1.) Which in class writing was your favorite? Why?
-  I like the "This I believe" writing because it allowed me to talk about some of my experiences that made me the person I am today.

2.)Which in class writing was your least favorite? Why?
- My least favorite writing was "If I were Invisible" because I didn't have a lot to say, so it was very bland.

3.) Review all your writing chronologically (earliest to latest). List three interesting observations or changes in your writing. Which are the most profound (obvious and important)? Why?
-  I can tell that I have improved in my writings over the course of this semester. I learned to dig deeper and think of more things to write about. I also learn to not use words repetitively. I also learned how to use many different word's instead of the same words that I usually repeat.

4.) If you could change anything about your writing this semester what would it be? Why?
-I would try to work on not repeating some of my words as much as I do now because I catch myself doing that all the time.

5.) What did you like best about this course?
- I liked how it wasn't a typical course that I usually had. We didn't follow a strict lesson plan and the free writes were fun and memorable.

6.)What did you like least about this course?
- I wish we had more time to read "The heart and the fist" instead of a last minute read.

7.) What would you have done differently this semester if you could have a do-over?
- Read "The heart and the fist" book sooner than the last few weeks of the semester.

8.) What did learn about yourself as a student, a thinker, a writer this semester?
- I can do the work as a student, I have a lot of thoughts in my head and I learned how to dig deeper and put them out on paper. I also learned how to use different words instead of the same words I use.

9.) What could I, Ms. A., have done differently to improve the course?
- Next semester, try to assign the book earlier in the semester so that people have time to read it around all of the other classes they have. It would help a lot.

10.) You begin this course with an engagement and participation score of an A.  Attendance, participation in activities and group work help you to maintain this grade.  Evaluate yourself and assign yourself a grade for the in class portion of this course.  Don’t forget the reasoning behind your self assigned grade.
- I believe I should get an A- at least, Since I did participate in a few of the free write discussions. I was here just about every single day, but only missed a few since I had some competitions. I think I deserve this grade also since I did every piece of work that you gave us, and I did good portions of whatever group work you gave us.

What if....?

What if I had a million dollars?

What if I didn’t go to college?

What if I never started to play video games?

What if I never started my fitness training?

What if I never moved to Missouri for college?

What if I never started to do extreme sports?

What if I lived in Hawaii?

What if I became a football player?

What if I became a teacher?

What if I didn’t grab my backpack today?

What if I never taught myself how to type fast?

What if I never taught myself how to use a computer?

What if I never had television in my life?

What if I joined the military?

What if I became recluse?

What if I became a social butterfly?

What if I was afraid of dogs?

What if I was never forced to teach myself life rules?

What if I never learned how to cook?

What if I never went to preschool to learn how to write?

What if I never learned how to read?

What if I never started to do extreme sports?

            Honestly, I really don’t know how my life would be without extreme sports. My guess is that I would probably be an antisocial recluse that stayed in my room all day and all night playing videogames and hardly ever talking to anyone. I would be overweight and be a very angry and sad person. I would not know what to do with my life and I would go into a deep depression if I already wasn’t in one. Why do you ask? Because extreme sports got me out of the hole I was digging myself in too. I decided one day that I wanted to teach myself a front flip on ground, because this kid at my middle school knew how to and everyone liked him and thought he was cool. I wanted to be looked at like that, I just love the feeling of people looking at what I do in awe. I love showing off, so I went to the park by myself to teach myself. It took me over an hour to get over the fear of doing it before I actually did, and it was a failed attempt. I landed on my neck, and was in a huge amount of pain. It took me about 5 minutes to get back up and I tried again, same result. I was there for about 5 hours that day practicing. Even though I didn’t get it, I found it sort of peaceful. It was a huge confidence boost to know that I am not afraid of doing that anymore. I came home so ecstatic and I told my mom what I did, and I showed her. It was a failed attempt, but she still supported me and told me to keep practicing, but be careful. Every day after school I would go to the park and keep trying. It got to the point where it didn’t hurt me anymore when I would land on my neck. Then I hit a stage of depression, because I felt like I could not learn it, so I stopped doing it for a year. It wasn’t until my freshman year of high school when I thought about doing it again. I walked into the front gates and I saw someone I didn’t know doing parkour (the art I was trying to teach myself to do.) my friend paul called me over and said I should try to compete and do it with him. When I started to do it, at first glance, he thought I was a wannabe, someone that is just trying to show off. But after about 30 minutes of doing it, I finally sat down and talked with him about it. I told him my story about me practicing in the past and such, and then we started to train after school every single day, getting better every single day.

What if I never started my fitness training?

            Fitness is my life now, most of my time is spent either working out or practicing my gymnastic and martial art moves. But what if I never started being fit? What if I never started to work out? I would probably be depressed, since I was depressed most of my middle school life. I would be overweight, I would not be eating as healthy, and I would be really hateful. I was depressed because I was picked on for being overweight and shy. I started to work out after my 7^th grade year in the summer at my dad’s house. He used to be Special Forces in the Marine Corps, so he knew how to get fit and stay fit. He helped my lose 20 pounds and I became very toned. None of the people that knew me could recognize who I was when I came back to school in the 8^th grade. I was nicknamed “the strong guy.”

What if you could not tell time?                          

            Time, what if we could not tell time? Maybe we would think of ways to figure out what part of the day it is, I’m not sure what we would do. In reality though, time is just a concept humans created to measure the days. Time is constantly changing, time is different in some parts of the universe. For example, if you are on a planet that is orbiting a black hole, then time moves slower there. What may seem like 2 hours on the planet would actually be 20 years in our time on earth. If we could not tell time, then perhaps we would look at the concept of time differently.

Fear

            When someone talks about fear, I think many things. The first thing that comes to mind are spiders. Many people make fun of me because I look like a bigger guy that wouldn’t be afraid of spiders, but in fact, im terrified. Something about spiders just freaks me out. Maybe it is the fact that there are poisonous, maybe it’s the way it feels when they walk on your skin. I have been bitten by a black widow before, so maybe the fear derives from that. Another fear is dying, I’m scared of what it will feel like, and will it hurt? Is there anything after life? Our religious leaders tell us that we will go with god, but what if that’s not how it works. So many things will be going through my mind when the time comes. Another fear is failing in life. I always want to be successful, it is my life goal to be successful and work hard, but sometimes, I feel like im not going the right way. What if I make the wrong choices, what if I miss something important that will change my life forever? I don’t want to be someone people look down on, I want to be someone people look up to and aspire to be. I’m afraid of being alone. For most of my middle school life I felt alone, I barely had any friends, and the friends I did have picked on my and took my lunch money. I was buying their friendship, and that is not true friendship. High school is when I started to get true friends that I could call my brothers and sisters. They were my family. But as time went on I thought about what life would be like if I didn’t meet them, where I would be and I am afraid of being there. That’s why I am afraid of being alone, because I’ve already felt the feeling of being alone. I am afraid of the dark sometimes. I tend to have night frights sometimes and I shake and freak out in my sleep because I am usually getting chased by something. I wake up in a cold sweat, panting and looking around to see if the thing in my nightmare is still chasing me. After each night fright, I can’t stare at the wall.

            Failing in life is my worst fear if I think about it long enough. I’ve seen so many of my friends do so well then just collapse and hit an all-time low. Ive seen them do well in school and social life and then start doing drugs and getting kicked out of their house and then they are homeless. I am scared that will happen to me, or something very similar to that. What if I am not working hard enough, what if I make the wrong choices, what if some tragic event comes and it destroys me emotionally and mentally? All of these things make me terrified of failing. I’ve seen what someone who has failed looks like, and I’ve seen how my family treats them, or looks down on them, and I do not want that to be me. Someone the rest of society looks down upon. Like I said in the paragraph before, I want history to remember me, I want to be someone people like at and aspire to be. To me, success is being happy at whatever you are doing in life. Success is having a great career that you love, a family, a nice house, the average American dream. Some people see success differently than me, but success isn’t living on welfare and doing drugs every day. People that use other people for their own personal gain aren’t successful. People the try to help others that need it are successful. Successful people help unsuccessful people get back on the right track and help them reach their goals. I have always been strong my entire life, not physically, but emotionally I have been. I’ve been pushed down so many times, and it tested my resilience. Not getting back up is failing, and I will always get back up. That shows true strength, that no matter what happens, you get back up no matter how many times you get pushed down.

            What if I am not working hard enough, what if I make the wrong choices, what if some tragic event comes and it destroys me emotionally and mentally? I’m not so sure what will happen to me or how I will take it. I don’t have any idea what would happen if I failed, sometimes I push myself even harder than I normally do since I don’t want to fail. I don’t want to become a drug addict or someone that lives off of welfare. I will never in my life take handouts from people. It is not my place. I am fully capable of working and doing what it takes to make a living. Just because I feel “tired” or “lazy” is no excuse to not work and get money for free. I’ve known to many people that cheat the system and it makes me so angry. How could they possibly be happy by taking money from other people that worked hard to get it? I could not do it. It would eat me alive and just make me depressed, yet these people are perfectly content on taking money. We use to be a great people, where everyone worked hard and took no handouts from anyone. They wanted to be great, but now, a lot of people are just lazy and don’t want to work. I wish our people would be like they used to, when working was expected and there were no such thing as government handouts. We have become weak, and it will be a very long time until we get that same mentality that we use to have, if we even get it at all. Yes, I believe there should be welfare, but I believe there should also be mandatory drug tests with welfare. I believe that welfare should only be limited to a certain amount of months, or if you have disabilities that make it so you cannot work. Why should people that work hard have to give money to people that are lazy and don’t want to work?

If I were invisible.

If I were invisible, I would use it to freak people out. All I would do all day is just mess with people. I would go order food and when I pulled up to get it, there would be no one driving. Or I would lift things up and run at people to make them think that there was a ghost or something. I would also use it to help stop crimes. I would stop crimes by beating up the criminals, and sense they can’t see me, they would not know where the punches are coming from. I would do things to make people feel good about themselves. I would sneak into movies. I would sneak into amusement parks.