Barrel Racer Poem

I Am A Barrel Racer

By: Erin Boyce

I AM a barrel racer

I am dedicated to the sport 

I am the gear shifter from barrel to barrel 

I am the steering wheel as we dig around the barrels 

I am the fan that cheers on other riders 

I am the muscular quarter horse that loves its job

I am the truck and trailer that hauls the team all summer

I am the dirt that is is dug up as the horses tear around the can 

I am the horn that is gripped tightly as we spin around the barrel

I am the ribbon that hangs from my saddle

I am the brave rider 

I am the crowd that cheers everyone on 

I AM a barrel racer 

Short Story Analysis Questions & Answers

1. Is there more than one theme in the story? If so, what is it? 

In the story "Young Man's Folly" by Susan Michalicka, I think there is more that one theme. I think the main theme is about the affect a separation of a family has on the children and other family members. It seemed as though the separation of this family was very hard on the young boy. In the story the boy is always wearing his father's old clothes, and smelling the sent of his missed father. Also, when the son proposed the idea of living with his father, he got shut down by his father's selfish excuse being that he has started a new life with a new person who is having such a great time with, and then also added that they are going to travel to California for a while. The boy was very heartbroken by this response. The mother had then made a quilt out of his fathers old shirts for her sad and disappointed son, as it could be something he could remember him by. Although I believe this is the main message that has come from the story, I think another message was also portrayed during the story. I think that message was that we should always respect and care for people regardless of there appearance or weight. Throughout the story the husband of the women continuously made rude comments towards his wife. He would say that she wasn't looking very pretty, and start to look really old.  Also that she was gaining a lot of weight and was acting really lazy. The wife also went to a lot of work by re-decorating the house, and all the husband did was complain about everything she had re-done and said that he had hated it. These comments that he made towards this women's appearance, weight and hard work were not caring, disrespectful and rude. Saying things like this to someone can highly effect their self esteem about themselves and their body image. This is what I think the other theme is in the story.

2. Is the story realistic? Why or why not? Can you relate to the story? 

Personally I believe that the story "Young Man's Folly" does have a realistic story line. I think this because what happens is the story happens to many families in the world all the time. In the story the father of a family leaves the mother and son. This is a realistic part of the story because this happens to many families. He left the family because the mother was not living up to the father expectations of her personal appearance and her actions. He felt as though the mother was becoming old looking and lazy. He was not happy that she was gaining weight and also made rude comments on how she was redoing the house. This story is also realistic because many man do suddenly leave their families, and not try bother with their kids or try to take care of them. In the story the father of the young boy does not want to stay connected with his son, or care for him at all. The boy feels unwanted from his father, and this is defiantly the case for many children in the word. I personally cannot relate to this storyline, but I know that there are many families in this world that experience the same thing as this family does. So many families have a parent leave their family and children's lives and begin a new life with new people and new surroundings. Also, almost ever divorced person has a new relationship with someone else, and creates a new life with new people. Although I cannot relate to this story line, I can feel as though the children are crushed by the fact that their mom and dad aren't going to be together anymore, and even more upset when a parent completely abandons their child for a new life and a new person. This is why I believe this story is very much realistic.  

3. What is the theme of this story? Have you ever read a story that has had a similar theme? How do the themes relate to each other? 

The theme of the story "Young Man's Folly" by Susan Michalicka is about the affect a separation of a family has on the children and on other family members. In the story, the separation of the parents seemed to be have a huge affect on the young boy of the family. He was always depressed, upset, and never acted like his old self after his parents had split up. The boy was also more hurt when he met with his father one day to ask if he could live with, but was told that he is living a happy life with his new girlfriend and that they were going to be travelling to California for a while, and that he wasn't going to be able to live with him. Hearing this from his father was very saddening and only made his depressed and sad life much more worse. Not only did this separation have an affect on the boy, but also affected the mother. She was upset when her beloved husband started to make rude comments toward and then surprisingly left their family. She was left to look after their boy and be responsible for him all on her own, with no help or assistance. She also got to watch her ex-husband live his life in freedom, with no child to care for, no job, and getting to travel to California. She knew she would never be able to live like her ex-husband was. I have read a similar story where the theme was the affect that parental fighting has on the children or other family members. In that story, the parents of a young girl were continuously fighting. They were yelling at each other all the time and it made the young girl scared, sad, insecure, and lonely. These feelings portrayed by the children caused by their parents behaviour were both the same in each story. In each story the parents actions towards each other made both children behave differently. They become shy, and depressed, and never acted like normal kids. Having their behaviour like this can really affect them for the rest of their life. it could cause problems in their own future relationships after having to experience their parents unstable relationship, could affect getting a job by having a shy and depressed like personality, and can defiantly interfere with their education and school work because they are not focused on school with the depression of their parents and can sometimes feel as though there is not much point to continuing with their education. This is the theme of the story "Young Man's Folly" and how a similar story's theme can relate to this one. 

Teacher Evaluation Paragraph

            In class, today, on Febuary 22nd, Mr. Lobb showed actions toward a student, making him a TERRIBLE teacher. In class he was picking on poor Laine Fincher. Mr. Lobb walked right up to Laine Fincher, who he has only known and taught for 20 minutes, and kicked her chair with force. She jumped in terror and let out a slight scream. After kicking her chair, he stood there, and boldly yelled, called her mean names and hurt her feelings. Calling her mean rude names and kicking her chair made her feel sad and really affected her self esteem. Doing this shows that Mr. Lobb is a terrible teacher because affecting Laine's self esteem could cause problems for the rest of her life, with making friends, getting a job, and doing well at school work. For example, at school she wouldn't be able to learn to her fullest ability because she would always be scared to ask questions or come in for any extra help, this could affect her marks and could change the way her life may end up in future years. These actions of cruelty and meanness could stop Laine from learning to the fullest and to the best of her ability. Kicking her chair was rude and really scared Laine. Having a student be scared in their learning environment can cause many problems. For example, if Laine is always scared, focusing and understanding will be very hard to do in the classroom. These are the reasons why Mr. Lobb is an awful teacher! 

I would like a level 4. 

Memoir

Walking into that big huge building and having to say goodbye to my parents. Seeing my smiling teacher in the colourful classroom and meeting new kids that were the same age as me. Learning how to sing O'Canada, reading stories, playing with the new toys and getting to play on the big yellow slide that was outside at recess. Learning how to write our names, getting to colour and sing songs. Lunch time, quiet time and clean-up time. "hand on your hip, finger on your lip". I remember kindergarten like it just happened yesterday. It was the starting moment to all our lives. Kindergarten.

Short Story Assignment

The short story I read was called "The Dark Brown Dog" by Stephen Crane. The story was about a young boy and a small brown dog. In the story the dog stumbles upon the boy as he is out in his neighbourhood, the dog was friendly and the boy began to pet the dog. Unexpectedly, the young boy hit the dog on the head for no reason. Later in the story the same aggressive action took place toward the dog when the boy lashed out at the dog to make him walk, when he dragged the dog up the stairs and when the father was throwing objects at the small dog. The story ending was horrific when the father of the young boy swung the dog around his head and then dropped him out of a window of a five story tenement building. The ending was not very shocking, although still very sad. I chose this story because the title and the introduction sentence caught my attention. The topic of the story was about a dog, and considering that I am animal crazy, I knew it was something I would enjoy to read. In the story I believe the protagonist is the dog. The story line is about a dog being abused, therefore I believe the protagonist is the dog. In the story the dog is described as being a small dog, around the age of 4-5 months old. From the description in the story it seems as though the dog is a stray and does not belong to anyone. I also believe that there is an antagonist in the story. An antagonist is a character that creates problem, therefore I think the young boy is the antagonist because he is creating the problem of abusing the dog in the story. The boy is young, stressed, and abusive. I believe that stress, aggression issues, and boredom motivated the young boy to act the way he did in the story. The conflict in this story is how aggressive the father and the young boy are towards the small brown dog. In the story, the boy realizes that abusing the dog is wrong and he began to stop hurting the dog, but the father showed very abusive actions toward the dog throughout the whole story. The aggressive issue between both characters was resolved in the young boy, but not in the father. The story takes place in a city setting and the young boy lives in a tenement building. I believe that setting plays an important role in the story ending, because in the end the dog is thrown out of a five story tenement building. The setting of the story helped to describe more about where the dog and the boy live and how the lower class living conditions could have played a role on how both characters act in the story. For example, the dog seems to be a stray in the run down city neighbourhood and acts as if he is looking for love and attention from the boy even though the boy was mean to the dog in the beginning. The mood of the story is depressing, when the boy and father abuse the dog I get a depressing feeling. The theme of the story is about domestic violence. In the story it seems as though the young boy was abused at some point, and now the young boy shows abusive actions toward the dog. The story is saying that when abuse begins in a family, other members of the family begin to learn abuse and start to show the same actions. The cycle of abuse continues, much like it is in this story. This is the story "The Dark Brown Dog" by Stephen Crane. 

Video Paragraph

     For a small assignment in my english class, we were supposed to take a good quality tour video of GDCI using the iPads. The video that I took of a tour of GDCI was very poorly done. In the video, I noticed that it was blurry at times, there was a lot of movement in the video, it was very choppy and shaky from walking around, and there was a lot of background noise. Also, the video was not entertaining and was very boring to watch. The start of the video was not intreging and would not hook any viewers to continue to watch it. During the video it made the tour of the school confusing and did not show some of the important areas of the school like the cafeteria, gym, and the cc lab. If I were to redo this video I would hold the iPad very still and not rotate the iPad from landscape to portrait. This would improve the shakiness and choppiness of the video. Another element that I would add into the video is entertainment. I would like to make the video more intriguing and entertaining to watch. Lastly, I would make sure that I included all the important areas of the school in the video. This is what the flaws were in my video, and some things that I would improve on in any future videos I had to make using the iPads. 

Example piece of my video 

In this video you can tell there is a lot of shakiness, choppiness and background noise. 

All About Me

My name is Erin Marie Boyce. I am 15 years old and I was born on January 4th in 1998. I am a grade 9 student at GDCI and in school my favourite subjects are math and gym. For me, high school has gone over really well and I really like it. The classes I have taken so far are french, math, science and the tech rotation. I really enjoyed the tech rotation and it was fun to experience new classes that I have never got to take before. Out of design, wood shop and auto, my favourite class was wood shop because I learned a lot of new and useful skills. 

Outside of school I am involved in a few sports and hobbies! I am a player on the Goderich ringette team and I have my own horse, which I compete on at western gaming horse shows. I also love to snowmobile now that I have have my snowmobile license. I have been playing ringette for 7 years now and I have had the best experiences from playing ringette and being with my team. I've made so many new friends from playing ringette and its been a blast getting to know them from playing ringette. Since my favourite number is 4, of course my jersey number is 4. My number has been 4 every since I started playing. Im hoping to continue playing ringette for as long as I can, and i'm hoping to tryout for an A ringette team next year. This is one of my favourite things to do outside of school.

Another one of my hobbies is horseback riding. I've been interested in horses for my whole life, and when I was 10 years old, I was surprised with a horse. Her name is Sonya and she is an 8 year old quarter horse. I started riding when I was 6 years old and I took private lessons for about 4 years. Today, I still have Sonya and I love riding just as much as I did when I was younger. Now I compete in local horse shows in the western gaming events, like barrel racing, pole bending, keyhole, down and back, and flag. I have been competing for 2 years now and Sonja and I have improved hugely. At the shows I have also made a lot of friends, and it also just so happens that my bestfriend, Courtney Gardiner, has her own horse aswell and we ride and show together 24/7/. In the winters I ride at the community rides at the REACH centre in Clinton to keep my horse in shape throughout the hole year. Horseback riding is my life, I live and breathe horseback riding and I will continue to ride and compete in horse shows for as long as I can.

                                                              Sonya's 3rd barrel race

Photo shoot-Sonya & I

Pole bending at Zurich horse show. 3rd place.

I also have a bit of an obsession... I'm just a little bit obsessed with Justin Bieber! He is my favourite artist and I love everything about him. I have been to two of his concerts, one in 2012 and one in 2012. They were both amazing. I have pretty much been obsessed with Justin ever since he was found. Some of my favourite songs by him are as long as you love me, beauty and a beat and all around the world.