03.07 Free Choice Blog

  Gerald is three years old and his mother, Monique, is screaming at him to sit down in the shopping cart. Gerald doesn't want to sit because he has had an accident in his pants and it's very uncomfortable, but he sees that his mother is serious and does as she demands. Gerald doesn't know many things three-year-old boys know because he's never been allowed that knowledge. For example, he doesn't even know that the name of his hometown is Cincinnati. But he has a great deal of knowledge vital to his survival - things like he should never try to get his mother's attention if she is in bed, regardless of whether she's alone or has a man in bed with her. Gerald has also learned to hide behind the couch anytime Leroy has been to visit because he knows that Monique might go on a rampage.
     Gerald's weakness for wanted to play with fire he accidentally set the apartment on fire and his is taken to the hospital after a neighbor discovers him behind the couch. Child services arrest the mom and puts him with his aunt. when Gerald gets older he loses his sweet aunt from death, his mom gets custody of him, he gets a mean step-dad, and a sister. As time passes Gerald finds out secrets about his step-dad and his sister Angel and Gerald decides to fight back to protect his sister. He then experiences a obstacle of challenges that lead up to the final showdown with his step-dad Jordan sparks.
     Jordan C. from "FLVS Times" rates it  "Amazing" , "A non-stop reader", "Once you pick it up, you cant put it down". "I give it 5 stars out of 5,""A all time thriller." "truly a great story line." "A trill ride," "shocking," "a roller coaster of a story." I believe intent was to entertain with a story of a boy who experiences all these challenges and hardship that lead up to him standing up to a bully. Some organizational patterns i observed was; compare & contrast, cause and effect, chronological order, and spatial order.

02.07 Free Choice Blog

   The story I have chosen was the story Bud, Not Buddy. The story is about a boy who embarks on a journey to find his real father after his mother dies and he is put in an orphanage. When he was younger before his mom died she gave him a suitcase, plus she gave him a flyer revealing to him that the lead jazz player on the flyer was his father. While he is resting in the orphanage he continuous thinks about his mother and his father who he wants to meet desperately and decides to runaway. However, before he could plan to leave a family spots him and decide to adopt him foiling his plans to escape. While he is living with them his step- brother picks on him starting a fight with him and Bud fights back landing in trouble. He is then locked in the basement to stay till morning, but bud is determined to escape, so he hatches a escape plan to leave and get back at the family for locking him up to begin with. He escapes, gets his revenge at the brother and the family, and sets off to find his father. Along the way on his journey to find his father, he is faced with obstacles that he must overcome in order to eventually meet his real father.

   My personal reaction was admiration, because he had the picture of his father and self-determination in order to take on that challenge-filled journey. If I had to create notes in order to help me remember the most important parts of the story I would use outlines, because it allows you to make heading and subheadings and then create points for that heading sort of like bullets. Another reason why I would use outlines because they are the most common, yet effective note take style you can use when taking notes for a topic.