Holland's English Blog

  Prompt Response:  I use the word "bro" a lot even though I don't think it's a good habit it helps me start off my sentences and also segway into new thoughts or phrases. In the context of a sentence, I think bro is a form of address or how to acknowledge something informally. I don't really remember when it became a part of my everyday life, but I've started to notice how much I use it and want to tone it back because I feel like it dumbs down my sentences. It has become apart of my everyday life because it helps me flow through my sentences better and while I would never talk to a teacher or my parents using bro, it creates an informal or casual conversation input with my friends.  Summary: Today in class we wrote down the definition of a set of vocabulary words and then answered lesson blanks with the word we thought best fit from a bank. Each lesson had a bank with a set of some of the new words we learned and we had to identify which word would be the co...

  Prompt Response:  In AP Lang, I think I'm doing well during the discussions on participating and having good claims and evidence but I think I need to work on putting it down on paper after because I find it much easier to answer verbally than typing or writing it down. I also need to improve on explaining my evidence in paragraphs because I feel like I'm still a little confused on that aspect.  Summary: Today in class we wrote our paragraph on Writeable about "good kills" and had to highlight each section for claim, evidence, and explanation and use a combination of our discussion points on Wednesday with outside knowledge to form a well thought out response to the prompt.  Reflection:  I think that I did well on making my claim and evidence but I had a bit of trouble writing out my explanation because I felt like I was just repeating what my evidence was saying and my brain felt foggy of what to write. I usually have this issue when I need to write out my an...

  Prompt Response:  One time I told my friend that I thought that the character Serena Van Der Woodson from Gossip Girl was the worst character in the show. When she asked why I thought that I explained that Serena was extremely selfish, manipulative, and always tried to make herself appear better than everyone else when she was just as toxic as the rest of her friends. Explaining each of these points with specific instances in the show helped me demonstrate to my friend why I believed she was the worst character and afterwards my friend also agreed with me.  Summary: Today in class we evaluated a passage and looked at the prompt "Is there ever such  thing as a 'good kill?'". While we didn't begin writing, we looked at the OJ Simpson case to see what explaining evidence looks like and why it is important to support your claim. We also had a class discussion on our stance for the prompt.  Reflection:  It was interesting to hear how different people had diffe...

  Prompt Response:  I like class discussions the most because it's helpful for me to get my thoughts organized when I say them verbally and I feel more confident in my answers when I'm saying them to a class then when I'm just staring at a paper. I also appreciate when we go over worksheets together because I get to hear other people's ideas and I feel like that can be added to my foundation of knowledge on the topics we're discussing. Summary: Today in class we looked at another FRQ from the 2013 exam about the relationship between ownership and different aspects of ourselves. We analyzed four different theories from three different philosophers and choose the theory we believed we could best support and argue. We then did the same organizer as yesterday by making five claims and putting them into the category we thought best fit and expanded on our evidence.  Reflection:  I think I'm getting more comfortable choosing a position in an argument and creating clai...

 Prompt: One thing I will never fully understand is how dreams can seem so vivid and real when we're sleeping but we are rarely able to remember them when we wake up. I think it's interesting but also a little scary that our brains can create an entirely alternate world just to discard it once the real one comes back into consciousness. Summary: Today in class we looked at an LEQ prompt from 2015 about the purpose or function of "polite language" through communities or cultures. We listed out five pieces of evidence to support the claim we individually created and then categorized three of those pieces of evidence into "observation", "experience", or "reading"and explained why we put it there. Reflection: I appreciated that we went over the prompt together because if that were to just have been thrown at me I'm not sure I would know how to tackle it off the bat. I feel like now that we've gone through the process and how to forma...

  Prompt Response:  This might not stand out heavily, but between me and my friends I feel like I spend the most time participating in a sport. I swim 90 minutes before school and then 3 hours after 5 days during the week and then another three on Saturday. While a lot of my friends are in sports, I haven't encountered someone that has as much of their day dedicated to it time-wise as me which shows up in conversations and I'm reminded that a lot of my life is taken up by swim.  Summary: Today in class we took a quiz on College board about identifying claims in passages and finished wish a writing portion asking us to identify the author's claim and provide evidence from the passage.  Reflection:  This quiz was a good introduction to what the AP Exam will look like and the types of questions we will encounter while taking it. I thought some of the questions were challenging because two answers were very similar and could both be the answer so I had to figure out...

  Prompt Response:  Living in Atlanta has influenced my perception of culture and identity because I believe that the city is extremely diverse and allows different people to express themselves freely. I believe this differs from other parts of Georgia because I live in an area and go to a school where different cultures and ethnicities to mine are very common so I am not surprised when I see a practice or tradition that I don't personally participate in. If I were speaking to someone unfamiliar with Atlanta I would want them to understand that Atlanta is somewhere you are able to express yourself more freely and have plenty of opportunities to associate yourself with a community who share similar interests to you. Summary: Today in class we looked at a speech by Mayor Bottoms about the violent protests happening in response to the murder of George Floyd. We also completed a packet analyzing the different rhetorical situations in her speech and identified certain words and phr...

  Prompt Response:  The most creative thing I have ever made was my extra credit one pager last year in APES because I got to draw several different environmental issues and solutions onto one page. I synthesized all of the topics into sections and it was probably the best drawing and coloring I've ever done so I was disappointed when she didn't hand it back to us because I was really impressed with my artist abilities.  Summary: Today in class we read a speech by President Trump about immigration and analyzed using SPACECAT the different parts of the speech such as audience, purpose, context, and where it showed ethos, pathos, and logos. Reflection:  It was interesting to read the speech and fully understand all the components that go into it. Sometimes when you're reading something you don't realize all the literary parts of it so it was cool to break it down together especially analyzing the targeted audience and different forms of ethos, pathos, and logos. 

  Prompt Response:  One time I felt lost was in AP Precalculus every day since the beginning of school. The teacher goes too fast and doesn't explain the information enough for me to understand and I feel behind and can't compute the work. It is definitely the most lost I've been in a class in highschool and I am in the process of getting tutoring because I don't like feeling behind or incorrect. Summary: Today in class we revisited types of claims such as claims of fact and claims of value. We went around brainstorming different claims of fact and ended the class off doing a worksheet about claims of values by picking a topic and creating a list of criteria going with the claim you made for that topic.  Reflection:  This worksheet was helpful because it cleared up any confusion I had about claims of fact because we learned that claims of fact don't actually have to be facts because those can't be argued, they just have to sound like facts. Additionally, the cla...

  Prompt Response:  One thing I believed in when I was younger was that on Christmas Santa climbed down my chimney and left presents. I would leave out milk and cookies for him and carrots for his reindeer, which looking back was suspicious because it's even less likely that the reindeer were climbing down the chimney as well to eat them. I asked for a jet back every year until my mom broke the news to me that he wasn't real and I was devastated. Summary: Today in class we learned what a claim was and defined three types of claims: claims of facts, claims of value, and claims of policy. We looked at a couple of examples for each and determined whether they fit the qualities of that claim type.  Reflection:  I liked the examples we discussed to determine different claims such as if Lakeside was in Atlanta or if Taylor Swift was the most successful female artist of the time because they were real-world examples I'm able to apply to things in my life since I go to Lakes...

  Prompt Response:  One time I tried to persuade someone to change their mind is when I wanted to do a 5 am workout class before school in Buckhead and my parents were against it because they felt it was dangerous to be out in the city at that time of day. I convinced them to let me go using the logic aspect of logos by explaining that I would be parked right next to the entrance of the building and only have to walk a few steps to get in. I also said that I agreed to not deal with parking and just let them pay a possible parking ticket so I wouldn't have to stand outside and deal with the meter. These precautions stemmed in logical reasoning made my parents feel better about me going to Buckhead very early and I got a great workout out of it! Summary: Today we analyzed different ads and identified if it was primarily ethos, pathos, or logos. We continued with a class discussion about different situations that would be categorized as each of these things. Reflection:  Thi...

  Prompt Response:  One argument that I've had recently was with my dad about homecoming because I have a swim meet the same day in Alabama and he wanted me to skip homecoming and stay there for that night. I was very upset about this because I only have two more homecomings left and it's one of my favorite times of year. I asked him why he hadn't told me earlier because he had known for a while and only now told me. This placement of blame upset him and he was beginning to close off to the idea of homecoming at all. Luckily we worked together to figure out a plan that I could do both but if I could do it again instead of immediately asking why he had withheld this information for so long I would immediately ask him if there were ways we could brainstorm together on how to get the best of both worlds. This relates to Chapter 3 of the textbook about tenses and how you present your goal, if I had not placed blame and go into the past tense we could've avoided a fight and ...

Prompt Response :  As I grow older, specifically in the next year when I turn 18, I think a topic I will find myself debating with myself as well as my family is politics. I understand that when I become an adult I have the right and responsibility to vote and that is very important to me. However, my family is extremely divided politically with my family leaning to the left and my mom's sister's family leaning far right. Sometimes I find myself in the middle of their arguments about elections or current events and feel the pressure to conform to one side of the other. However, as I mature through life I want to make it my goal to try to make the choices I think are right and not let my family control or dictate my political voice.  Summary: Today we discussed what defines an argument and that anything can become an argument given you state your claim and provide evidence. We covered rhetoric and the rhetorical triangle as well as how it connects to ethos, pathos, and logos. A...

 Three goals that I would like to achieve this year is scoring at least a four on the AP exam, completing the course with an A, and broadening my vocabulary and literary skills in preparation for the SAT. Many of the colleges I am interested in attending require at least a 4 on the exam to receive credit so that is a very important goal for me going into my final two years of high school. In relation to that, I believe that finishing the year with an A will reflect my work and hopefully prepare me for the exam. Finally, as I prepare for the SAT I feel like AP Lang will help greatly on the grammar and English section of the exam and better my score.