Journal 82: My Last Journal Entry

Every things come to an end some day, and today, it is the last day of our journal entry for eighth Grade. I still remembered when I was first in the grade eight class, our teacher, Mr. McCool assigned our first journal entry, which was Journal Entry 1: Introduction to me. I remembered that he wanted us to write at least two hundred words for this journal entry and every journal entry we will write in the following year. Although I've been assigned two hundred words, I always wrote only about one hundred fifty words. This dropped my grades a lot, because our journal entry was a huge part of our English grade. I always thought journal entry was easy and a fun thing to do, because I had a lot of time to do it and other homework. After the first quarter passed, I began to play basketball and stay after school more often. This caused me to lose time and do my homework for school. I began to fall behind in the journal entries and I lost a lot of credit because of late journal entries. I think that I've learned my lessons by not getting a very good grade and I will organize my time better and not waste anytime. After all, homework comes before basketball and every other activity.

Journal 81: In Defense of My Treasure

Treasures are valuable things that are important to us. People would do anything to protect their treasure. Some treasure are solid, which means they are objects that we can touch or see. Sometimes treasures are invisible. Invisible treasures are those memories and relations we have with other people. In the story "Lemon of Lemon Brown", the narrator, Lemon Brown's treasures are the newspapers that talks about his achievements in music. Although he was once a wonderful and brilliant music player, time passes by, he turns old and he becomes old and people forget about him. Even though people forget about him, his memories of the great time he had when he was a wonderful musician will always be in his mind. This is why he tried so hard to protect his treasure. If I were to protect my treasure, I would do anything. My treasures are the memories and times I had with my family and my friends. I will do anything and help as hard as I could to protect my family and my friends. I would make sure my treasures were safe and protected all the time. This is how I would protect my treasure and make sure they will last forever.

Journal 80: My Treasure

What does treasure mean? Treasures are valuable things that are important to us. People would do anything to protect their treasure. Some treasure are solid, which means they are objects that we can touch or see. Sometimes treasures are invisible. For example, sometimes memories or lessons can be treasures to people. Just like their backgrounds, everybody has something to protect and something that they care a lot about. These things are their treasure. For example, the president of a country's treasure may be his country. He would do anything to protect it. I have a lot of treasures myself too. My treasures are the memories and times I had with my family and my friends. I will do anything and help as hard as I could to protect my family and my friends. I might be able to protect my family and my friends, but one day, they will have to leave me and from that day on, I will have to be on my own. Although they may have to leave me, all the memories and times I had with them will stay in my mind for ever and I will never forget them. This is my treasure that I will never forget.

Journal 79: My Background

Everyone has a unique background. I believe that my background is kind of special in a way too. My name is Hank Chau, I am 14 years-old, and my birthday is March 25. I was born in a hospital in Taipei. When I was very young, my parents used to take me around Taiwan on field trips. Although I had forgotten most of them, I still remember some really good things that happened in my childhood and good memories that I had. For example, one time when I was about 3 years-old, my parents brought me to Tai-Chung to watch a dinosaur exhibition. It was fun and very interesting to look at the robotic models of dinosaurs moving around. I remembered that I loved dinosaurs when I was young. I used to collect dinosaur cards when I was young and put them in a box where I kept them very safe. When I grew up, I gave those cards to my best friend's little brother. He liked it a lot too. When I was a little bit older, I began going to elementary school and I learned Mandarin Chinese and English. I loved Chinese classes because my teacher would talk about ancient China. I loved the stories that were from ancient China, especially "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms. "

Journal 78: Style

There are a lots of different styles. Styles are the way that the author presents his or her story or writing. For example, the authors style can be nerdy which he or she uses words that we don't usually use today. An author's style can be like a gangster, which is very informal and sometimes bad-ass. These styles can tell us about the author sometimes. If he or she is polite or what he or she is like. The styles of a story can sometimes help us identify the author too. For example, if the author always uses a specific style in his stories, we can figure out who the author is just by reading his or her writing. The style the author used in "Raymond's Run" was a lot more informal and easy compared to the style of the author in "The Treasure of Lemon Brown". In "Raymond's Run", the author uses a tone in which kids like the narrator's age would use. On the other hand, the narrator in "The Treasure of Lemon Brown" was depressed and angry at the beginning of the story. This is why the author used a more serious tone instead of a informal and easy tone.

Journal 77: Slang

Slangs are words that are said but not written. These words are used by people talking to each other instead of in essays or articles. They are usually used informally or in informal essays. There are a lot of slangs. People use them when they are talking to someone they know. For example, 24/7 means all the time; always available; without a break. There are also other slangs to describe other things. For example, some slangs that describe cool or good are bad-ass, 133t ,  5 by 5 ,  A-1 ,  ace ,  active ,  aight ,  ain't no thing but a chicken wing ,  a kick ,  all good, all that , all that and a bag of chips ,  all that and a bag of Fritos ,  alrighty ,  alvo ,  amped ,  A-Ok ,  awesome , awesome possum ,  awesome sauce ,  B.A ,  bad ,  bad-ass ,  badassical ,  badonkadonk ,  ball ,  bang ,  bang on , bang up job ,  beast ,  beastly ,  bee's knees, the ,  bitchin' ,  blast ,  bodacious ,  bomb ,  bomb-ass , bomb diggidy, the ,  bomb diggity ,  bomb, the ,  bonkers ,  bonzer ,  book ,  boomtown ,  boss ,  bostin ,  broken , bullet, the ,  bumping ,  burger ,  butter ,  CAH ,  capitol ,  checkin' ,  cheez whiz ,  chicky ,  chill ,  chilling ,  chim , choice ,  classic ,  clean ,  clutch ,  colp. These are all slang words that describe cool or bad.

Journal 76: Analogy

Analogies are comparisons between two things to show how they are alike. I think that analogies are very good in conversations because it is a good way to tell the other person what you are meaning and what you are thinking. Although it is a good way, the person you are talking to must be able to understand it. In order to understand it, the person saying it and the person listening to it must understand the thing that is being compared to understand what the speaker is trying to tell. For example, if I want to make a analogy of someone's heart and rock, I could say "His heart is as hard as a rock." For the person who I am speaking to to understand, he has to know the person I am talking to and what he has in common. For example, I may be describing that the person has no feelings, because a rock is hard and if a person's heart is as hard as a rock, it can mean that the person has no feelings. Another example can be if I want to say that a person is very fast, I could say "He is as fast as a leopard." I can do this because everyone know's that a leopard can run very fast. This is why I can use this analogy to describe a person that runs very fast.

Journal 73: OOPS!

A lot of people say that your first impression of something is right. I believe that this is sometimes true, but not always. People have their first impression of something when they see anything. Their first impression is the thought that first comes to your mind when you see someone, some place, or something. For example, when you see an elephant, your first impression of them might be, "Wow, what a big animal." These kinds of impression is sometimes true, because what a thing does can change it's appearance. I once had a classmate who was very tall. Everybody thought he would be good at sports, but actually he was not. Another classmate was skinny and everybody thought he couldn't each much, but actually he could eat more than I could. Another time  I saw a person who had a bad looking face and a messed up suit. I thought he was a poor dude on the street, but he turned out to be one of the teachers in my school. These were all first impressions about someone, but at last, when I get to know them, they proved it wrong. This is why I think first impressions aren't necessarily right all the time.

Journal 74: Below the Surface

Have you ever judged a person based on his or her appearance? Although judging people by their appearance can sometimes be right, it is a bad and wrong thing to do. This is because a person should be judged by his characteristics and personality. If a person i very handsome or beautiful, that doesn't mean that is beautiful on the inside. A lot of times, a beautiful young lady may be a wicked-witch on the inside. On the other hand, an ugly or bad looking person may be very nice and gentle. This is why we shouldn't judge people based on their appearance. When I was in elementary school, one of my classmates was not-so good looking and he had a lot of bad habits such as not taking a shower. Although he smells (not kidding here), he is still a very nice guys and he was a good friend of mine. This is why I think we shouldn't judge a person by his or her appearance. We should try to understand, be friends with and think on their point of view. This way, we can know which friends are the best and who we should really be friends with.

Journal 72: My Tell-Tale Ending

The story "The Tell-Tale Hearts" ends by the narrator confessing the crime and turning himself in to the police. He did this because he thought he heard the old man's heartbeat growing louder and louder as his guiltiness grows larger and larger. Actually what he heard was his own heartbeat that is growing larger and larger as he is getting more nervous and excited. I think this is very good ending because like every other story, the villain gets punished at last. Even though I think it has a good ending, I have my own ending for the story. In my ending, the narrator feels the heartbeat growing louder and louder. Then he asks the police to leave. The police felt that something was wrong because he suddenly changed from welcoming into nervous and in a hurry. The heartbeat grows louder as he gets nervous. He kept telling himself to calm himself down because he's smart and he should know better. At last, the police found out something strange about him. He was moaning about something about the body. The police thought he was crazy and sent him to a madhouse. What the police never knew was that he killed a person.

Journal 71: Hints and Foreshadowing

When we read a story, we can find  lot of clues given by the author. These clues can help us understand the story and find out the mood of the story. These clues are given by the author usually by foreshadowing and hinting what will happen. These clues are usually in the text, but the author doesn't tell you directly. The author hides them in the text, but they are clear enough so that the reader can figure it out and know it. For example, if the author describes a person walking down the street with the cold wind blowing behind him like it's stabbing him. We can infer that the person walking down the street might be attacked or killed, because the wind was blowing behind him like it was stabbing him. I think foreshadowing and hinting is a good way to tell the reader more about the story because this way, it makes the reader thinks about the story and understand it. In the story, the narrator tells us that he hates the old man's eyes. The heartbeat he hears when he was killing the old man also foreshadows what happened to him in the end. This is why I think foreshadowing and hinting is a good way to use to tell the readers.

Journal 70: Narrator

A narrator is a person telling the story in a story. It can be in the first person view, where the narrator is one of the characters in the story. It can also be in the third person view, where the narrator is not any character from the story. When we read a story, we rely on the narrator to tell us what information we should need to understand and follow along with the story. In other words, if the narrator doesn't tell us anything and only describes briefly about the story, we would never know what the character is thinking and what the story is about. In the story "Tell Tale-Hearts", the narrator is a character in the story who is a crazy killer who claims that himself is smart and not crazy. Even though the narrator says that, we know that he is crazy by looking at the content and the things the narrator does. In this case, the narrator is not a reliable narrator, because what he says isn't always true. In these kinds of stories, we would have to find the clues in the story and question about what the narrators says. We can do this by paying attention into every detail in the story.

Journal 69: Scary Stories

There are a lot of different kinds of stories that a could be written. There are adventure stories, love stories, and scary stories. Scary stories are the ones which make you feel scared. They often contain little bits of horror and they are usually nervous. I think scary stories are very fun to read because they build up suspense and they are usually interesting. Sometimes scary stories are a little bit violent, because the author wants to build up the scariness of the story. I think the elements inside the scary stories are very important because they decide whether it is a good scary story or not. I think the elements that make up a scary story are suspense, violence and mysterious. Scary stories need to have suspense because it makes the story more nervous and interesting. A scary story needs a little bit of violence because it helps build up the suspense. A scary story also needs to be a little mysterious because if it is mysterious, people won't know much about it and it adds up the interest and builds up the suspense. This is what I think should be in a scary story and if a scary contains these elements, it is surely scary.

Journal 68: My Style

From what I learned today in class, everybody has a style. Style is the way a people shows themselves. Everybody has a style in everything including wearing, walking, talking, writing, communicating, listening, watching or maybe even sleeping. Everybody wears different clothes and types of shirts. For example, a sporty person may be wear sports clothes all the time instead of jeans. A nerdy person may have everything tidied up and clean. People with different style also walks differently. For example, a person with a cool style may walk like a gangster. A nerdy person may walk softly and gently. A person's style can also be revealed through his or her writing. For example, a writing that rhymes in a particular way may tell the reader who the writer is if the reader is familiar with the writers way of writing. I think I have my own style too. I think I wear sports clothes very often and walks normally like normal people. I think my writing style is the same as any other normal student who is at my age. I believe that I have my own style too, it's just that I haven't noticed it yet or I haven't shown them.

Journal 67: Betrayal

In the poem "In Response to Executive Order 9066", the writer shows that she is betrayed because of her best friend. Because the poet looked Japanese, she was sent into a camp. The camp was for Japanese Americans because America was having a war with Japan. The U.S government was afraid that these Japanese Americans will give secrets about the American government to Japan. This is very unfair for those people. This is because although the poet was born in America, grew up in America, only spoke English, ate only English food, only had friends who are Americans, she is still considered a Japanese. Her friends knew that she was a Japanese and lost trust in her, but she didn't do anything wrong. I had been betrayed before too. I remember when I was in elementary school, my best friend told one of my classmates who he likes. Because my classmate liked the same person, he told the class just to make my best friend embarrassed. I think this is very unfair too, because my classmate betrayed my best friend. After my classmates found out why my classmate told everyone, no one liked him or old him any secret again.

Journal 66: Real American

In the poem "In Response to Executive Order 9066", the poet was moved into a camp because the American government was starting a war with Japan and the poet looked Japanese. Although the poet was born in America, grew up in America, only spoke English, ate only English food, only had friends who are Americans, she is still considered a Japanese. I think this is very unfair because she is a real American. The only part of her that is Japanese is her look. I believe that the poet herself feels like she is a Japanese. She told us that her favorite food was hot dogs which is just like an American. I think she chose to include these details because these are the elements of an average American. When we think of hot dogs, we think of Americans, because they are from America and all Americans love it. This makes us think and convinces that she is an American too. If I had to prove I was a Taiwanese, maybe I will say that my favorite food is rice with meat sauce, because it is from Taiwan and all Taiwanese love it. It makes people believe that I am a Taiwanese.

Journal 65: General Conditions

In the story "Camp Harmony", the writer talks about how the Japanese were brought into the camp, the writer also says what the camp was like and what they had to do in the camp. From what the writer described, I feel like the camp they went to wasn't very nice. I, myself, had been in a lot of camps before too. In the beginning of every year, my school brings the whole school to a place in Taiwan and camp for at least three days. This is because every year, there are a lot of new students and going on a trip with them can always help them meet new friends and know the class much more faster. I remember the year when I first came to PAS, we went to a fantastic place which I enjoyed. Everybody was very happy and I made a lot of new friends just after a few days I went into the school. I believe that it was worth it because it helped me know my classmates and it was super fun. The difference between my camp and the writers camp are that in my camp, everybody was happy and it was meant as a field trip. In the writer's camp, they were forced by the government to leave their house and move into the camp.

Journal 64: Camp Harmony?

In the story, author calls the camp "Camp Harmony". I think this is a very bad name for the camp. The camp was meant for people who's ancestors are Japanese who lives in America. Because America is having a war with Japan, the president of America told all the Japanese who were living in American to summon up and stay in a camp while America was still in war. This is because that the American government don't believe in the Japanese who were actually Americans. They were afraid the the "Japanese" would give secrets about the Americans away to their original country, which is Japan. Even though the Americans considered the "Japanese" Japanese, they grew up in America, ate American food throughout their whole life, only spoke English, born in America, listened to American music. I think this is very unfair to the people,because they were actually Americans. Just because they look Asian, that doesn't mean they are Asians. I think this is very unfair. The camp was called "Camp Harmony" Harmony means living peacefully, and staying together, but what actually happened was people being forced into a camp because of something they didn't do. This is why I think it is a very bad name for the camp.

Journal 63: Camp Pictures

The pictures in pg 471 shows a camp with houses and there are only a few people in the camp. In this picture, it seems like there are only a few people, but there are a lot of houses and they are all big and able to contain a lot of people. I think this picture is quite similar to where I live, because in the neighborhood where I live, there are not a lot of people. And there are a lot of big houses all over the place. In where I live, everybody doesn't know each other well. I think the picture in pg 471 is a little bit like where I live. In the picture in pg 476, there are a lot of Asian people lining up. They are probably going into a camp or house. The building where the people are lining up to go into is big. It can also contain a lot of people. The Asian people might be waiting or moving into a place. I don't think this picture is like where I live, because it is fulled with people and there are mountains in the background. In where I live, there are no mountains and there are only a few people living in my area. This is why I think the picture in 476 isn't like where I live in.

Journal 62: Spring Break

During the Spring Break, I did a lot of things including going on a graduation trip with my friends, watching my favorite channel everyday after the graduation trip and watching NBA. Our graduation trip began on the first day the Spring Break came. My classmates and I went to Bali. On the airplane, we watched movies and chat. When we arrived there, we felt very hot and began to sweat on our way to the bus that was going to bring us to Club Med. In Club Med, I enjoyed my time with my classmates and friends. We played basketball, swam, soccer and a lot of fun activities together. We also went rafting and we spent our time with each other and playing. I believe that everybody thinks that it was worth it and fun. After we came back from the graduation trip, I continued watching a TV series called Doctor Who. I also watched a lot of NBA, because of Jeremy Lin who was incredible in his team New York Knicks. I planned on doing some of my homework, but in the end it turned out that I ran out of time, so I had to find some time to finish it during the school days.

Journal 61: Film v Book

Have you ever seen a movie that is different from the original book it's from? In fact a lot of movies are only what the director imagines in from reading the text in the book. Maybe your own imagination from the book is very different from what is performed by the actors. I believe that both the book and the film of the movie can be right. For example, the book Star Wars is based on the movie, so the picture the book wants to create in your mind is the picture that is already created  in the movie. In the book Hatchet, I can picture Brian living in the woods by himself and other pictures that Gary Paulsen created in my mind. In the movie, it showed pictures and scenes that are very different than what I have imagined. For example, I never imagined that there was a bear who attacked Brian. I never imagined that the door he built for his shelter was that big, and so on. I think the movie is not wrong because after watching the movie and re-reading the book, my brain creates the picture that I have seen in the movie. This is why I think the movie and the book are both right.

Journal 60: Hip-Hop Language

It's six o clock in da morning, I woke up on ma bed and went to da first floor. I saw ma mom watching da television and making breakfast fo me. I told ma mom tat it's time ti go, so I took ma backpack and went into da car. I got to da high speed rail station at 6:50 and I ran down the stairs ti try ti get onto the train on time. I began lookin at my clock, the time passed on and on. Tik Tok, at last I ran down the stairs, saw the train leave the station and I knew I was late for school. I waited in the station for da next train. At 7:30, da next train came by and I went onto the train. There wasn't a lot of people, so I sat down on the train. When I arrived at Hsinchu, it was nearly 8. I got on to a bus that drove me out of da station. I ran to school after I got down the bus. I got to PAS at almost 9, my first history class was half over, and I walked into the classroom. My friends and classmates were all there on time. This was my first time late.

Journal 75: Fighting Words

In Raymond's Run, his sister protects her brother by fighting or arguing with people who insults or bullies her brother. I think that this is reasonable and a right thing to do, because it is the sister protecting her brother. If I was the bigger brother or sister, I would do the same thing to protect my siblings. If my siblings are being bullied, I will protect them and never let them get hurt. I believe that words are worth fighting. One time my classmates insulted and bullied my best friend. I felt like defending my best friend so I protected him and told them to stop. At last our teacher found out about it and told our parents. Although I got into a little bit of trouble too, I still felt like it was worth it, because my classmates will never do it again. I feel like we should protect ourselves when we are insulted. This is why I protect myself when I'm being bullied or offended. If the people who are talking about us, I feel that it's okay, but if they are really being mean or doing it all the time, I think that it is right to protect ourselves and defend ourselves.

Journal 59: Epic Language

I went into the math classroom this morning  like I always do. Put down my bag on the chair beside me. I stared at the teacher's desk and saw a stack of exams. I said to myself, this is the math Mid-term and it is very important. When our teacher Mrs. Sue passed out the worksheet, she told us that we have the whole class to do it. So we took our time as we did our test. The first section was very easy. Only a few simple calculations to do. On the second page, there were multiple questions that require us to read and choose the answer from the word bank. The third page was questions that need us to fill in the answers ourselves. This was a little bit harder because when we get the answer out, we're not sure if it is right or not. When I got to the last page, which is the fourth page, the questions require us to make a chart and calculate a lot of things. Suddenly, the bell rang and the test end. I put down my pencil and turned in my test to the teacher. I believe I did a good job and I will get a good score.

Journal 58: Luck?

What is luck? Luck is the possibility that a thing could happen or not. In real life, luck is very important. For example, if we are lucky all the time, we can get high scores in tests, score in basketball when we shoot, win a lottery, and everything will go as we wish they will. In the book Hatchet, Brian says that he was lucky because he survived in the wild. I agree. This is because he needs to be lucky to stay alive in the plane crash and in the moose attack. He also needs to be lucky to make a fire out of his hatchet and get saved by the plane passing by. All of this requires luck, so I think Brian is very lucky to be able to survive and go through all this. When the moose attacked, he needs luck to run away and survive. When Brian was starving, he needs luck to find food that are not poisonous or so. This is why I think Brian is very lucky. I hope I am as lucky as Brian too if I was trapped in the wild.

Journal 57: What Makes Fire?

What makes a fire? In our lives, a lot of things make a fire. Electricity, heat... these things can all make fire. A fire needs three important ingredients, heat, oxygen and something to burn with. In the wild, it is very hard to create a fire. It is very hard to create a fire because it is hard to find enough heat to make a fire. In the book Hatchet, Brian uses dry wood, his hatchet and some grass to make a fire. The dry wood is the material to burn with, so the fire keeps burning. The hatchet is for making sparkles. When Brian uses his hatchet to defend himself during the night, he threw it and it hit the wall and made sparkles. Because of this, he began to notice that sparkles can create fire because of the friction that made the heat. The grass is also for the fire to go on. These are the materials to make a fire and how Brian made a fire in the wilderness.

Journal 56: Lost in the Woods

In the book "Hatchet", Brian was lost in the woods in Canada. He was lost and no one could find him or rescue him if he didn't try the best to survive. If it was me that was lost in the wilderness, I would try my best to stay alive too. Staying in the wilderness without anybody accompanying you would be very scary and dangerous. In the wild, I may not survive because every animal is trying to stay alive by eating each other and finding food for themselves. I believe that in order for me to survive I have to work very hard and try to find food too. I would try to remember everything I've learned for survival and use it while I am trying to stay alive. I think that in the wild, everything is dangerous and you're on your own. In order to survive, we will need a lot of things and we will have to fight for own lives.

Journal 55: Personal Assets

In Hatchet, Brian has to survive in the wilderness. In order to do this, he has a lot of things to do. For example, he has to stay optimistic and keep himself alive so that he believes in the rescue plane will come someday. If he was pessimist, he would not have prepared  fire or signal for a plane that flew by. If he was pessimist, he would have been sad and desperate that he had a plane crash and he would have just done nothing. I believe that the assets Brain has in order to stay alive were being optimistic, trying to stay alive, and the knowledge he learned from before. Those assets helped him stay alive by giving and telling him what to so when he faces danger, he can overcome the fear and survive. My assets are very different from Brian's. My assets are, for example, my temper and my grit. When I do things, I won't give up easily. Although this may turn into stubbornness, I still believe that if we have grit, we won't give up and we will succeed at last. Having a good temper is also very important, because if we have a good temper, we are usually optimistic and we can handle things more easily.

Journal 54: Solving Problems

In the book Hatchet, Brain was going to visit his father. When he was in the flight to Canada, the plane which he was in crashed because the pilot had a heart attack. Brian was trapped inside a forest in the Canadian Woods. While he was trying to survive in the wilderness, he learned that everything needs food to survive. He learned from the television that turtles lay eggs on land. Because of this, he found food. He also found food on the trees that were beside the lake he had fell in. In my life, I have met a lot of problems too. When I solve these problems, I use the information that I have experienced. Some time these information are from television channels I've seen, the newspapers, or even movies I've watched. I use these information and put them together to solve a problem. From these information, I can know what I should do and shouldn't do, and I will not make the same mistakes that someone has made before. Another way to use these information is to use them in real life. For example, if we know that certain types of plants are edible, we can eat that in the wild and we will not die that easily. This is how I use information in movies, books or television to help me solve my problems in real life.

Journal 53: Triolet

I like basketball

And it's fun to play

Basketball is harder then volleyball

I like basketball

In basketball, you must be tall

Or else it would be hard to play

I like basketball

And it's fun to play

How do we write a poem

We write it in rhythm

And it should be awesome

How should we write a poem

When I wrote this poem

Nothing rhymes with rhythm

How do we write a poem

We write it in rhythm

Journal 52: You and Nature

I believe that nature is the world that people hasn't build human technology on yet. Although buildings are all around the world now days, I believe that nature is still everywhere. When I think about nature, I think of a huge green plain with grasses and some trees that express peace. In my nature, everything is very peaceful. No evilness is expressed by anything and everything shares and protects the same thing, which is the land they live on. In nature, I have seen a lot of things such as the trees, the birds singing in the trees, or even the little bugs that live inside the trees. Some of these things make me happy. For example, new lives in nature are born during the Spring time and they make me feel happy because they will soon grow into the nature I believe in. Some of the things in my nature make me feel open. For example, when little birds are singing and young animals are playing with each other, they make me feel that they are innocent and pure. This makes me feel that my heart is opened. Others of the things in my nature makes me feel that everything is in a cycle. For example, in nature, everything goes in a cycle. An animal eats the plants to grow up and when they die, they turn into fertile soil for more plants to live on... , when Spring and Summer end, Autumn and Winter comes and when those end... These things are always in a cycle. These are the things of what I think about nature, and I wonder: Can human be a part of nature?

Journal 51: Limerick

I am a good child.

 That is never wild.

Not in a fight,

That no one is right.

I am very mild.

There was once a young man named Bill,

Who was an assassin that kill.

He took out his gun,

pointed at the sun

Bang, killed a person on a hill.

Once I wrote a poem about strong.

The poem was a little bit long.

Read in a tone,

It was well-known,

My poem was like a song.

Journal 50: Tanka Poem

I am a student

A good, responsible one

I do my homework

Although sometimes I miss them

I try to do all of them

I like basketball

I play it with my classmates

They all like it too

A lot of people play it

It is very popular

I like playing games

I like them because they're good

They are interesting

There are many kinds of games

I like every one of them

Journal 49: Cinquain Poem

Hank Chau

A good student

Responsible and kind

He is a very nice classmate

Friend

Basketball

A sport

Interesting and fun 

I play it everyday

Sports


Spanish
A language
Fast and interesting
I take Spanish classes
Espanol

Journal 48: Haiku

I have a good friend.
Sometimes annoying and bad,
But still my good friend.


I like basketball.
It is fun and cool to play.
I really like it.


I was late today,
But I still got into school.
Because I take bus.

Journal 47: Diamante Poem

Hot

warm comfortable

exercise  swimming  sweat

fire       sun       ice        rain

raining  snowing  blowing

freezing uncomfortable

Cold

Teacher

intelligent nice

teaching grading correcting

student office parents teacher

learning listening working

responsible polite

Student

Parents

responsible strict

teaching showing caring

baby grandparents toys parents

learning playing crying

innocent cute

Baby

Journal 46: Acrostic

Hank Chau is a student,
Any kind of student.
Never upsets his parent
Knowing what will happen.
Causing no troubles at school,
He looked into the homework pool,
And saw a learning fool.
Unfortunately, he was the fool.


Yeti, the Abominable Snowman,
Eats up every man and woman
That passes through its mountain.
Inhabits in the Himalayas.

Journal 45: List Poem

Saturday Morning math homework,
Listen to music and watch NBA.
Play my PSP for a while,
Go on facebook and skype and smile.
Play with my cousin until night,
Annoy my cousins till the next light.
Sunday Morning math class,
PAS homework after that.
Review each subject till dark,
Try to make myself more smart.

Journal 44: My List

1. Do my math homework the whole day
2. Listen to music
3. Play my PSP
4. Go on Facebook and Skype
5. Play with my cousin
6. Annoy my cousin
7. Go to math class
8. Go home and watch NBA
9. Do PAS homework
10 Review each subject

Journal 43: Elements of Poetry

When we write a poem, we use a lot of techniques such as alliteration, assonance, metaphor, onomatopoeia ... These techniques help the poem to become more beautiful. In my poem, I am going to use rhymes. When sentence rhymes, they give the reader a feeling that the sentence is complete and nice. These elements are like the ones in stories. In stories, there is a plot which makes the story interesting, there are conflicts which are problems that characters have against another character, there is the resolution where the conflicts are solved and the stories ends. Foe example, the poem the highwayman is like a story. The highwayman was in love with the land lords daughter, but at last, he died under the army's bullet. This story is a poem, put it also has a plot, conflicts and a resolution.

Journal 42: Ode

For the ode that we are going to write in school, my topic will be "My Watch". I chose this topic because I like my watch, I wear it almost everyday, and I can write a lot of things about my watch. For example, I can write about how it tells me the time, how it is important, how it helps me organize my time, how it wakes me up in the morning and tells me to go to school... There are a lot of things that I could write about my watch. Other things that I could write about my watch is it's appearance. My watch is blue with a big piece of glass that shows me the time, date and the day of the week. It has a blue circle surrounding the glass and a black part that can hold on to your wrist. Although I like my watch very much, it is getting older and older, and one day, my watch will stop ticking when it runs out of battery.

Journal 41: Poetry

There are many types of writing, for example novel, stories and essays are ones that everybody has seen. Poems are different from other forms of writings because they can express feelings very well. For example, poems can express the feelings of the poet while most essays can't. Poems are also different than other types of writing because they are concise. Poems are short and meaningful while some stories are boring and long. Although poems are different from other types of writing, they also have s lot of similarities.Both poems and essays express the authors opinion and describe a thing. A poem is also similar to a song. It is similar to a song because they both have a rhythm. A lot of poem rhymes just like how lyrics in a song rhymes. A poem can express a person's feelings to things using only a few words. Although not a lot of people write poems now days, we can still see them in daily life. Poems are in advertisements, songs and a lot of things we see in our daily life.

Journal 40: Winter Holiday

Last week was Christmas and I enjoyed a lot in my Christmas holiday. First, our holiday started on December 16th, 2011. On this day, I finished my math homework and prepared for the math class I have next day. After that, my family went to a famous hot pot store and ate some warm food. The soup tasted fantastic as the warmness goes from the mouth all the way to the whole body, and it feels good especially on a freezing day. On December 19th, my cousins came to my house and we went to Yang Ming Mountain to enjoy the view of watching Taipei town from the top of the mountain. Because it was a cold day and we were on a mountain, my hands got so cold that I couldn't feel them anymore. On the mountain, we ate our lunch and enjoyed the warm chicken soup. My cousins and I had a wonderful time. On Christmas Eve, my family and I stayed together in our house watching the television. Our dinner was delicious and we prepared for the new year.