Mary is an eighth grader and, until recently, pretty popular at school. Lately, she started finding notes in her locker and in her backpack that were really upsetting. The notes were unsigned and mean. They said things like: “ We don’t like how you’re treading on our territory.” “ You act like a bitch.” And even, “ You better watch out because we’re watching you…”

Mary had no idea who might be sending the notes but she had an idea why. In the last few months she had started accepting invitations to high school parties. She had also fooled around with a couple of sophomore guys. She had a feeling that the notes were from some of the high school girls. She knew how gossip got around and how mean other people said the sophomore girls were.

What was she supposed to do? Almost every day this week she received a note. She felt angry, scared, and hurt. She showed the notes to two of her friends. One of them said that whoever is sending them was probably just jealous and she should just ignore them. The other friend said she should show them to a teacher.

Mary felt like there was no good choice. If she tried to ignore the notes she was afraid they would just continue, and she was not only scared, she was mad. She wanted them to stop. But if she turned in the notes, she was sure the whole school would find out and she would probably have to name names as to who she thought was sending them. If the gossip was bad now, wouldn’t’ it be worse then?

1. What do you think Mary should do?

I think that Mary should just tell someone and say that she doesn’t know who has she has no idea who it could be.

2. What do you think would happen to someone in your school who was in Mary’s situation? (I.e. would she get backlash for hooking up with older guys? Would people gossip about her?)

I’m not sure about that because it depends on the person and their personality.

3. How does gossip play a role in your school, in your community?

Gossiping is like a rumor and it can get around the school/community very quickly. It is a very bad thing to do because if someone tells who started it then they get in trouble.

4. Have you ever been in a situation similar to Mary’s? How was it resolved?

No, I haven’t ever been in a situation similar to Mary’s. I wouldn’t want to ever get in a situation like that because it is hurtful to other people.

5. Why do you think people gossip? Have you ever gossiped about someone? Why do you think you did?

I think people gossip when they are angry with someone or they plain just hate them. To tell the truth I haved gossiped about someone because he/she was very annoying and I was very mad with that person for what she/he did.

- margaret

This is a picture of the DVD

this is a picture from one of the chapters.

I think this is a really good DVD and I would watch it if I liked animation!

- margaret

Maria was worried about her good friend Pam. Pam was always talking about how fat she was and what she was trying to do about it. But the truth is that Pam was not at all fat. In fact, she was downright skinny. Since their freshmen year Pam had lost at least 15 pounds. Now, they were juniors and Maria was afraid that Pam had an eating disorder. Maria was also getting frustrated. Where were all the grown-ups? Who was watching out for Pam besides Maria and her friends?

Maria knew that someone from their school had talked to Pam’s parents last year, and that Pam’s mom had gotten angry about the school poking its nose into family business. Pam’s mom claimed that Pam had a dancer’s body and a high metabolism. That was last year. Now things were worse and Maria felt like she was literally watching her friend disappear.

Finally, one Monday afternoon Maria had had enough. As she watched Pam take three diet pills and eat four grapes for lunch she decided she had to do something. As helpless and scared as she felt now, how would it compare to how she would feel if Pam actually ended up in the hospital…or worse? Pam would be furious if she found out the Maria had talked to someone behind her back. So, Maria had two problems–should she tell someone how bad things were, and if so, whom should she go to?

Here are some questions that our teacher gave us.

1. Whom should she go to?

I think she should go to the principal or the teacher so that they can convice Maria to go to a counselor. She should go to a counselor to get help and tell someone her problems and why she is getting skinnier and skinnier.

2. Do you agree with Maria? Do you think she should tell someone about Pam?

I think that telling someone about Pam is the right thing to do because something really bad can happen to her. Like going to the hospital or fainting for no reason or having a really bad thing like dying happen to her.

3. If so, who do you think she should tell?

I think she should tell the principal or the teaher so that they can talk to the parents or Pam about thins problem.

4. What do you think Maria should say if Pam asks her if she told someone?

I think that Maria should tell her that she did tell someone and it was for her own good. If Pam didn’t say anything about it then she could have gotten really sick.

5. Have you ever been in a position like this? What happened? Would you make the same choices if you were in that position again?

No, I have never been in a postition like this and I wouldn’t want to be because I would be pressured to do things.  I would have made the same choices that I wrote down.

- margaret

]]> http://margaret12sjs.learnerblogs.org/2006/09/29/ethical-dilemma-3/feed/ http://margaret12sjs.learnerblogs.org/2006/09/27/leadership/ http://margaret12sjs.learnerblogs.org/2006/09/27/leadership/#comments Wed, 27 Sep 2006 07:23:25 +0000 margaret12sjs http://margaret12sjs.learnerblogs.org/2006/09/27/leadership/ Here are 5 websites that tell you about leadership.

http://www.andinia.com/a00100.html

http://www.clomedia.com/content/templates/clo_section.asp?articleid=1114&zoneid=101

http://www.managementhelp.org/mgmnt/leader.htm

http://www.selfgrowth.com/articles/Sharma2.html

http://www.tellboss.com/

Here are some questions our teacher gave us

1. In your own words, what do you think a LEADER should be?

In my own words, I think a leader should be someone who has courage, trust, and other good virtues, they also should have good ideas.

2. What are the qualities of a person that a leader should have? 

Again I think they should follow good virtues and not have plans to take over the world. They should know how to deal with things or problems that might come up while they are a leader.

3. Who is the leader that you look up to or insipred by? 

I am not really sure who the leader that I look up to, but I do know about leaders that have done good and bad things.

4. If you were a leader, what would you do?  What would you be a leader of?

If I were a leader I would give people positive ideas instead of ideas like taking over the world or killing everyone who is your enemy, or other stuff like that. If I was a leader I would be a leader of anything I can be.

5. What kind of leader do you think you’ll be?

I would try to be a good leader, but I would be scared if I do something bad and then people start betraying me.

 - margaret

- Margaret

- Margaret

For Social Studies we are doing a powerpoint about the First Civilization.

 For P.E. we are playing softball and volleyball.

For Honor Choir we learned many songs.

Science we are learning about the earth.

For Math we are learning geometry like angles and geometric figures.

And for computer we are blogging and for study skills we are learning many different stuff.

I think students should be allowed to bring cell phones to school but not use it until after school. It is bad to do it during school because people might cheat by telling answers to each other by text message and it will also interupt the classes if someone calls each other. I would be good to so that they can communicate with the there parents if there is an emergency or if they can’t find someone. I really think that we should be allowed to bring cellphones to school just in case, but not for chatting with others until after school.

- Margaret

Then when I went to Chiangmai, Thailand we did a lot of things with the tour. Changmai is nice because no one steals there or does crimes, so there is very little cops on the streets. We went to go ride elephants,we saw a snake show with king cobras, and we saw monkey shows, and we also went to go feed wild monkeys. I think the best thing we did was riding the elephants because they also had a show. The elephants had different flags on them and they were playing soccer with giant soccer balls. Some of the soccer balls even hit the aduience. We also saw the elephants dance, draw, and play the harmonica. It was kind of scary in the beginning of riding the elephant because we were so high up and the hill was very high up too. The elephant I rode was 17 years old, and it’s name was Mae Boomamai. The elephant I was on went to the river and then sat in the water. The driver was like take a shower? And me and my sister were like no way!! The driver the instructed the elephant to go away from the river. There was a ton of elephants too. The Place I went to was Maesa Elephant Camp. Then after that we went to go look at the wild monkeys and when the our tour guide shook some peanuts all the monkeys started to come down. Some of them even had babies on them. We even handed the monkeys peanuts and bananas. I think my whole summer vacation was very fun this year.

-Margaret