moved to the next scene I was confused and asking other people why they didn’t show the plane. I think what they should have done to include this part was to have a sound effect of a plane and have all the cast members look up and look frightened. They could have also had someone talking on an intercom telling everyone to run into their homes immediately, just as they did in the book. That is one of the changes that I would have made to the play if I was the director.

Another part of the play that I found odd was that they had the same actress for Fiona and Lily. This part of the play was difficult to understand because Fiona and Lily have two way different personalities. Fiona is a nice, sincere, young lady, and Lily is a whiny, loud, brat. When I saw the actress play Lily I liked how she played her personality, however when she went to play Fiona I couldn’t get the annoying, loud actress playing Lily out of my mind. Another flaw with this was that Fiona and Lily had the same color hair and the same style. This was confusing because when the actress played Lily and was loud I thought for a second that she was still Fiona. What I would have to done to fix this problem would be to get another actress to play Lily or Fiona. This change would make the play less confusing.

The Drinking Fountain

During my seventh grade year I was bullied by a teacher. It all happened when I was with my friend at the drinking fountain. He was getting a drink of water and I was poking him. Since he was my friend he didn’t care that much and he was laughing. Well, the teacher came up to me when I was about to get my drink of water and she shoved my head into the bubbler. She forced me to take a drink and told my friend to do to me what I did to him. Maybe she thought I was picking on that kid but he was my friend and still is one of my best friends. At that moment my own brother and his friend saw this happen and the teacher stopped and pulled my head back. The way she reacted was to laugh. What my brother and his friend did was to take this to the principal. I was called down to the office one day about this whole fiasco to talk to the principal about it. I had to write down on paper what happened that day. I was not alone in the office. The other people in the office were my friend, my brother, and his friend. They were in there because they all saw what happened that very day. They also had to write about what happened at the drinking fountain. The day after this teacher was in the office along with me. She was called in by Mr. Daul so she could apologize to me. I accepted her apology and no one spoke about it again.

How not to get targeted by bullies

You should have a close group of friends. Bullies tend to look for kids that walk alone. When you have friends bullies will stay away from you and look for the alone ones.
It may be hard, but you should try to be nice to everyone. Even though bullies will pick on you for no reason, if you are nice then you have a chance not to get bullied.
Don’t bully back. If you are getting bullied do not bully them back. If you do then you are just as bad as the other person.

Helpful tips to stop bullying

Use the crowd. This means that if you were the victim then you would talk to the bystanders. You could say things like “Did you guys just hear that?” Talk loudly to the crowd so that they hear you. Wait for their response and embarrass the bully.
Smile and walk away. If a bully is picking on you then smile at them and then walk away.
Agree with the bully. If the bully is calling you names then agree with the bully. For example, if the bully calls you stupid then you say, Yeah I know I am. The biggest reason a bully picks on you is to make you miserable. If you agree with the bully then they don’t have the satisfaction of making you miserable.
Be the bigger person and walk away. If you are getting bullied and they call you a name then you can say “Cool” or “Ok.” You don’t have to waste your time on bullies.

Civil War journal

September 1, 1863 2:53 p.m.: My troops of the Union are getting ready for the three day battle of Chickamauga and Chattanooga. They’re sharpening their bayonet’s and gathering ammunition for their weapons. My name is Ulysses S. Grant, I am a general for the north also known as the Union.

September 5, 1863 10:30 a.m.: This battle was going to be the turning point of this war. I was preaching this to my troops while they were gathering food and water. Only a few of the soldiers were believing what I was saying. Most of them were shaking their heads and snickering. I just seemed to ignore those non-believers.

September 19, 1863 8:45 p.m.: Tomorrow my troops and I were off to Chickamauga to start this battle off. To be honest I was extremely nervous. The Confederacy outnumbered us in every battle including this one. Therefore we are coming into this battle, the underdogs. However, I had confidence that this would be the extremely important battle that the Union was going to win. At least I hope it is.

September 20, 1863 10:53 p.m.: It was incredible! We won the battle of Chickamauga! It was exhausting and bloody. It lasted from 8:00 in the morning until about 10 o’clock at night. There we were in the dense woods near the Chickamauga River. Since we fought in woods we couldn’t see very well and the darkness didn’t help either. We were about to corner the Confederates until a charge was ordered by Braxton Bragg. Bragg was my arch enemy and I wanted to see him dead. This charge caught us by surprise so we retreated. However, this was all part of my genius plan. You see our sharpshooters were hiding on the hill and when I waved my sword they unloaded on the Confederates. They never saw it coming. By the time they tried to retreat we had them cornered and we took no prisoners. Now I know why Chickamauga is Cherokee for “River of Death.”

September 21, 1863 11:15 p.m.: Another excellent Union victory. However, this was day one of the battle Chattanooga. We fought in woods again but this time they weren’t as deep. I must say the Confederates were about to win this one. This mini battle, believe it or not, had no leadership. Because of the woods and thick brushes my troops retreated when I ordered them to charge. The Confederate charge must not have been very strong because once we turned around and started to shoot they lost all their momentum immediately. My troops decided to take out the Confederate’s right flank and they succeeded. I had no control in this battle, and I’m proud.

September 22, 1863 12:39 a.m.: At the end of the three day battle, the Union stand tall. We are victorious. This has been the greatest victory that I have ever endured. Like I said this was the turning point of the Civil War.

September 15, 1864 11:38 p.m.: We just captured Georgia. All because of our outstanding victory in Chattanooga. We opened a doorway to the deep south and we had captured Georgia. It looks like my prediction of this battle being the turning point of the war was correct.

The weekend party part 3

After that traumatic experience, we went back to Luke’s house. I wish that would have been the last of that horrible man. However, I can never be right. All of a sudden we heard a ring at the doorbell. This time we were prepared. I grabbed a baseball bat, Jake P grabbed another golf club, Joe H grabbed a rusted metal pole, Cal C grabbed some toxic spray from Luke’s closet, Luke took two ping pong paddles with sharpened handles, Ryan H took a butcher knife, and John C took a . We carefully ,quietly went up the stairs and opened the door with caution. We must have took a long time because no one was there. Although we saw the van parked at the end of Luke’s court. That’s all we saw. Suddenly there was a crash that came from the kitchen. We all took control of our deadly weapons and walked very steadily into the kitchen. The back door was open and we heard footsteps running on Luke’s back patio. I ran outside cause I wanted a piece of this old guy. However when I went outside no one was there, not even the white van.

The weekend party part 2

After all of us ran away, we took a breather in Ryan H’s backyard. So many thoughts were racing through all of our minds. No one knew what to expect from what just happened. That’s when we heard deep breathing and it was coming from the front yard of Ryan’s house. That’s when we spotted the man standing on the road. The light was just perfect so you could hardly see the man. He was walking towards us again, and Ryan tried to open his back door but it was locked. We turned around again and the man grabbed hold of my shirt. I would have screamed for my life but his dirty hand was over my mouth. When Ryan S found two golf clubs on Ryan’s porch he picked them up and tossed one to Jake and the next thing I saw was the man on the ground with two huge bruises on his forehead. If they wouldn’t of found a weapon I would have been gone with man to who knows where. I couldn’t believe it, I was safe.

The weekend party part 1

Over the weekend I went to Luke Mark’s house for the night. We played capture the flag, ghost in the graveyard, and much more exciting activities. When we were playing capture the flag we all saw this mysterious white van with no logo or anything on it. We didn’t think much of it until we saw it again on the same road when we played ghost in the graveyard. I was it and I was laying down on the ground and I saw the van again, except this time it was moving very slowly. I looked at it for a while and then it drove away. We all started to get kind of scared. Later that night we went outside again because Joe Henderson lost his phone. As we went to look for it, Jake Paget noticed the van again for the third time. When we all looked at the mysterious van it stopped right in front Luke’s house. All of a sudden it started to creep forward and then stopped again. All of our hearts were racing. Suddenly the rusty door swung backward and an old man with a big scruffy beard walked out. Jake P, and Joe H both said “What do you want?” The creepy man just kept walking towards us. That’s when Luke and I started to walk backwards at a quick pace. When he ran towards us that’s when we all booked it out of Luke’s driveway.

"Godfather Death"

Imagine a life were you are a single man with 13 children running around your house. This poor man in “Godfather Death” lives that awful life. “Godfather Death” demonstrates the life changing decisions that we go through every day.

The man in this story has to make a life changing decision. Since he clearly has way too many children, he makes a choice of having a godfather. He gets the incredible choice of having God as his godfather. However, he rejected Him! He claims that God gives to the rich and lets the poor starve. Could he have different beliefs? Maybe he doesn’t believe in God or maybe he doesn’t have a loyal religion. His beliefs are to treat everyman equal, rich or poor. When he meets the Devil he immediately says no because even though he may not believe in God, he knows that the Devil is bad. The person he finally meets is Death. He chooses Death as his godfather. Well he knows that Death treats every man equally. In other words, when he kills people he doesn’t give special treatments to certain people. This choice backfired on the man because Death ends up killing him.

Everyone in their lifetime gets a life changing decision and “Godfather Death” proves that. Life will throw a ton of decisions at you so make sure you make the right choice or you will end up like the man is the tall-tale.

"The Monkey's Paw

Imagine being given three wishes and then picking what to wish for. In “The Monkey’s Paw” Mr. White gets this precious opportunity. “The Monkey’s Paw” describes the advantages and disadvantages of having three wishes.
“I wish for two hundred pounds!” This was Mr. White’s first wish. This would probably be one of the most common wishes of all time. Wishing for money is a very selfish wish and very common one. However, 200 dollars today isn’t that much money. That’s how you knew that this story was made a long time ago.
After that selfish wish then comes a good smart one. Which is exactly what Mr. White does in “The Monkey’s Paw.” This old man wishes for his son’s life back because his son was dead. This is the wish that the person makes for someone else. Usually people make this wish because they learn a lesson from the first selfish wish. Which is exactly what Mr. White did.
For some extremely odd reason Mr. White makes a wish that is life changing just like his second command. Mr. White wishes his son dead. He makes this wish because after he wished for his son back he realized something. He noticed that his wife loved his son more than him. When Mrs. White heard a knock on the door she sprinted down stairs and found out that her son disappeared. She loved him more than anyone and that is exactly why Mr. White had to wish for his son to be dead.
There are many disadvantages and advantages to having three wishes and that is shown in “The Monkey’s Paw.” If you happen to get the chance of having three wishes make sure you pick them carefully or you could turn into Mr. White.

Donald Dragon: part one

Donald Dragon part 1
Trevor Raasch
1-15-09
I’m off to planet Zambonia to free the alien slaves! (All the people in the crowd are cheering loudly. Yeah! Go Donald! We love you!)
Who could’ve guessed that I, Donald Dragon, the man who just suffered from cancer a month ago diving 150 feet off a cliff into a pit of alligators to save a kitten. Is now freeing alien slaves from the most heavily guarded, dangerous space station in the Universe. Planet Zambonia. This may be my greatest adventure of all time. Even more epic than the day I stopped 6 robbers that were trying to break into Fort Knocks. That was the day I got the key to the city.
Well, I guess it’s time for me and my crew to go now. As I said to my wife and children. I tried to hold my tears back but I failed. I started to cry along with the rest of my family. Because I will be gone for about 4 years I had to say goodbye to everyone.
The day of departure: Alright crew, are you men ready to free some slaves!
Yeah, alright, let’s do this!! Shouts the crew.
As we all gathered into the very large rocket, I look down once more and I see a final glance of my family. They’re waving and crying. So am I.
3, 2, 1. Lift off! As we fly 25,000 mph into the night sky my crew and I are putting on our space helmets and suits. Space really is an amazing thing. It looks so beautiful at night, even though it’s dark year round. Now it’s 3 o’clock in the morning and I’m drifting off to sleep and right as I am about to drift off I hear a huge crash. I look out the ship window and then again I hear an even bigger crash. Well now everyone is getting kind of freaked out so we land the ship on Mars. By that time we all had our suits on and we walked outside. We searched for where the noise came from but we couldn’t find it. BOOM!!! Everyone screams and now we know where that noise was coming from. It came from over by our ship. Then suddenly I see dark tall shadows from behind the ship and I tell me crew to be quiet. I guess the creatures must have heard me too because all of a sudden the critters started to run away. I wasn’t thinking at the time so my first instinct was to chase them down. That had to be one of my smartest idea because as soon as I came within reach of one of them the three aliens along with six more came out with ray guns. They started to shoot at me but since I am extremely fast I out ran the bullets. I shouted at my crew to get their guns and shoot at the aliens. I can’t remember what happened after I got hit with some shrapnel in the back of the knee. I must have been knocked out for at least three hours. The next thing I knew we were hurling in space towards planet Zambonia.