I guess I never thought about it!

Before a couple days ago I never exactly thought about the creationism vs. evolution controversy. I had heard about it but I had never stopped and thought about my views or the facts behind either theory. After listening to the presentation about whether or not both creationism and evolution should be taught in schools I realized that both theories have fact behind them and should be taught in public schools.

During 7Th grade when I first learned about evolution in my school, I just figured that that was true and that is what I should believe and that is not the case. Students should not just believe something that they are taught when there is another good theory out there with fact behinds it like creationism has behind it. Before watching this presentation I didn't realize that creationism had facts behind it. And his fact alone changes my thinking about this topic.

After this presentation I feel confident in that both creationism and evolution should be taught in schools because they both have fact behind them and students should decide which theory they believe and makes sense to them.

How a High School Student Changed my Outlook on Cell Phones

The article that I looked at is Cell Phone Rules Actually Make Sense by Shannon Turner. The article is about a student who attends a high school that has a complete ban on cell phones meaning they aren't aloud to use cell phone at all during the day and her view on the rules in her school. She has very interesting views, she unlike most students supports her schools rules. This to me is very interesting because it is so unlike the ordinary student. She says that "However, the more I thought about it the more I realized how sad and pathetic it is that teenagers can’t go six hours, five days a week without being on their cell phones, and maybe the rule was put in place for a reason." What she said didn't completely change my thinking but it did open up a new view for me. Before I read this I didn't really see why there would be a full cell phone ban. But now I can see maybe where the schools are coming from. Teenagers should be able to go six hours a day five days a week without constant contact with their friends. So this article did not completely change my outlook on my topic but it did give me a new perspective on cell phone bans in schools.

When can you make big decisions on your own?

The book I am reading is My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Piouclt. This book is about a girl named Anna(13) who has a sister named Kate. Kate has had cancer since she was little (she is now 16) and without Anna's kidney is going to die. But Anna has been keeping her sister alive since she was born. And Anna doesn't want to give her sister her kidney because she is sick of helping her sister. The book is about this family's struggle with Kate and Anna.

This book reminds me of a discussion that we were having in class about when you are old enough to make big decisions like Anna's to get medically emancipated even if it meant killing her sister. I think that a regular 13 year old is too young to make their own decisions. But Anna is more mature than a normal 13 year old because her sister has cancer and she has had to deal with that her entire life which had made her more mature.

I think that their is no set age for someone to start making their own decisions. I think that it depends on your maturity level. So for some people that age could be 13 and for others it could be 20. It depends on the person and what they have had to deal with in their life.

A Conflict in Athem by ayn Rand

In Ayn Rand's Anthem the main conflict is not knowing who you are. In the novel Equality 7-2521 has to deal with his problem about not really knowing what to think about himself. He doesn't know if he is nice or mean person. He only knows what he is suppose to be like and how he is suppose to act. In the beginning of the book when Equality 7-2521 is describing his world " We strive to be like all brother men, for all men must be alike." this proves that in his world if you are different you are punished and forced to change. In a dystopia like this no one has their own identify, they all share one. No one knows who they are and that is a big problem with this type of world.

This problem of not knowing who you are is a Man vs. Man conflict because when you are struggling to find out who you are, you are struggling against yourself. Other people can't find out who you are for you, you have to find out for yourself.

Skype is Changing the World!

The article that I read was called Neither rain nor snow nor... tonsils and it was written by Karl Fisch from his blog called The Fisch Bowl . This article was about how a teacher at Arapahoe High School who was staying home with her sick daughter and was communicating with her students using Skype.

This article made me think about how I could be using Skype to communicate with my family around the country. This all started a little more than a month ago when I had my family in town. We all decided that we didn't talk enough and that we should start our own blog so that we could keep in touch easier. But reading this article made me think that if a teacher could talk to her students when she is at home than why couldn't my family and I use Skype to keep in touch with each other. That way we could have even more time to talk to each other.

Skype has really started to change the way everyone has communicated with each other. A few years ago there was really no way to have a "face to face" chat with someone you wanted to talk to. But now with all the new technology there is people can have a" face to face" chat with anyone. So this article really made me think of all the new ways people are communicating that didn't exist a couple of years ago.

To what extent do actions change intentions?

Are actions have a big affect on what we intend to do. If we have negative feelings of someone or we use negative actions on them than our intentions towards them will probably also be very bad and negative. For instance in Edgar Allen Poe's "The Cast of Amontillado" Montresor wants revenge on Fortunato so he locks him up to die in the catacombs underground because of something unknown that Fortunato did to Montresor. If Fortunato didn't act in the way he did maybe he wouldn't be dead in the catacombs because of Montresor. Because Fortunato acted that way it somehow offended Montresor in a negative way. So Montresor's intentions we also negative towards Fortunato. So I think that actions have a very big part of what we intend to do. No matter what the situation our actions mean a lot.