The McCandles Project

I chose to do the experiment where I sat at a completely different table at lunch. My friends at my usual lunch table all thought that they did something to make me upset so they all came up behind me and kept asking me if they did anything wrong and if they did, that I would forgive them. However, I did not say a word but inside my mind, I was laughing like crazy. I felt like I was being cared and I knew that my friends were my true friends because they did not leave until I told them that I would tell them the reason why I was sitting at another table sometime else. Sitting at a different lunch table was fine because I had some of my other friends at it so I ate lunch having a good conversation with them. Surprisingly, I was not shocked by my friends' reactions. The reason is because I knew that my friends and I have a good relationship so I was aware that they would at least do something to bring me back.

In the other hand, I didn't really feel free. Maybe because it was only during lunch. I still don't get how sitting at a different lunch table makes you free though. Overall, I thought that this whole project was very interesting and I hope that we could do more of these projects later on.

My Favorite Quote

"I can do everything through him who gives me strength"

(Philippians 4:13)

 

 

I chose this specific quote because it truly motivated me to do my best to glorify the Father’s name. Adding to that, it really helped me to believe that all things are possible. When I go to church on Sunday mornings, and learn and get reminded that our purpose in life is to spread the Father’s glory, in the past sometimes I felt that I couldn't do it. I felt like I was just small person living in this humongous world and I became shocked and questioned myself how this would be possible. However, after reading this verse, I truly realized that I could do everything through him and it made me confident. Now I know that God will help me in all things I do. It also made me really understand how great God is, and how powerful he is. Even though, we may be weak and small, we serve a much bigger and greater God and he will make all things possible to those who believe. Even in all the hardship you may have in life, and also the pain and suffering you may have right now, God will help you overcome that obstacle as long as you believe. For God is love.

This quotation represents my actions because now I do not hesitate before I do anything. Before I read this verse, when I had a recital or an audition, I would always be so nervous and my hands would get as cold as ice. I thought I couldn't play the piece I had to perform. Also my heart would be pounding faster than the speed of light. However, after reading this verse, when I had auditions or a recital, I stood strong because I knew that God was always with me and that I could truly do everything through God's help. Even in the future, I will always be strong and courageous and I will never be afraid to do a certain task. 

If I literally lived every second of my life by this verse, I would do everything without being scared. Even in any situation, I would always believe in Him, and never lose hope. Even though I may have lost a battle, that doesn’t mean that I have lost the war, and I would always live my life with a strong mentality and I would be positive and believe that God has plans for me.

 

Joel Osteen says, “Most people tend to magnify their limitations. They focus on their shortcomings. But scripture makes it plain: all things are possible to those who believe. That’s right! It is possible to see your dreams fulfilled. It is possible to overcome that obstacle. It is possible to climb to new heights. It is possible to embrace your destiny. You may not know how it will all take place. You may not have a plan, but all you have to know is that if God said you can…you can!”

Source: http://jonathanmerritt.religionnews.com/2014/01/16/philippians-413-many-christians-misuse-iconic-verse/#sthash.XEWh4uDg.dpuf

Short Story Rough Draft

David Lee

Mrs. Belden

Honors English 1

October 8, 2014

Friend or Foe

Call me David, David Lee. Maybe you’ve heard of me. Not to brag, but I am the star basketball player at Roseville Area High School. Today is THE Game. It is us against White Bear Lake High School, our cross town rival, think Army vs. Navy. To make matters worse, my arch enemy, the hideous Bryan Blaze is their star player.

Inside of my school, I see waves of posters that say “Beat the Bears”,“Go Raiders”, and my personal  favorite, “Let’s go hunting for some bears.” All of the walls are painted our home colors, white and black. Even all of the classrooms are painted black and white to support us. I arrogantly walk into the team locker room where all of my teammates are already waiting for me. Our respected coach is going over the offensive plays as I listen to my jam on my beats. Then coach leaves us to let us focus and have some time to think about the game. I angrily reflect about what happened last year. I can still remember the bitterness so clearly. I quickly say my prayers asking God to guide me successfully through the court as I hear the buzzer roar. It’s showtime! As I look onto the court, I see waves of people all wearing our home color black and the opposing White Bear orange. There he is, Bryan Blaze, my rival. Just being in his presence causes a rush of hatred to fill my body. We win the tip off and I get the ball, and shoot an easy jump shot to put us on the board. White Bear gets the ball and for some reason Bryan is dribbling the ball up the court straight towards me. He is 6’7 250 pounds of pure muscle and he plays center. Why is he coming at me like he is playing guard? As he gets to half court he taunts me by saying, “David Lee, come out, come out wherever you are.”

This guy is really getting on my nerves. Let the battle begin.

    I go at him violently moving my hands like I am slapping somebody. He drives to my left, and I quickly follow behind. He goes up for the layup, but I strip the ball away from his hands. I grab the ball and sprint to the other hoop, but I awkwardly trip and fall. The ball goes out of bounds and it is my first turnover. White Bear Lake takes it out of bounds, and the selfish Bryan Blaze calls for the ball and drives all the way up the court passing all of our players. The last hope of defense is me. He runs full speed towards me and I put my feet together to take a charge. He runs into me and gets called for a charge. He immediately comes up to me and curses at me. We hear the high pitch sound of the ref blowing his whistle as Bryan gets called for a flagrant foul. I go up to the line for my 2 free throws. All I could think of was the shame of losing to Bryan Blaze. I couldn’t bare the thought of losing to this team. I took my first shot, but it hit the rim and missed. I screamed inside of my head, and I took my second shot.  It was an air ball. BUZZ! It’s the end of the first quarter and we are down by ten points. Our fan section is as silent as a funeral, but the away section is as loud as a world cup stadium.

The second quarter starts and my coach foolishly decides to bench me. As soon as the game resumes, Bryan is a machine and he sinks four 3-pointers in a row. Their entire team is on fire and scores 12 points in a row. Our coach thankfully calls a timeout. During the time out, I couldn’t stop staring at Bryan. I mean, there was this thought in my mind questioning, why I hated him so much. I mean the only thing he has done to me was block my shot last year that led to being a blow to my ego. Other than that, I thought, there was no reason to envy him.  I made up my mind and decided to talk to Bryan after the game. I came in after the timeout, and I myself  started to go on a roll. To close the half, I score twenty points in a row and cut the deficit to five points.

After the halftime, we come out of the locker rooms and the crowd gets rowdy. As we warm up, I walk over to Bryan. “Hey, I’m sorry man” He responds by saying, “No big deal, its all part of the game.” I say, “Well, see you man.” He replies by saying, “Okay, see you to.”

Now, I feel as though all the weight on my shoulder has disappeared. Now, my thoughts were to just enjoy the game instead of trying to beat Bryan. The ref blows his whistle to indicate the start of the second half. This time, the White Bear’s guard is taking the ball up court, not Bryan. This told me that maybe, he didn't have much hatred towards me than before. The White Bear guard, quickly gets a block from Bryan and makes a jump shot. Our center, Joseph, quickly takes it out of bounds and inbounds it to me. I walk slowly up the court and pass the ball to our other guard Ben, and he makes an easy jump shot. From there, it went back and forth, layup after layup, jump shot after jump shot and by the end of the third quarter, we were only up by five points.

The buzzer and it was time for the fourth and last quarter.

As soon as the fourth quarter starts, White Bear Lake comes out strong scoring 10 points in a row to give them a five point lead. Then I get the ball and make a 3-pointer to cut the lead down to two. Then, just like the third quarter, we go back and forth for the next 2 minutes. The score becomes 54-52 with us trailing. With one minute left., our coach calls out a play which would give me an opportunity to shoot a three pointer. I get the ball and pass it to one of our players, then I cut back to the 3-point line and wait for the ball. My teammate passes me the ball and I have a wide open three. I shoot the ball and the ball goes in the basket. Now we are up by one with 40 seconds left to play. Bryan gets the ball in his hands. He fakes to his right to try to get his defender moving and he shoots a jump shot with the defender running at him. The ball goes in the air and hits the top of the backboard, then goes in the net. Now White Bear is up by one. There is 17 seconds left and I have the ball in my hands, I quickly dribble up to half court and call a time out. As I come out of the timeout, Bryan wishes me good luck on the next play, and I say thanks, but you better guard me tight. I get the ball from out of bounds and Bryan is guarding me. It’s last year all over again. I could still remember so clearly. “We were down  by 1 with 10 seconds left. The ball was in my hands and I had Bryan guarding me. The crowd were all on their feet eager to know what would happen next. I faked Bryan out and I saw an open lane so I just ran in for the layup. However, Bryan was right behind me all along and he blocked my shot so hard it went to the stands. The buzzer screeched and the game was over. After the game I felt so bummed, and angry at Bryan and I started to hate him.” However this time, things were going to be different. This time, I was going to make the shot. I faked Bryan to my left but he doesn’t fall for it. I keep dribbling, but the clock ran down to 3 seconds. I heave the ball in the air as hard as I could.The ball bounces off the rim and hits the ground. The buzzer roars and the away side is all cheering. As soon as the game ends, Bryan rushes towards me and tells me that I played well. I tell him that his defense on the last play was outstanding.  He says thanks and he asks if I would want to go get some Canes with him, and I definitely say yes. Even though we just lost one of the biggest games in our season, I am not mad or frustrated a single bit like last year. That reason is because at least I made a new friend and all the weight from hatred came off of my shoulder to make life easier.

Timed Writing Essay Revisions

I read the book Gifted Hands by Greg and Deborah Shaw Lewis. The author's purpose of writing this book was to deliver a very important message. The message was "With God and his help, all things are possible." This message is shown many times throughout this book.

One of the details that supports the message is how Ben Carson became a great neurosurgeon. As a young child, Ben is the "dumbest" in his class and he was often teased by it. Even through the persecution, Ben still has faith in God. One day, all of this began to change. Ben wants to do everything for God's glory. He realize he wants to become a doctor so he prays to God every night and he surrenders his life to him. God helps him to realize that he had to work hard to complete fulfill his glory. After he realizes, he begins to study harder each and everyday and by high school, he is one of the smartest people in the grade. Later on, he goes to Yale University and goes to Johns Hopkins Medical School. This detail supports the author's message because in the beginning, Ben was not the brightest kid and had no motivation. He was the dumbest in class and was made fun of. However, God helped him, so Ben became a very successful neurosurgeon.

The second detail is about the surgery Ben has to perform. He faces an operation that has to deal with Siamese twins. His job is to (along with his crew) split the twins apart safely, so they could live a normal life. In contrast, nobody has ever successfully split conjoined twins conjoined at the back of their heads. It seems like it is an impossible task for Ben to do. Ben and his crew are very nervous and are very stressed out about it. However, Ben has a key factor, God. Before the operation, Ben prayed a lot and asked God to guide him during the operation. God answered his prayer and Ben (along with his crew) successfully split the Siamese twins apart. This detail supports the message because in the beginning, the operation seemed impossible. However, with God, Ben and his crew did the "impossible".

In the beginning, everything seemed impossible for Ben. He wasn't sure what he would become of nor did he care. He didn't really try his best in anything and he just went along with the crowd. However, God was always with him, even during his struggles so Ben became a brilliant pediatric neurosurgeon. That led him to save many people's lives and while doing his work, he spread God's glory. Nobody knows what will happen in the future, or what each and everyone of us will become us, but we know that God is with us and he will always help us succeed.

Metacognitive Blog: And Then There Were None

1. The first draft I wrote was reasonable but it wasn't the best. It had minor grammatical errors along with containing few ideas that were not very strongly supported. When I got my essay revised, I fixed all my grammatical errors. Another think I changed was my second paragraph. Before I got my essay revised, the second paragraph was written in third person, but after I got it checked, I changed it to first. Lastly, in the last paragraph, I added page numbers and sourced strong quotes that would help support my statement.

2. I think sharing my essay with an adult helped me the most for improving my essay. I think it was the most helpful to me because adults are smarter than most high-school kids and they know more than us. They have more things to comment on us and know more ways to improve my writing. Also they take the time to really read over the child's paper and they give key statements that improve the child's writing. When other peers look at it, some of them don't really read it and they just put random stuff down or they just say that the paper was good. When I revised it myself, I didn't realize the mistakes I had written so I didn't know what to correct. That is why I think sharing my essay with an adult helped me the most.

3. What will really help me to continue improving my writing this year is if we got a lot of writing time. Whether if it is writing an essay or writing a story, it still will help me a lot because I would get a lot of practice. By practicing many times, I can realize what I need to work on when I am writing so the next time I write, I could fix it. Also, if we get a lot of writing time, the I could come up with unique ideas and change their writing style to make a story or a writing better.

4. One thing that I really want to grow is limiting unnecessary words in my writing. What it means is when I write, I have so much to say so sometimes I repeat myself over and over again. I want to cut my writing down and make it short but sweet. Another thing I want to improve on is using different variety of word choices. Instead of using the same word many times, I want to use different words when they mean similar meanings.