How my character has changed: Divergent

Right now, in my book, it is visitation day. Visitation day is a time where family can go visit the loved one(s) who had recently chosen a faction to live in. Once Tris had chosen to go to Dauntless and away from her family, I thought that none of her family was going to come visit. As Roth went on to explain Tris's parents emotions, it sounded as if her mother might come and visit. In fact, she did! She was the only person in Tris's family to come and see her. Tris and her mother had a lot of talking to do now that Tris was in Dauntless. Many unexpected things were said! My mind was blown! To find out what was talked about you will have to read the book! Shortly after her mom left, she went to go find Al who hadn't talked to his parents yet. Al told her that he was very embarrassed about his performance so far and didn't want his parents to know. Tris gave him a lot of support and comfort but Al started to take it the wrong way and almost kissed her! Now Tris isn't sure how she feels about him!

Tris is a dynamic character! It seems like some part is changing in her in every chapter. At the very beginning she was a very quiet and shy girl who didn't seem to fit into Abnegation like the rest of her family. Then the most frightening day came, the day of her test. When she finished her test, she was very anxious to see what faction she would be in. Test Results: Inconclusive. Divergent. As those words went through her mind, she became even more scared than before she took the test. Being Divergent was considered dangerous to a lot of the factions. So people who were divergent were considered factionless. Tris had a very important decision to make, which faction would she choose? She had to be fully committed to that faction because if anyone found out that she was divergent or had any suspicions, she would be in trouble. Tris ended up choosing Dauntless. Now she is a loud and very strong woman. She is more aggressive than before she stepped foot into Dauntless initiation. I mean she was the first initiate to jump off a high building! She completely lost her first fight and now she is taking people down in less than 3 minutes. She has become almost a completely different person from the first part of the book.

Divergent Thematic Prompts

I believe that the author wrote this novel because something like this could easily happen to us. When you look at a school, you can already see all of the different groups or factions. There are the populars, nerds, jocks, skaters, etc. Most people would just stay inside there "groups" but then there are the ones that don't really care about groups and like to hang out with everyone. Those people would be considered Divergent. In both our world and in the book people tend to call those people weird and/or sometimes feel threatened by them because they are "different". I think the author is telling us about reality in a way that people would find interesting, while realizing how similar our world is to this book. Another reason that the author wrote this novel could be that he wants us to realize how choices can effect us, sometimes good and sometimes bad. That also connects to real life because we make decisions all the time, even if we don't notice it.

The best thing about Divergent

The best thing about Divergent is that you never know what will happen next. You always want to read more. For example during the beginning of the book, Beatrice was taking the test and her results came out inconclusive, which means she is Divergent and doesn't have a certain faction to be put into. People who are Divergent are usually taken away or killed because they are different than everyone else. So now she must act like she is Dauntless and only Dauntless. She has to show no signs of any other factions. So far, I don't think that any of Divergent is bad. I think that this book, is easily one of my favorites and I am not even that far yet!

Why did I choose Divergent?

I started reading Divergent by Veronica Roth towards the end of last trimester. I didn't get very far in it because of exams and all of the studying that we had to do so I am very excited to finish it this trimester. I did read other blogs like Ms. Cohen's which helped persuade me to read it. Also a lot of my friends had said how great the books were. Some people even compared it to the Hunger Games, which I loved. Even though I am not very far in the book, a lot has happened. Veronica Roth really pulls you into the book by putting a conflict at the very beginning. It starts the book off with a "bang". I think that it would be very hard to have to choose a faction like Beatrice has to do. I would be afraid to hurt my family but I wouldn't want to choose something that would make my life miserable. Beatrice chooses to live her life the way she wants to and so far it is working out very well for her and I am excited to see how she grows as a character.

Fahrenheit 451

Fahrenheit 451 is about a government where they censor everything you read. If someone finds out that you own books or you have been hiding them then the Fireman will come and burn all of your books. If you fight them and don't want to give up your books then you may be burned. For example on page 37 it states, "The woman on the porch reached out with contempt to  them all, and struck the kitchen match against the railing." In this case the woman burnt herself the fireman didn't burn her but if anyone didn't want to leave their books then they could be burned or even put in jail. I do have a couple of predictions about events that are going to happen in the book. One prediction is that Clarisse was hit by a car. There was some foreshadowing on page 6 that said, " 'I sometimes think drivers don't know what grass is, or flowers, because they never see them slowly,' she said. ' If you showed a driver a green blur, Oh yes! he'd say, that's grass! A pink blur? That's a rose garden! White blurs are houses. Brown blurs are cows. My uncle drove slowly on a highway once. He drove forty miles an hour and they jailed him for two days. Isn't that funny, and sad, too?' " Then on page 44, Mildred says, " 'No. The same girl. McClellan. McCellan. Run over by a car. Four days ago. I'm not sure. But I think she is dead. The family moved out anyway. I don't know. But I think she's dead.' " Along with those predictions, I do have a few questions. Did she actually get run over by a car or was she taken away because she "knew too much"? Will Montag get caught with all of his books? If so, who will turn him in? What do you all think?

Blog Reflection

Click hereto view my best blog post.

The post I chose as my best post was the character post. In the rubric it says, "The student analyzes in detail how complex characters develop over the course of a text, interact with other characters, and advance the plot or develop the theme." I believe that I did all of those things and I even added quotes to support my findings. As for the first task, explaining how complex characters develop over the course of a text, I explained that in the beginning of the novel she was Abnegation and had to make a huge choice in her life to leave her family and become Dauntless. That choice made her even more brave and it made her want to try new things. The next task was to show how characters interact with other characters. I said, "In this book people only really interact with the people in their faction. Unless your family is in another faction, then you can visit them on the visiting day. Most families don't go to visit the member of their family who switched factions because they feel that they were betrayed." I showed that people only talk to the people "of their kind", even their own family members wouldn't talk to them if they switched factions. Finally, the last task was to show how the character advances the plot or develops the theme. I stated, "Her action ties into the theme, 'sometimes you make choices and sometimes choices make you', because this choice will change her life forever. She will have to move away and act according to her faction." That shows how her action to switch factions will effect her whole life and it also shows the theme of this novel. 

Over all I thoroughly enjoyed English 1A. I am more of a science and math person but this trimester got me into English as well. As for goals for the next trimesters reading, I would like to read more books and continue to blog because that helps me process the book. As for writing, I would like to continue to work on my grammar and I would like to write more creative writing pieces. Areas for improvement in reading are reading more books and choosing a little more challenging books. I love anything that makes you think. Areas for improvement in writing is definitely grammar.

New update on the Mysterious Dog Disease

In my blog before, the scientists had no idea what this disease was and only a few dogs had died from it. Now they know some symptoms and sadly a lot more dogs have died! Scientists have found out that the symptoms are very similar to those of the flu! Also dogs are having trouble barking. All they can do is cry. They won't eat and they have a lot of abdominal pain. They are also saying that the dogs are getting sick from their owners. A lot of the dogs that got the disease had a sick owner! This is very scary! I mean they still don't have that much information about it and they aren't completely sure of the way that the disease is transmitted! But be careful and don't take your dog to dog parks and if you are sick try not to give it to your dog!