Resilience in the Book Speak Essay

This novel “is a book that truly speaks to adolescents in contemporary language and with teenage characters about adolescent sexuality” (Kaplan 27). Katherine is learning about her sexuality in the novel.

Just before school ended, she started communicating with her lab partner and friend, David Petrakis. She also met Ivy, a kind girl in her art class. As Melinda finally met people that she felt comfortable and happy around, she gained confidence. Her teachers and parents were pleased to discover that this also improved Melinda’s attendance and grades. Melinda finally opened her mind enough to think through the events of the party. She had blamed herself the whole time, just like the rest of the school. As Andy pointed out, Melinda never explicitly told him, “ no” during her rape. She thought it was wimpy that she called the cops. She let her friends and peers convince her that she was an idiot and a wimp. Melinda eventually allowed herself to figure out that she was a victim. She never gave permission to Andy, and she was right to call the police because she was in pain and in danger. Once Melinda opened up and let herself and others in, she was able to defend herself. Melinda proved her confidence and power when she told Andy, “No!” when he tried to attack her in her closet. With Melinda’s new found confidence, she was able to drastically improve her life and save herself from her

In “ Zach’s Lie” by Roland Smith, the characters responsible and worrisome qualities contribute to the speaker’s message that is, resilience is a positive factor for success in life. For example, Zach is having difficulties with making friends in his new school, and he has lost hope, as the text states, “pitiful! my classmates call me a tall snob,” (page 84-85) which shows his worrisome trait. Furthermore, Zach is captured by his greatest fear, and Sam is counting on him to get them out of this situation, according to the text, “giving him time to spring the trap...” (page 205) shows Zach’s responsible trait in which he succeeded.

In the article, “How Kids Learn Resilience,” author Paul Tough introduces a staggering new statistic that 51 percent of public-school students in the United States fall below the federal government’s low-income cutoff (Tough, 2016). This shocking statistic to get our attention and address an even bigger problem involving the challenges of teaching low-income children. Before writing this article, Paul Tough wrote a book called, How Children Succeed. This book was written in 2012 and explored the benefits of teaching children non-cognitive skills. He talks about the success of his book and how schools across the country have been embracing the notion that educators should be teaching grit and self-control. However, while educators agree with

Imagine having everything taken away from you, your food, your rights, your family, and your life. That is what happened to Louie Zamperini and other other POWs at japanese prison camps. Louis Zamperini grew up in Torrance being a bad kid that everyone in his town disliked. Later in his life in high school he took on running, being trained by his brother pete. This turned his life around and everyone loved him. He started breaking records and adventally he went to the olympics. He was drafted into the air corp and was a bomber. He got stranded in the ocean and later was taken captive by the japanese, who tortured him. During his life Louie never gave up, he was unbroken. Even through the hardest things he had resiliency and showed redemption.

She does not understand why the older and well-known authors are not being read in high school. Prose uses a personal experience from her son’s sophomore English class. He had to read a “weeper and former bestseller by Judith Guest” (424), about a dysfunctional family dealing with a teenage son’s suicide attempt. “No instructor has ever asked my sons to read Alice Munro, who writes so lucidly and beautifully about the hypersensitivity that makes adolescence a hell,”(424). She again mentions books she approves of that should be read in English classes.

First, what many teens go through, many adults seem to overlook their problems due to the fact that they’re younger and “haven’t experienced much”. When in reality, what they are going through is just as difficult to face as their own. In the novel “Speak”, Mr. Freeman, Melinda’s art teacher

From humanity comes friendship, but friendship may not be as one-dimensional and simplistic as the common person believes it to be- it may not stop at the surface level. In David Whyte’s book, Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words, he writes on friendship, exposing the true facets of an authentic friendship that oftentimes are overlooked by many people. In Whyte’s opinion, friendship is an eternal experience, or at least an experience in which people take part over an extended period of time. The need for continuous support and forgiveness from and for both parties in a friendship presupposes this prolonged temporality. Naturally, as friendships take constant conscious effort, they require interest

Psychologists usually agree that the teenage years are among the most difficult periods in one’s life. Most teens are trying to figure out who they are, what they believe, and how they fit into the world around them. Beginning in the late 1970’s, a whole genre of fiction, referred to as coming-of-age literature, emerged and serves, at least for many teens, as believable presentations of young people learning to navigate the difficulties of their lives, often fraught with feelings of rejection, seemingly unresolvable personal turmoil, social problems, school and family issues, etc. Indeed one value of reading is to see and better understand some aspect of ourselves through studying others. The reading of SPEAK, a somewhat controversial book

Speak, The Art of Resilience, and The Third and Final Continent were all passages that shared a central theme of overcoming adversity; however, each text developed the theme differently than the rest. First off, Speak, written by Laurie Halse Anderson, explained the importance of growing after facing a difficult trial through diction. Melinda Sordino, the main character, was raped at a party; thus, she chose to converse with others as little as possible, since she felt guilty. As time passed, she overcame this challenge saying that she was, “not going to let it kill me” (Anderson 198). Time had allowed Melinda to heal and flourish after going through an awful experience. Secondly, The Art of Resilience, written by Hara Estroff Marano, used

Stories of teenage years and coming-of-age have always enrapt children, teens, and adults alike. But why do they? These groups share virtually none of the same interests, and reside in very different emotional levels of life. In every other form of media, these groups can scarcely coexist—the prospect of watching Power Rangers for the six hundredth time would make any parent blanch, and the thought of their four year old asking to borrow his parents’ copy of The Canterbury Tales is laughable. And surely no other age group would condemn themselves so deeply to internet culture than teens. Coming of age stories, however, are the exception. Nadine Gordimer beautifully explains this phenomenon in her short story “A Company of Laughing Faces”.

The school year approached its end. Another summer to spend alone by myself. The cycle had been repeating since I was in grade school. Sadness choked me as I returned home and shut my door. Every year, the resolution was the same: I would try to make friends next year; however, every year, I felt myself falling back down into the same trap. By the time high school began, I no longer felt the numb sensation of sadness or the flow of tears as the final day of May became the last day I talked with my “friends.” I no longer expected to make any friends, or, more accurately, I no longer expected to be able to make any friends. The sheer possibility of befriending an individual appeared to me as foreign as speaking in latin. When I walked into school, what should have been a site of chatter, opportunity, and growth appeared to me as a form of imprisonment and torture; however, unbeknownst to me, I did have friends; something of which I did not recognize until years passed by. I grown attached to certain conversations; there were times where I felt the need to initiate a conversation rather than waiting for someone else to make one. It was not until one of my friends told me,”We’re your friends aren’t we?” when I realized I was not longer

In life there are many changes that can cause a true friendship to go wary such as marriage, divorce, birth of children, new careers, and sickness. However, through each of those events the two must remember to keep the intimacy, the letting down of emotional barriers and the expression of innermost thoughts and feelings, “that which makes friendships thrive must be an enjoyable one” and to “always interact” (Karbo 3). Although psychologists continue to research the formation of friendships the great philosopher Aristotle knew exactly how friendships formed and how the lasted.

When I heard a term called resilience, I have no idea about it and think that it is not related to me. After I had a lecture with a topic resilience. I realize it is necessary and I need to face many adversity in my life. Also, I remember something happened in my past are shown my resilience level. I would like to share the story in my life to show the factors which are indicated in the last part can show resilience level.

What is the single greatest personal asset that will serve you in realizing these goals?