Category: English Literacy

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The Vietnam War | Literacy

“ War demands sacrifice of the people. It gives only suffering in return.” – Frederic Clemson Howe

Over the course of the world’s history, war is not an unused term to narrate those infamous devasted periods of time. The conflicts between or within countries left countless consequences to millions of lives (e.g, hunger, loss of people, health issues, and mass destruction of the economy). Besides those consequences, the results pass on to the citizen to endure the damage it has done. Eventually, the damages are scripted in historical records as a representation of numerous scars on our land. 

In English Literacy, I’ve studied one of the depressing war called “Vietnam War”. The period of time consists of 1955 to 2975. While many might call it a civil war within the country between the north and south, America was also one of the army forces engaged in the war. We have read the novel called “Inside out and back again “ By Thanhha Lai and numerous other documented history about the war itself. 

Word Choice, Tone, & Meaning 

While the novel is written in the poem phrase, word choice, tone and meaning are crucial to how the reader perceived it. Furthermore, it shows a perspective of emotion, feeling, experience and a meaningful purpose for the reader to explore. I’ve chosen one of the poems from the novel titled “Wet and Crying”. This poem shows Ha’s favorite papaya tree to be cut down by his brother due to the hatred that the north shouldn’t have the papaya tree and her mother’s advice to eat as much fresh food as their future’s food might not be what they’ve wished for. To flee to another country, many things they once adored must remain in the same place that they were going to abandon. 

WET & CRYING | Writing
Within every each of the words, they have a different meaning to represents and response to different parts of Ha’s family and her situation. As the decisions were made, everything they’ve known and loved would be left behind. The words “Chop”, “Slice” contribute the selfishness and heartless they need to be in order to prepare the mindset to walk through a new chapter. “Crying” shows the rushing emotion as sacrificing is the only thing Ha could do to the tree she’s treasured. Ha, and her family is going through an intimidating and miserable time. The tone of the word “fresh”, “fleck”, “Green”, “Yellow” shows the little amount of faith, belief and hope they have after making a decision to dip their toes into the unknown by escaping from the south. 

Memorable Moments 

Besides the novel, moments of desperate survival, injustice, end of the war are shown in photographs. 

I FEEL SYMPATHY | My opinion

The war ended but the severe wounds leave scars in many lives. I feel sympathy for all the people who experienced or suffered in the war. Unlike them, I only know it from the documentation that is just a small portion of all the suffering, loss, trauma, grief and other jumble of intense emotions. To me, Wars are never meant to happen if only peace is the main guide in an argument. 

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How to be happy when you aren’t what society expects

“To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

A major key that leads to true happiness is being who you are. Unfortunately, this generation has created a boundary that told you to not get out. Societies have myriad of stereotypes and concepts that are being used to judge you as a person. Sometimes, it is almost impossible to be yourself due to the pressure that makes it seems like you must fit into the expectation of modern society. If you are a woman or man, society has created those categories they expect you to be in, rather than giving more freedom to be yourself. It is as if you’re being locked in a cage where you don’t have the ability to go to catch or show uniqueness inside your soul. Rather than thinking about other people criticism or opinion, use your time to be in your best true version. These are ways to just be yourself while you can feel better and be more confident.

The acceptance of being you

During your childhood, it is very easy to be yourself because no one really puts the pressure on kids to be in a certain way. In the process of growing,  you will be less good at being yourself due to the influence that society sets for you. It is okay if you don’t feel comfortable being who you are because of the way other people think about it. You don’t need to make yourself bigger or better while making others feel smaller than you. You’re beautiful, precious, lovely in a way not everyone can see. If you are a female and you love to have short hair, it is your right to do something you feel beautiful in. If you are male and love to put on makeup, remember everyone wouldn’t say it is beautiful but you should be proud of being brave. Being who you are with the criticism and the thought of other people might not be the situation you wish to be. Experiencing your uniqueness out of the cage of society is a gift the universe gives you to be different from others. Those criticisms can be unpleasant but being true to yourself can be the most beautiful life experience of all time. 

“Acceptance is being able to feel beautiful in whatever you feel comfortable in. ” – Barbie Ferreira

Raise awareness 

After getting all of the criticism, you can know the feeling of being judged by other people from society. You understand all of those feelings for yourself and others. With all of the criticism involving in your life, you should be brave to help raise awareness for yourself, others and society. EndVowNow quoted, “Awareness-raising can be an important part of developing community support for changes in the informal justice sector”. By raising awareness, our people in this generation would have more freedom of being who they wish to be rather than a person that society sets for us.There are many campaigns or international days such as human rights, women’s right, pride day and more. Those messages such as campaign, events, conference as a community wouldn’t spread in one day. Change need times and participation from every human being. With effort and participation to raise awareness, our generation will be a place of freedom where we can be ourselves “regardless of our race, color, religion, sex, language, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status”. (United Nations)

“Awareness in our society has flipped all types of injustice on its head.” – Serj Tankian

Motivate yourself 

Caroline McHugh on The Art of Being Yourself Ted Talk quoted “What do you expect from life? And what life expects from you? ”. These two critical questions could be used to motivate yourself for not being what the society told you to be. It is the priority to think about what are the things you expect and what life expects from you. You can have a dream of becoming a dancer while your society says you should be a doctor. Don’t be afraid to stand up to follow the path you expect because life expects us to learn new things and never regret being who you are. Furthermore, you can also set a path for things you love to do without the need to get permission from our society stereotypes and criticism. People always make a mistake and from time to time you will learn from it. 

In Conclusion, never play a role as someone who society expected to be, show your uniqueness given from nature. Your talents, feeling, uniqueness are a part of you and it will always remain simply just by being yourself. Eventually, you’ll never be perfect to fit in everyone perspective but always remember that you live a life to please yourself not the society’s expectations.

These are the links that are inspiring for being yourself:

 

 

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Poetry Study | An art to reflect your soul

 

The word “Poetry“ has been used in English for more than 6 decades. It comes from the Greek word Poiētēs, meaning “to make”. Poetry is the genre created to express the emotion, feeling, loss and diversity of the human’s mind. There are different types and form of poetry in English literature. Furthermore, more than 50 types of the poem were created such as haiku, free verse, cinquains, epic, ballad, acrostic, sonnet, etc. They have a different structure, uniqueness, length, verse, rhythm and the core beauty of it. Poet prefers the poem by the rules or the styles of rhythm it has. 

“Poetry is the essence of language and language is the mirror of the soul” – Scott Griffin

Poetry is written at the small tip of a pen with emotion rushing through on the paper using letters. Good poetry can paint and illustrate the picture and emotion vividly. Moreover, it has the power to change people’s mind through the meaning of the words. Poetry is beyond definition hidden in imagination.  Continue reading “Poetry Study | An art to reflect your soul”

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Responsible for independent learning

 

“You can’t escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today”- Abraham Lincoln

As our life continues, we can’t deny all of the responsibility we have to take as a person. From days to days, we grow up to learn how to take care of and be responsible for our life. It’s best to be prepared for all of the responsibility as it continues to give us. One of the big responsibility we might take as we age is education. The beginning of school means responsibility is added to your life. You need to ensure you are managing your time for study, homework, social life and more. Learning is one of the top priority and you should complete all of the work given to you. Students are being told to do what the teacher gives. As the education system develop, independent learning is also a very crucial part that allows students to have responsibility, integrity, determination with all of the work they complete and the time that they used. 

The last round of English literacy is a very special round. I was allowed to have an independent learning experience. I can manage and arrange all of the work and ensure I am using my time wisely with responsibility and integrity. During the experience, independent learning helps me to learn in my own pace and improve the area I needed to improve the most. At the end of the round, I’ve read many articles, write an essay about how to be happy when you’re not what society expected, how I change Cambodia, poetry study. 

Apart from those accomplishments, I’ve also read a book called The princess dairy 1 written by Meggin Patricia Cabot. She is an American author of romantic and paranormal fiction for teens and adults. She has written and published over fifty books and is best known for The Princess Diaries, later made by Walt Disney Pictures into two feature films of the same name. It is talking about a girl named Mia Thermopolis. She was just living in her regular teen life. Even though she’s a quiet girl that only write most of her feeling in dairy given from her mother, she’s about to find out who she really. The day comes and her father tells her news that everyone is keeping a secret from her. She learns the astonishing news that she’s a real-life princess!. This book is very interesting as it was written as a diary with every little detail of her. Before reading this book I’ve read so many other books with different taste and It was great to read different types of book. 

 

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My Name in my perspective

 

To me, a name is one meaningful word or words given by our parent or relative to define us all as a person for every single day. When I woke up from my bed soft as a cloud, the first word I would hear before anyone starts the sentence it is always my name. When I shared my story or met new people in my life I’ve never forgotten to introduce my name first. For all these days after I was named in a young age, I would hear this sweetest word the most.

 

I hold dear for my precious name.

My name is Bopha which means flower in Khmer language. Tons of the type of flowers bloom and fade just as my mood or luck that changes. The smell and shade of color in each flower show me there is always potential in me but not everyone could see it. Even some people hurt me by cutting the root of flower but none of them can cut spring from coming to let me have the chance to shine again. Another meaning can be the metaphor of the word beautiful or good ladies.

Despite all of the deep meaning hidden inside, not everything about my first name is perfect. Most of the foreigner always pronounce my name wrong which made me kind of sad for telling people your name and they can forget it easily. Sometimes I laugh a little bit not to make myself too negative when they say it. With all of the effort to control my emotion, I am now getting used to it. One funny moment sometimes I felt like watching comedy is when I listen to Khmer song. Some of those songs contain my name represent beautiful lady that makes it seems like I am the main lady in the songs.

I love my name as the most adorable treasure I own. Unfortunately, I love my middle name more. “I did ask u when you were young and you choose Bopha over Morokot. I was afraid that you don’t like the name and I wait for you to grow but your name right now is just what you choose ” My mom would say whenever I said I kind of want to change my first name to my middle name instead. My middle name means a green gem which can bring light to all the darkness around it. It is rare and unique in its own way. The value and green light added the taste of delightful path for me. It shows me that before I can shine to be bright as that type of gem I needed to put thousand of effort and processes. My grandparent chose the name for me. My grandfather wanted my name to be “Bopha” while my grandmother wanted my name to be “Morokot”. My mother didn’t put it in my birth certificate until I was one and a half.

After I grew up and become teenage I think that I am very attached to my name. Even though, when I compare my middle name and my first name people usually say that my Morokot middle name is better but I would still prefer to be a flower that pushes through dirt to be a positive and delightful person. My heart, my personality, my life is already attached to my name for a long way with so many great memories I could remember. Now, I don’t want to change my name anymore but I would still prefer to have the long name with my gemstone middle name MOROKOT!.

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Environmental Justice| Research and Discussion

Environmental Justice as a given definition it means The fair treatment of people of all races, cultures, incomes and educational levels with respect to the development and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations and policies. It is a breathtaking lesson to learn and explore. We have research on how the lack of fairness of Environmental Justice affects our world as a whole. Our teacher (Hannah) has given us the opportunity to research about how the pollution has affected the minority group in one of the smallest states in the United State which Connecticut. We have made a video to educate people and learn more about it. After, the discussion I wrote a reflection about how pollution has affected my community. This is the reflection:

Since I was born, I lived in Kampong Cham province. It is one among other provinces that have Mekong river crossing. We have three big market that is very busy. If you cross the big nearby market, You would have the possibility of smelling the trash from the food. On the road, There isn’t a lot of trash as much as the trash in Phnom Penh city.

Sources in my community of pollution exist from the vehicles. Near the Kizuna bridge in my community is not badly affected. As the matter of fact, Cambodian usually use this bridge to cross to another province, the highway on the bridge and near the bridge is kinda busy. Due to my observation, I can see that the people who are affected by pollution live near the busy near the big markets or busy high. There used to be a lot of trash in the province due to the big celebration. The provincial chief has worked on it by collaborating with the students or other people to pick up trash in kampong cham city.

In general, To secure environmental justice in my community people should use less vehicle to reduce pollution. If they are traveling in the province they may use bikes instead. As a matter, bike or walking can reduce noise pollution and air pollution. It would also help saving space for the road from parking the vehicles.

Another research is about impacts and injustice or living near the filthy waste dump.

There were four countries to do research such as India, Philipines, Ethiopia, and Kenya. I choose Ethiopia to be the countries to write the paragraph and answer question to think openly about the impacts.

Ethiopia is part of the continent of Africa with a population of 105 million. Trash dumps are everywhere in the city and outside the city. Some are buried over 50 years ago.  the recent year 2017, A tall massive trash dump, has collapsed and killed at least 114 people. Some of them are still Buried under the ground and the new became a world tragedy.  It is so horrible and ridiculous for the people to be killed by trash.

  • Taken on March 12, 2017 shows a view of Addis Ababa from the main landfill on the outskirts of the city,

According to world economic forum news, 1,400 tons of trash is wasted every. A big waste management in Ethiopia is turning trash to cash. By burning it down into power. In the community, there will be a tank and when it fills the government will empty it out. The dumped of landfills has affected the nearby river,  create methane and greenhouse gases. A project is started by Alemayehu with Chinese ivy partner CNEEC join the revolution of turning waste to energy. This energy plant is designed to solve waste problems. According to CNN news, They are burning 1.4 million kilograms of waste each day that light up 30 percents of the household. There are also landfill communities with massive trash mountain. That is not manipulating really well. It causes death over the past years. Koshe dump mean “Dirty” it is the biggest trash dump that people live there.

 
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Etymology/ The history of English language

Etymology is the study of the history of language and where it is from. One the first round of literacy, We’ve been focusing on this splendid lesson with excitement. As an English Learner, we’ve been trying hard to know and understand more about this language. The English language is from Latin and Greek and most of them are created in Church. There were so many articles that we read such as day’s name, black death, dog, Exhibition of work. All of the articles are related to how Language change over time. One example for the exhibitions is that it is the collection of his work that has written and made a big impact on English. His accomplishments are play and more. Moreover, the purpose of this round lesson is learning new vocabulary and the root word. Our teacher would us a home packet that contains 10 vocabularies and some exercise with word on Monday every week.

There were also a lot of interesting articles I’ve read about in this round. I’ve read about the silence GIF that people can hear the sound. The GIF contains the movement of voltage electricity that jumps over a rope and the picture shake. The scientist discovers and finds out that many people heard the sound when they look in the gif. As I sometimes also hear the GIF I think that people heard the sound because when voltage electricity jump and touch the group it will shake. It creates the sound from the brain because people see things falling and has the sound in their daily life.

This is the link to the article: https://newsela.com/read/hear-silent-gifs/id/41656/