Margaret’s Blog

We have been blogging since April 5, 2006. I think that blogging has been a good experience for me. It is nice because people like family from other places can also read what you are writing in school and what is going on with your life. I think I am following the class rules, but if I am not I am very sorry. I think that this is very good for our classes because then if you have a problem people frm all over the world can help you with that problem. I think blogging can help people outside of school by helping them express their feelings. They can also use blogging to tell other people about what they are doing everyday.  I think that blogging is something good to learn and I will try to keep blogging after this quarter if I can.

- Margaret

Brendan was in third grade when he was caught cheating on his math quiz. He had been doing poorly in math and his parents had threatened that if he didn’t raise his grades they wouldn’t let him play on the baseball team. So he cheated. When the teacher asked him about it, he denied it at first, but finally admitted to writing down the answers ahead of time.

A parent conference was called and Brendan had to sit with his parents, the teacher, and the principal to discuss the school policy on cheating and lying. On the way home, his father told Brendan he was deeply disappointed in him and expected more from him in the future. That night, Brendan felt like the whole world was against him, but he also felt guilty for letting his parents down.

That weekend, Brendan and his family went to a movie. When they got to the ticket window Brendan’s dad asked for children’s tickets for both Brendan and his 16 year old brother. Brendan looked over at his brother, who stared down at the sidewalk and hunched his shoulders hoping the ticket seller wouldn’t notice that he was well above the age for a child’s ticket. The ticket seller glanced suspiciously back and forth between the father and the brother, and then, with a doubtful look on her face, she handed them the the two child’s tickets. This happened every time they went to the movies, and it always made Brendan feel weird.

On the way home from the movie, Brendan asked his father why it was okay to lie and cheat the theater out of money but not to cheat on his math quiz. His dad responded that sometimes its okay to lie as long as nobody gets hurt.

Do you think Brendan should try to talk to his Dad again about his lying at the movies?
Yes, I think he shuld tell his dad that there is no difference from what he did and what Brendan did.

Who might Brendan have hurt by cheating on his quiz?
He could have hurt the teacher because if he cheats then the teacher will know that she is doing a bad job with Brendan. It also says that the teacher is not helping him.

Brendan’s Dad said it was okay to be dishonest if no one was hurt. Who do you think might have been hurt by his lying at the movie ticket office?
The people who work there because they use that money to buy food and to pay for their employees. If they don’t get the money then their employees would want to quit there jobs. And the movie theater would lose there business.

well thats the story of Brenden.

- Margaret

This is my story. Instead of people hating me I was the one asked to hate someone. Here are some pretend names Jack, Benny, and Jeremy. Jeremy got a prank email from Benny, but Jeremy didn’t think it was funny. Jeremy didn’t want to be his best friend anymore so he asked me and Jack to hate him too. I said okay I will kind of hate him for you, but Jack said he wouldn’t hate him, so then Jeremy and Benny didn’t really like each other anymore, but Jack told Benny why Jeremy didn’t like him anymore. Now they are all best friends again.  Okay that’s all. Bye

- Margaret

Here is an article that our teacher told us to read.

Julia was in 6th grade and had been at her school since kindergarten. Her two best friends were Wendy and Erin. Erin was the most popular girl in the class and all the girls saw her as the leader. One morning Julia arrived at school and Erin was acting weird. When Julia said hi to her, she didn’t respond. She just looked away and smiled at a group of girls in the corner of the classroom.

It didn’t take long for Julia to figure out that Erin had turned most of the girls against her. But, she didn’t know why! She went to Wendy and asked her why Erin was mad at her. Wendy acted nervous and said that all she knew was that Erin told her that if she hung out with Julia, none of the rest of the girls would talk to her anymore.

The rest of that day lasted forever. Whenever the teacher was looking everyone was nice to Julia. But, when her back was to the class, Erin or another girl would throw pieces of paper toward Julia or whisper to each other and look in her direction. Julia thought Wendy would help her but Wendy just pretended nothing was happening.

That night Julia talked to her parents and they told her to wait and see if tomorrow was better. If not, they said, perhaps they could help Julia talk to Erin and work through the problem. Julia felt like that would make her look stupid if everyone found out that her mom and dad had to get involved. She knew that sometimes the class would pick on someone, but she never thought her friends would turn against her and do the same thing to her. She felt like she didn’t have any friends and nobody liked her.

The next day was even worse. No one wanted to hang out with her at recess and she had to sit by herself at lunch. At the end of lunch she went into the girls’ bathroom. While she was there, a girl from her class came in and said that Erin had sent her in and that Julia had to take off her shoes and send them back to Erin or no one would talk to her tomorrow. Julia just wanted to go home. She didn’t want to cry but she was confused and hurt and scared. She gave the girl her shoes.

Now she was late for class and was in the bathroom with no shoes. She headed to class and walked in quietly with her head down. Before she could get to her chair, the teacher asked her why she was late and where her shoes were.

Why do you think Wendy didn’t stick up for Julia?
I think that Wendy didn’t stick up for Julia because all the girls would have turned against her too. If she did then she would have been a really nice friend but she didn’t because she didn’t want everbod to hate her.

Has this sort of thing happen ever happened to you or to someone you know?
This has never happended to me or anyone I know.

Have you ever been in Wendy’s position? Erin’s?
No, I have not ever been in Wendy’s or Erin’s postition. If I was in Wendy’s postition then I would have just keep being friends with Julia. If I was in Erin’s I would have stopped being mean to her and start helping her.

How do you think this situation would be different if the case involved boys instead of girls?
It would have been even more horrible because sometimes the guys are tougher then the girls. If that did happen I think that the girls should help Julia stick up to the boys.

Why do you think people pick on others, and why do others join in?
I think that people pick on others because they just think that they are nasty and that the have never given them a chance as a friends, so they pick on each other. I think others join in because the don’t want to be picked on too.

Have you ever felt that a good friend turned his or her back on you? What happened and what did it feel like?
I haven’t ever felt that way but if I did I would have tried to become friends again instead of making a new enemy. I think I would have feel really embarrased and would have tried to tell someone.

I think that people shouldn’t treat other people like that. They should treat everone fairly instead of making everyone turn against him or her. That’s what I think.

- Margaret

For Mother’s Day, our family and my mom was with us and we went to buy something that my mom wanted we ended up buying something that was $500!!!! I don’t know what it is called though. We also had some of my parents friends come over and eat dinner and my house. Besides that we didn’t really celebrate Mother’s Day. Maybe will we really celebrate it next year.

- Margaret

Our teacher gave us a website to take a personailty test. The website is http://www.queendom.com/cgi-bin/tests/transfer.cgi. I took this test twice. The first time I took it I got a 54 and was a type B personailty. The second time I got a 75 and a type B personailty again. There was only type A and Type B.

Type B was this : You seem to have Type B personality. Your attitude towards life is more of the “smell the roses” kind and you know how and when to relax. Nonetheless, you realize that picking up a challenge and competing a little bit for your place in the sun can add some spice to your life. Generally, you are easy to be around, and people tend to feel relaxed and comfortable in your presence. The equilibrium is important, so don’t let your hostile, aggressive, and competitive alter ego take over too often. Yours is a very healthy attitude towards life.

Type A was this: Your attitude to life is very relaxed and hedonistic. The hostile, aggressive and competitive part of you surfaces rarely, if ever. You are easy and fun to be around. The down side is that you seem to take everything so easy that you might miss on important opportunities. Make sure you are just being cool and relaxed-and that it’s not getting to the point that you simply don’t care much about anything. Try to put some structure into your life-get organized. Pay more attention to what you are doing and focus.

Ok bye

- Margaret

The Giver is what we read in class a couple weeks ago. It is about this community where you can not decide who you are married to or who your children are. They even decide your job depending on what you do or where you spend your volunteer hours. If you do something wrong you either have to apologize or get released. The Giver is the one that has to give The Reciever the memories he holds in his mind. Some are bad but some are good. There are no colors in that world too. It also never rains there. The main characters where The Elders, Jonas, the father, the mother, Lily, and The Giver. I think that The Giver was a good book and that other people should read it.

- Margaret

Here is the website to the article: http://www.westislandchronicle.com/pages/article.php?noArticle=6063

The questions are:

1. What do you think of this issue?

I think that being racist is very horrible. They can be sued for being racist to people with other cultures.

2. How do you feel about this?

I feel that what they did was bad because you should not tell other people how to eat. They way they eat may be in their culture. People should not be racist just because for the way other people eat.

3. You recently studied about Canada. Why do you think the adult and the principal acted this way? How would you feel if you were Luc?

I think they just wanted there school to be the same. So that everbody would eat the way Canadians eat. They shouldn’t do that though. I would feel that people are just looking at me and how I do things. I think I would feel embarrased about my ethnicity.

4. Would you want to be in a school like this?

I would not like to go to a school like Luc’s. If I went to that school and I was Asian and I was eating with chopsticks, the would be telling me to eat with a fork and a knife. It is like everywhere you go people would be watching your every move to see if you did it correctly.

Again I think that people shouldn’t tell other people how to live their life. I also think that the people in Canada should leave Luc alone.

- Margaret

In my free time I like to -

Play sports like:

Basketball

Soccer

Some other things I like to do at home is:

Watching Television

Chatting with my friends

Here are some stuff I don’t really like to do, but I still do.

Doing a lot of HOMEWORK!

okay that is all I have to say. so Bye.

- Margaret

Today in school we had tests and other educational things. We had a 3 english test and a social studies test. For Math we played some games and we checked our homework ( I got one wrong!) For English we had tests for our book The Giver.

For P.E. we had a catching test and I got ten out of ten!

For Social studies we had a test on The Caribbean.

And we did not have science yet

ok bye - Margaret