Tuesday, January 26, 2016

Journal 3 from Matthew Glenn

Part One:

My overall reading has been going great so far.  When actively reading I highlight sentences of a chapter that I like the best and I jot down characters, places, and important events in the margin, so when I skim through the chapter it gives a good refresher. When I actively read I make sure I have plenty of time with no distractions and do it all at once. To me a strength both The House On Mango Street and A Long Way Gone have is the use of details. I feel both stories are showing you instead of telling and give great mental pictures as I am reading. For me, a weakness in The House On Mango Street is that the book isn't one story, but instead each chapter is its own story. However, the way Sandra Cisneros gives the book a comedic feel and includes so much detail, outweighs not having a main story. Personally, A Long Way Gone is a better read for me, but I definitely understand why some people may not like it as much and would consider the graphic details a weakness.

Part Two:

The chapter I have chosen is chapter six. The title I thought best suits this chapter is "Vigilance Fades With Passing Of Time".

Bypassing villages due to rumors about groups of boys, people had attempted to harm Ishmael's group. Eventually, the group was captured, then set free after the chief of the village learned the boys did not mean harm. The boys hear from a passing woman in the village that Gibrilla has family in a village thirty miles away. The group of boys go to Kamator. The boys work for in the village for food and shelter. After a while people began to wonder if the rebels would even come. Four months had passed and they finally arrived. During the chaos Ishmael had been separated from his brother and friends. That was the last time he saw his brother again.

A vocabulary word I think is important is vigilance. The definition of vigilance is the action or state of keeping carful watch for possible danger or difficulties.

I would say a challenge in this chapter that affected relationships between people would be that the village at first anticipated the rebels were coming, but after a while the anticipation disappeared. This became clear on page 40, the last sentence in paragraph three says "But we lost our vigilance to the gradual passing of time.". The people of the village lost expectation that the rebels were no longer coming and moved their focus on producing food. The fate of their actions lead to a surprise attack from the rebels and consequently a loss of their village.

3 comments:

  1. I like your nutshell of the chapter. It's brief, but gets the message through as to the events going on.

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  3. When I go to do my active reading I also do it all at once and make sure I have no distractions. I agree that the books are showing us what is going on instead of just telling us. I really like the title you came up with for chapter six. I think it perfectly describes this chapter. I like your choice of the word, vigilance. They did lose vigilance after a good while of peace. I guess during war times at short times of peace it raises ones hope and causes them to relax and loose focus on being vigilant.

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