Extra Credit Reading Challenge

Response to Julie and Julia movie and book

Julie and Julia is the story of two very different women living in two very different times, connected by one thing, cooking. The Julia of the story is the famous Julia Child one of the authors of the widely known cook book, Mastering the Art or French Cooking. Julie is a young women living in the “outer boroughs” (as it is commonly referred to in both movie and book) who loves to write, but has ended up in a dead end secretarial job for families effected by 9/11. The story begins when Julie decides with the help of her husband and friends to start a blog. One year to cook her way though the entire Mastering the Art of French Cooking cookbook.

The basic story line of both movie and book are similar. For the first time I saw the movie before I read the book, before I knew about this project and before I knew there was a book. I liked the movie it was witty and growing up in a family where cooking is important I could understand the cooking terms. I am very, very sorry to say that I did not like the book. I want to make excuses to say that it is because I saw the movie first or maybe the weather for reading the book did not put me in the proper mode, but that was not it. It is very simple. The movie was good the book not so much. She is clearly a good writer but the book is written too much in a diary style where every little detail must be fit in and I could weed out about a paragraph of fluff in every page. The book though was well written and had a certain flow and language choice that kept me from throwing it agents the wall when it seemed the details about how to poach in egg would bore me to death. Maybe if I had anticipated a diary format I would have been more prepared and not as shocked.

I think many people will enjoy the movie Julie and Julia and if you like diary style books and cooking and every little detail of very little thing in this womens life you will enjoy the book.

First Draft Author's Note

Author’s Note
Everyday girls and boys everywhere are pressured to be “like everyone else.” Pressure comes from their peers, magazine ads and T.V commercials. Everyday girls feel pressure to change them selves. People who were confident suddenly find flaws and problems in the smallest things and the pressure to be perfect leads to drastic measures.

A good definition of social pressure comes from dictionary.com.

“The influence exerted by a peer group in encouraging a person to change his or her attitudes, values, or behavior in order to conform to group norms. Social groups affected include membership groups, when the individual is "formally" a member (for example, political party, trade union), or a social clique. A person affected by peer pressure may or may not want to belong to these groups. They may also recognize dissociative groups with which they would not wish to associate, and thus they behave adversely concerning that group's behaviors.”

This definition is very helpful because of how general it is. The most important part of the definition is “encouraging a person to change his or her attitudes, values, or behavior in order to conform to group norms” this is all that is necessary for an understanding of social pressure.

I wanted my story to have a broad topic because I wanted people to understand the general idea of social pressure and not just one specific branch. I hope that my story spreads awareness for this general topic so that children will be aware of social pressure.

Social Pressure reserch

       Dictionary.com defines Social Pressure or Peer Pressure as,

refers to the influence exerted by a peer group in encouraging a person to change his or her attitudes, values, or behavior in order to conform to group norms. Social groups affected include membership groups, when the individual is "formally" a member (for example, political party, trade union), or a social clique. A person affected by peer pressure may or may not want to belong to these groups. They may also recognize dissociative groups with which they would not wish to associate, and thus they behave adversely concerning that group's behaviors.

       This is one of the best most in depth definitions I have found with out reading an entire article.This does not beat around the bush it is direct it is truthful and it is a definition that I have found most useful during my research.

    Other then this definition I have not found many general sources of info on social pressure or peer pressure. The library home page took me to sirs which for my first topic I used and enjoyed, but was disappointed when I tried to research peer or social pressure I found mostly articles like http://sks.sirs.com/cgi-bin/hst-article-display?id=S44-4241-0-3872&artno=0000301708&type=ART&shfilter=U&key=Social%20pressure&title=Big%20in%20Japan%3F%20Fat%20Chance%20for%20Nation%27s%20Young%20Women.&res=Y&ren=N&gov=N&lnk=N&ic=N

    Which talk almost only about weight. What I want for my picture book is social pressure in general I want the pressure to be like everyone else. It is at times like this that I resort to google to find at least something. I found even less and mostly definitions like these 4 lines that do not help me at all http://priory.com/mbti5.htm.
Acidently I clicked images and got

This is more helpful then most of the articles and says more too.

 

Even websites for kids ages 4-8 have more info then most teen/adult sites.

Reserch Project 1

For my first research topic I wanted to do something that had to do with the homeless. I found an article that did not quite relate to my topic but I read it in case it did. What I found out shocked me. Many states are trying to pass laws allowing them to give tickets and fines to people that are not wearing the proper clothing. For example a man who was wearing ratty shorts in the winter would be fined. They could say it was indecent exposure if the person were to challenge the fine. This is upsetting in so many ways. In our desperate attempts to become a utopia we are doing what a five year old does when they are cleaning their room. Sweeps everything under the bed.

            We will never be perfect. We will never be even close to perfect if our solution to homelessness is giving fines that we know people can not pay and then putting them in jail. How can we even consider to fine people who have the cloths on the back and ten cents to their name?

            What I realize reading on is that southern people are not all agreeing with this. Some question why the government does this if they insist that it has nothing to do with “cleaning up” then why is it that shorts from Marc Jacobs are not something that can be fined?

            The fact is we are still a segregated country. Not in the common ways of racism like, race and religion but in the way of similarity. Similarity is something that in America we pretend not to think is important. The truth though is that we want everyone to be the same somewhat. We may not want to be exact but there are something’s we like to have in common. There are some people that think we all should be different things that are under the same category almost. We can only be a certain amount of different before we are “too different.” This is upsetting but may inspire a very different type of awareness. For my next research project I will look into the new idea.

5 day Reflection

Day 1
"Arkansa School Offical Acussed of anti-Gay posting"
The story is about a teacher who posted on facebook. "I will wear purple if they all kill themselfs."

Day 2
"Yet Another School Vandilized"
This is really sad to me because I have a family member who works in yonkers school and has had good offers but stays there becuase she loves the kids.

Day 3
"Fordia, Newborn killed by pitbull"
At first this does not look like a social justice piece but there was a lot of abuse on the parents part of the baby.

Day 4
"Children Everywhere Show Gay and Lesbian Support"
This is the opposite of the first article it is about kids supporting gay and lesbian rights.

Day 5
"Facebook Moniring"
It says that more then ever fb is having to shut down groups that are inappropriate on facebook.

REFLECTION

This study is desterbing but enlitening. I feel like words can not capture the emotions that fly through my mind when I read story like these. In america we pride ourselfs on being an"amazing" "great" place, but if this is true why is everything on the news so awful? We are a country that has made progress but the fact that we are diffrent and uniqe sets us apart from the rest. We as a nation can only grow if we except that each of us is different in some way shape or form, some more then otheres but still all different.

Social Awarness Responce to a song

We live in a place where when a homeless man or women calls out you pretend not to hear. You keep walking. You have to keep walking homeless equals crazy doesn’t it? Dirty faces equals bad. These people made a mistake, something happened it might not even be there fault, but who cares it’s not your problem, right? My song is called “Another Day in Paradise” by Phil Collins. Lyrics, http://www.lyricsfreak.com/p/phil+collins/another+day+in+paradise_20108035.html I almost cried when I read the first four lines. They read,

“She calls out to the man on the street

“Sir, can you help me?

It’s cold and I have no where to sleep

Is there somewhere you can tell me?”

That is not the bad part though.

“He walks on, doesn’t look back

He pretends he can’t hear her

Starts to whistle as he crosses the street,

Feels embarrassed to be there.”
What makes this so terrible is it’s true. We walk away. Don’t act justified every single person who is reading this now, has ever read this and will ever read this has done it will do it or is doing it. Listening to this song pushes you over the edge though. Listen you will see, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qt2mbGP6vFI Watching the music video there is a slideshow, one of the signs says and I quote, “Please, DO NOT FEED THE BEGGERS, it cause traffic problems.” This is just another kind of segregation. We ignore them, we joke about them, we wish they were not there, but there just as human as us. No one is asking you to do anything. Not to give money but to not treat them like something dirty. I know that there have been times on the train when I have wished the man in the corner in his underwear in January was not there. Why have I wished that though? Is it because he is not as fortunate as me? Or is it because we have been taught that they are bad unhuman things that do not deserve our compassion.

An appreciation Final

Stuart Little is the kind of book that you love as a young child because of its adventure and plot and the kind of book that you can appreciate at an older age for it’s language, characters and real life connections

Stuart Little is the story of a mouse living in a world of people. That does not limit Stuart though. He makes sure that anything he wants to do gets done. Stuart Little is written in the early 40’s and emulates the time period through it’s language and ideas. The language flows and gives you the perfect picture of what is happening.
“In the loveliest town of all, where the houses were white and elm trees were green and higher than the houses, where the front yards were bushy and worth finding out about, where the streets sloped down to the stream and the stream flowed quietly under the bridge, where the lawns ended in orchards and the orchards ended in fields. . . .” (Page 100). This part of the book has a quiet flow. Though it is not quite necessary to the plot,  it helps set the scene for a quiet, sunny morning. That is something amazing about E.B White’s description and dialect. He uses it to set a scene and get you into the appropriate frame of mind. It is not always the perfect setting though.
“Snowball, the cat, enjoyed nighttime more than daytime. Perhaps it was because his eyes liked the dark. But I think it was because there are always so many worth-while things going on in New York at night.”(Page 67).
This as opposed to the calm setting on page 100 sets the scene more for a dangerous, less peaceful scene.

A lot of societal problems are mirrored in the book, such as the way people are doubted because of physical problems and limitations. There are many scenes when you get nervous, biting your lip as Stuart sets out to do something. He is daring and in many parts of the story I don’t think Stuart can do what he sets out to do.
“When the bus came into view, all the men waved their canes and brief cases at the driver, Stuart waved his spyglass. Then, knowing that the step of the bus would be too high for him, Stuart seized hold of the cuff of a gentlemen’s pants and swung aboard without any trouble or inconvenience what ever.”(Page 28).
Every time I am proven wrong because Stuart manages to work his way out of sticky situations. My love for the book does not come from the language or plot but from Stuart himself. We like to think that so much has changed between periods of time such as when the book was written and now. But have many things really changed? I can still see many are doubted because of physical problems. Reading this book I thought of myself as a little girl in elementary school.  Back then, everything came down to physical strength. The boys usually won games because they were taller and could throw harder. Why was it that when we put almost double the heart into what we did the boys still won every time?  Reading Stuart Little was important to me. I could not look too deep but I could scrape just past the surface of the book. Stuart was the knight in shining armor that proved size did not matter.

Reading Stuart Little the second time, I saw problems that had made their way into the book that had slipped unnoticed by the six year old who had read this book so many years ago. There had been so much less worry when I read the book the first time. Now it seemed different, sad. I could feel so much more pain whenever something bad happened to Stuart. When Marglo left Stuart, my heart stopped for a second. You could feel how much Stuart hurt.
“For three days everybody hunted all over the house for Marglo without finding so much as a feather…. Stuart was heartbroken. He had no appetite, refused food, and lost weight. Finally he decided that he would run away from home without telling anyone, and go out into the world and look for Marglo.”- (Page 73).

 I now think I know why I loved Stuart Little as a little girl and wanted to read it again. I wanted to see if it still meant to me what it did seven years ago. It was different, not entirely in a bad way, but just not the same book. Maybe as we get older we lose the ability to read for only story and adventure. Maybe being trained to think more deeply takes away from the story when we read a child’s book. Maybe we will never be able to read a book the way we could at six and seven. Maybe opening up to a random page and reading the third sentence would be so, so, so much different then the first time. I hope that every child out there can read as many books before they lose the ability to read without over thinking and “deeply thinking”.

An appretiation Draft 2

Ask me to go back. Far back to when I was little. When all that mattered was what we where having for lunch. When everyone was friends with evryone. If you asked me what I was reading then I would rattle of a few of my favorites, The Little Princess, The Secret Garden, Narnia, Trupet of the Swan, Love, Ruby Lavander and Charlotte's Web. Stuart Little does not come to mind the way thoes do, it takes a little longer like trying to remember what you ate for lunch two days ago, you know it just takes a minute. So why is it when I got the sign up sheet that said to put your name under the book you wanted to re-read did I find myself writing Kate Macrae under the Stuart Little. It was fast I got the sheet wrote my name and then the person next to me tugged it away before I could think.

The first time I read Stuart Little I read it for story and adventure, for which there is no dought in my mind that Stuart Littke is the book for someone who loves that thing. Stuart Little is the story of a mouse living in a world of people. That does not Limit Stuart though. He makes sure anything he want to get done gets done. Stuart Little does not stick to a specific story line the way all of my favorite books do. Instead it jumps from adventures of Stuart and his family made all the more intresting by the fact that Stuart Little takes place in Manhattan. Toward the end though the story does find a specific path that even then is inturupted by other short adventures. I can't say that I love that about the book. I can't say that It bothers me enough to not want to read on. It does keep the story intresting.

Stuart Little is writtan in the early 40's and emulates the time period through the language and conflict in the book. Some thing I love is that reading Stuart Little you can almost feel NYC all thoes years ago.The language is from a time when even slang (if there was any) was beautiful. Reading it makes me long for people to talk to me using beautiful words such as the ones Stuart uses through out the book. Only good books, and there is no dought that Stuart Little is a good book (just maybe not my kind of good book) alow you to submurse yourself and be provoked by the authors ideas. I can say that I appreciate this book.

Entry 7

When you read a book for the first time you will judge it and being human’s we usually want to have something (not everything) in common with other people reading what we are reading.  When I found out that we would be doing all this research I was worried.  What if what I thought was different from everyone else?  What if I was wrong?  Could I be wrong on my own ideas?  Was that possible?  As I started to research pm Stuart Little I realized that it was not opinions but more critic. 

E.B White has always fascinated me.  He writes in this amazing style, something I like about reading his books is you’re not sure what will happen but when it does you can relate it to his previous writing.  A good source on his life is http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._B._White.

As I begain to do more reserch I was not finding to many opinions that I could not relate to, in facet I agreed with alot of ideas and thought in new ways about the book. An intresting aproch to the blog was made by this website http://www.abbythelibrarian.com/2008/06/book-review-stuart-little.html. I found thought It was harder to find links that talked about the book in other formats other then blogs (i.e newspapers, magazines, books) it was very easy though to find reviews on the two movies which both incude very little about the book. The NY times gave one http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/review?res=9F0CE5DD1430F934A25751C1A96F958260.

I do think it would be intresting to countinue looking for information and other opinions on stuart little I had fun with this study and would like to see what the other people in my group came up with.

Entry 6

At the start Stuart Little was just Stuart Little a chidrens book, well writtan and clever but still a chid's book. One day during book club we turned back to an early page in the book (11) and were disscusing something, in my head I was asking myself questions on the opposite end of the point, and at home I relized what I had been thinking. On page 11 there is talk of Stuart going into a mouse hole (that is what the Little's thought had happened) but really he had just been stuck somewhere else. The idea of people of you love going somewhere or doing something and you not able to stop them or help them was scarey. I'm still not sure why this spoke to me but for the rest of the book I was making text to world connections a lot easier then I had ever made them.

Charlotte's Web

Charlotte's Web is the book that our parents read to us in pre-school or we read to ourselves in 2nd grade. For me it was both, it was read to me at 4 and I read it again the summer before 2nd grade. Charlotte's Web was one of those books that you could not wait to get home and read. When I herd that we had to read this book I was confused, why are we going to read this book for a 2nd grader when we are in 8th grade? Though all my confusion was lost when I pulled the book down from the shelf in the den. I could almost see my self 6 years ago running up to my room after school or camp or anything. I could escape into this book in a way that had only been described to me. The honesty in this book is so well honest. With our world everything has one single goal perfection, and goals are good with out them we would never get anywhere or stride to do anything, but when everything must be perfect and anything less than perfect is worthless what can we turn to?

At age 7 you don't have many cares you wake up get dressed go to school play with friends go home sleep and eat. In 8th grade it's completely different you’re up later and earlier and doing as much as you can every second in between. Reading should not have to be something you feel you have to do (unless it's for a class) it should be your way of escaping from everything being able to relax and forget about anything you want to forget. When you read a book (if it is a good book) you should be able to leave yourself behind and be where that book is forget everything until the last page. Though the book did not have quite the same experience for me the second time around I could see why I enjoyed it so much. I can still see how there is no sugar coating. Parts with Charlotte and Wilbur when they first meet are completely honest and admire Charlotte for that. When Wilbur finds out that Charlotte sucks blood he is a poled, Charlotte points out something that we see in the real world too “you can’t talk you have ypur ,eals brought to you 3 times a day, I must mind my own food and this is the only way I know how.” The book is honest and I think that with younger kids nothing is more important. At 6 or 7 you don't always understand the meaning of a lie or how someone can chose not to tell the truth. This is why I and others probably found this book so special we subconsciously knew why we loved it with out fully understanding.

This book is amazing and I am so glad that I can now say that I understand why I loved and everyone before me who loved this book loved it.