![]() ![]() These sections are essentially about the absolute miseries of teaching or the terrible poverty and horrible situations students are faced with. I began liking these sections just as much as the first but they are essentially about the same thing and it becomes repetitive and depressing. The next three sections were entitled challenges, engagement, and disillusionment. However the book went down hill after the first section. Honestly I was relieved to discover that I'm not the only person who has anxiety over whether or not they will be an effective teacher, and fear that they will run into a class or a situation that they wont be able to handle. It had journal entries from the pov of first year teachers and from teacher's that are just about to retire. The first section is entitled anticipation, and it describes teachers common fears about the first day of school. As I started the book I was absolutely enthralled by it. The book is a collection of different diary entries from teachers around the country who joined Gruwell's freedom writers journal program. I read the other Erin Gruwell book entitled Teaching Hope. I plan to do everything I can to make them feel worthy to be the best that they can be and that they can achieve anything they want to in life if they put the effort in and fight for it. I don't every want my students to feel that they are "unteachable". This book really makes you reflect on your own life and makes you think that something you think is the end of the world really isn't compared to what a lot of these students had to go though. I know that there are going to be challenges I will have to face in my classroom that I may not be familiar with and I hope that I can be as successful and helping my students. Reading these different stories really opened up my eyes. I never worries about the violence or losing a friend. Having gone to Catholic school, I feel like school was a little bubbled world: there were rarely fights, everyone wanted to be there, we all had the same mindset. A lot of the situations that the students and Erin faced, I cannot relate too. I have seen the movie but reading it just makes it that much better. I am loving this read! It is not what I expected. I loved seeing the change in theses student's attitudes and how much she did for them. But I hope to have students that will love to come to my class. Not many of us will be able to do that, or maybe none of us will. She made such a profound impact on her school in just her first year of teaching. I loved reading about how students were on a waiting list to get into her classroom. She was able to find a way to teach these students and the students enjoyed it. Two, it makes you want to be an extraordinary teacher like Erin Gruwell. I read about so many people in this book and learned a lot of some of these people in history. We all go through rough patches, and reading this book makes you realize, maybe my life isn't so terrible. ![]() This book is inspirational in two aspects. I was the first one in my family to accomplish that. I didn't have someone to look up to, my parents never went to college. I saw myself in some of these students because my parents were immigrants, my parents do not speak English. Teachers failed to acknowledge that in their students and that is why these students were labeled the "unteachables." No wonder why they didn't care about their studies, they had no one to look up to. I could not believe what these students went through in their lives. I can only hope that I will be as successful as she is one day in my career. Gruwell is the kind of teacher we should all strive to be. She worked her tail off to make sure Zlata would come visit, all because she didn't want to let her students down. She constantly gives her students hope, like when they wrote letters to Zlata. Gruwell got to know her students first, and although she struggled at times, she found a way to get through to them. You don't know what students you are going to get, and once you meet them you may find that the lessons you planned will never work with certain kids. This is why I think you can't create your entire curriculum before you step into the classroom. She has them read books that directly relate to their lives, which makes them more interested in the subjects they are learning. Gruwell has never had to experience and yet she does a great job of making her students feel like she cares. It is sad how many problems the kids face, like with drugs and alcohol and the deaths of their friends due to gang violence. Gruwell is given the "bad" kids and slowly but surely she turns them around and makes believers out of them.
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