Reflection Of My Sec One Life

My Sec One life is coming to an end and I am posting this blog to talk about my reflection of the year. I stepped into HCI at the beginning of the year, meeting new friends and teachers. The life in HCI is rather stressful and there is a whole load of homeworks, but I also learnt a lot of other skills like IS which includes html, adobe photoshop and flash which are essential for future working purposes. I have also learnt some new subjects which includes Geography, History and IS. I also had a lot activities happening this year which includes Beach cleaning, Angles and Projects etc. Our group consists of four person and we went into the Finals without much problems, unfortunately we are not able to went into Grand Finals as our website is not very well done. I am also satisified with my results for the whole year and I hope it will be a fruity year when I am a Sec 2 student.

Expections

My parents put high expectations on me, especially in the subject of Chinese and Maths. Sometimes, although I have put in a lot effort studying for the test, yet the results are poor,they will tell me to strive harder for the next test to get better grades.

In my opinion, I will not put a very high expection on children, otherwise they will be very stressful. As long as the child puts in effort studying for the test, I will not punish them. I will tell them to work hard for the next test and achieve a better result.

I think that the expectations will differ due to the generation gap as different generation will have different expectations on their children.

Book Review in the Sep Holiday

Book Review

Title : The Stonewalker

Author: Vivien Alcock

Everyone is tired of Poppy Brown's stories and hence Poppy started talking to garden statues. Later her favorite statue, Belladonna, is struck by lightning and comes to life, Poppy have to find a human who will listen. Poppy's classmate Emma is skeptical, but was curious to help Poppy investigate the living statues, which are disappearing from gardens all over town and assembling somewhere on the moors. What seemed fascinating at first soon becomes terrifying as the two girls are captured by the creatures they had observed,the creatures who are at once beautiful, spiteful, and as unfeeling as the stone they're made of.

Poem

This is the very first poem I will be writing. It is about a student walking into the staff room.


The Staff Room

Timid like a small rat
I enter the dangerous room
with all eyes facing me
and a cleaner with a broom

My heart is jumping fast
eyes focusing at homework
the teacher starts screaming at me
I regret doing all the housework

With a sword in his hand
hacked his way towards me
feeling very scared
why is it me?

Wishing to turn back
with no possibility
the teacher approach me
I feel with no ability

The fire blast burns my hair
attack with deadly aim
pulling out his shotgun
he continued his game

Tears start falling down
hoping for his forgiveness
he pats my shoulder, comforting me
luckily he still have some kindness

Lesson 5: Poetry on Gambling

1.In the first poem "Tom Beatty" ,the author describes a lawyer who tries his luck to win some money .He finds that the chance of winning are very low. The author writes the lawyer felt despair.

2.In the second poem the author describes the colourful casino environment where there are colourful tips,smoke, dry lips, erratic lights, constrained tones, mesmerizing lights,the author shows a gambler trying to win back his money, even though he is exhausted.

3.The third poem shows how money is wasted when a person gambles, he will bet on anything in order to gamble.

The main difference in the three poem, is the feeling of the author of the poems. For example, the first author is trying to show the feeling of everything that turn against you. The second author, shows the desire to win back the money. And the last author is the feeling of lose of money.

Lesson 6

I do not support the opening of casino. This is one of the quotes from the gamblers "“The longer you gamble compulsively , the more you become a compulsive liar”.

When there is casion, people will be addicted to gambling. As a result, they will start to lie to their family.When the gamblers have won some money, they will not be satisified and will continue to gamble. They will eventually lose all the money they have and may borrow money from loan shark and the consequences will be very serious. The family will be threatened by the loan shark and the family will be in a chaos. Some of the addicted gamblers will rob and steal from others to get the money and continue to gamble. As a result, the crime rate of Singapore will increase in number. The tourists visiting Singapore will have a sense of fear and will not come to Singapore again. It will deeply affect the population of Singapore.

Opening casino will enable more job opportunities, but the negative effects are much greater than the positve effects. Gambling will destroy a family ot their relationship. The consequences are very seerious. All in all, I do not support the opening of the casino.

My favourite poet (Lesson 2)

Langston Hughes

James Langston Hughes was born February 1, 1902, in Joplin, Missouri. His parents divorced when he was a small child, and his father moved to Mexico. He was raised by his grandmother until he was thirteen, when he moved to Lincoln, Illinois, to live with his mother and her husband, before the family eventually settled in Cleveland, Ohio. It was in Lincoln, Illinois, that Hughes began writing poetry. Following graduation, he spent a year in Mexico and a year at Columbia University. During these years, he held odd jobs as an assistant cook, launderer, and a busboy, and travelled to Africa and Europe working as a seaman. In November 1924, he moved to Washington, D.C. Hughes's first book of poetry, The Weary Blues, was published by Alfred A. Knopf in 1926. He finished his college education at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania three years later. In 1930 his first novel, Not Without Laughter, won the Harmon gold medal for literature.

Hughes, who claimed Paul Lawrence Dunbar, Carl Sandburg, and Walt Whitman as his primary influences, is particularly known for his insightful, colorful portrayals of black life in America from the twenties through the sixties. He wrote novels, short stories and plays, as well as poetry, and is also known for his engagement with the world of jazz and the influence it had on his writing, as in "Montage of a Dream Deferred." His life and work were enormously important in shaping the artistic contributions of the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s. Unlike other notable black poets of the period—Claude McKay, Jean Toomer, and Countee Cullen—Hughes refused to differentiate between his personal experience and the common experience of black America. He wanted to tell the stories of his people in ways that reflected their actual culture, including both their suffering and their love of music, laughter, and language itself.

Langston Hughes died of complications from prostate cancer in May 22, 1967, in New York. In his memory, his residence at 20 East 127th Street in Harlem, New York City, has been given landmark status by the New York City Preservation Commission, and East 127th Street has been renamed "Langston Hughes Place."

In addition to leaving us a large body of poetic work, Hughes wrote eleven plays and countless works of prose, including the well-known “Simple” books: Simple Speaks His Mind, Simple Stakes a Claim,Simple Takes a Wife, and Simple's Uncle Sam. He edited the anthologies The Poetry of the Negro and The Book of Negro Folklore, wrote an acclaimed autobiography (The Big Sea) and co-wrote the play Mule Bone with Zora Neale Hurston.

I felt that this poet has a hard ilife when he was young. His parents were divorced and he was raised by his grandma until the age of thirteen. But still he is a great poet. Not only did he write poems, he also wrote Proses, Drama, Poetry in Translation and Translation. I think that the poems he write is totally awesome. His poems are interesting and rhyming, that is why I liked him, his poem, his drama etc. I think he is a very talented person, he is able to write such wonderdul poems. He really is a great person and I liked him. His poems are famous, but unfortunately he died in the year of 1967. He is the best poet in my heart.

http://poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/83

Three poems done by Langston Hughes

The Weary Blues

by Langston Hughes
Droning a drowsy syncopated tune,
Rocking back and forth to a mellow croon,
I heard a Negro play.
Down on Lenox Avenue the other night
By the pale dull pallor of an old gas light
He did a lazy sway . . .
He did a lazy sway . . .
To the tune o' those Weary Blues.
With his ebony hands on each ivory key
He made that poor piano moan with melody.
O Blues!
Swaying to and fro on his rickety stool
He played that sad raggy tune like a musical fool.
Sweet Blues!
Coming from a black man's soul.
O Blues!
In a deep song voice with a melancholy tone
I heard that Negro sing, that old piano moan--
"Ain't got nobody in all this world,
Ain't got nobody but ma self.
I's gwine to quit ma frownin'
And put ma troubles on the shelf."
Thump, thump, thump, went his foot on the floor.
He played a few chords then he sang some more--
"I got the Weary Blues
And I can't be satisfied.
Got the Weary Blues
And can't be satisfied--
I ain't happy no mo'
And I wish that I had died."
And far into the night he crooned that tune.
The stars went out and so did the moon.
The singer stopped playing and went to bed
While the Weary Blues echoed through his head.
He slept like a rock or a man that's dead.

http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15612

POET TO BIGOTI have done so little
For you,
And you have done so little
For me,
That we have good reason
Never to agree.I, however,
Have such meagre
Power,
Clutching at a
Moment,
While you control
An hour.But your hour is
A stone.My Moment is
A flower.

http://www.poetrymagazine.com/archives/2000/Feb2000/hughes.htm

DREAM VARIATIONS
To fling my arms wide
In some place of the sun,
To whirl and to dance
Till the white day is done.
Then rest at cool evening
Beneath a tall tree
While night comes on gently,
Dark like me--
That is my dream! To fling my arms wide
In the face of the sun,
Dance! Whirl! Whirl!
Till the quick day is done.
Rest at pale evening . . .
A tall, slim tree . . .
Night coming tenderly
Black like me.

http://www.poetrymagazine.com/archives/2000/Feb2000/hughes.htm