Ernest Hemingway Essay, Research Paper

?Today on the five o?clock news a man goes on a rampage at the office leaving five dead.? As I flip on the TV, I see another top story! A man has killed others at his workplace and taken his own life. This is becoming very old. I begin to think, ?what could push this person to the point where they feel that it is necessary to take the lives of innocent people?? Even more disturbing, what could drive a person to the point that they believe it is necessary to end their own life? What could drive a person to the point of no longer having the desire to live? I believe that being prepared for life and the difficulties that come along with it is part of the key. The world can be a very difficult place, especially once out of high school. It is the high school?s job to prepare us, as students, for the harshness of the real world. Expectations are high for every single person in today?s world and some people just can not live up to the expectations of other people. Trying to live up to other people?s expectations creates competition. Competition is in everything from getting into college to finding a job. I believe that is why some of the most basic skills learned in high school are so valuable. The most basic and important skills are used in school everyday: reading, writing, listening and speaking. These are some of the most important skills needed to a get a good job, a good education and essentially a happy and pleasing life.

Reading is extremely important when it comes to surviving in the real world today. Being able to read opens up a variety of doors in life and opportunities. If you can?t read, imagine what type of job you will be qualified for. Let?s see, a minimum wage job at McDonalds! Wait, even to be able to work at McDonalds you have to be able to read. What about reading the cash register or the orders off of the computer? Even a minimum wage job making burgers requires the skill to read. My reading skills were shown and improved upon in my English, Spanish, Math, Keyboarding I and Football classes. One class that might question how I learned or improved upon my reading skills is in my Football class. For football class, we read different lifting magazines and pamphlets, that teach new strategies to get a better lift. If we do not know how to read it, it is difficult to fully understand the article, and therefore the proper and safe lifting technique. In my portfolio I have placed a picture of me lifting. At the beginning of the semester I would not have been able to even come close to the weight I am lifting in the picture. This shows just how important reading has been in my advanced football. So in my football class I believe I showed enough skill in reading that I can qualify for a $5.75 an hour job flipping burgers. So far so good.

The second class in which I believe the skill of reading is important and becomes improved is math. When I am about sick of math class and we still have 15 minutes to go, I come to a very complicated word problem. My mind is not completely in it. That is when reading comprehension comes into play, so I can properly complete the problem and accomplish everything that was asked for. If not for my skill of reading comprehension, I might not be able to figure out each and every word problem. The math lab that I placed in my portfolio would not have been possible if it were not for my skill of reading. If I did not know what the book was asking of me, I would not have been able to complete the lab. The lab asked me to graph and solve the equations using the techniques we read earlier in the chapter, this is where reading comes into play. Now I am not only able to read, but I am also able to comprehend. I have also learned the technique of re-reading. If I do not understand something the first time through, I have to take the time to re-read the problem. This qualifies me to the next step up in the career field, now I can go from flipping burgers, to another $5.75 an hour job working behind the register, because of my reading skills. I also believe my skill of reading is shown and improved in my Spanish class. I have to be able to read and comprehend in Spanish as well as English. If I can?t even read in English how am I going to be able to read anything in Spanish? I have placed a little book in my portfolio that I made in Spanish. First, I read the requirements for the project. Then I had to read and write certain things that I wanted to place in my book. I believe the book is a quality product. This shows just how I used the skill of reading in my Spanish class. Now due to my ability to read and comprehend, I can communicate fairly well in Spanish. This also will look good on my college and job applications. This will also open new doors to new chances and opportunities. Maybe if I could get a job at a place that needs a person who is bilingual. If it were not for my ability to read and comprehend, then I would not have even passed Spanish I, let alone Spanish II.

In my Keyboarding I class the skill of reading comes in when we are reading over what we have to type and the different things it must contain. We must read the instructions to each assignment so we know what style the work is to be done in. In my portfolio I have placed an assignment ( R5-36) that I completed nearly perfectly, thanks to my skill of reading. I read the instructions in the book which told me the assignment in the style of enumeration which we had read about earlier in the year. This is why reading is so important in my keyboarding class. Then after completing the assignment, I have to go through and make sure there are no mistakes and everything is spelled correctly. Also, reading comes into play when we are learning new techniques to key faster. The evidence which I have placed in my portfolio is a timing test, showing just how I have improved in my time thanks to my reading and comprehending. In the beginning of the year, I struggled just to key the ABC?s twice in a minute. By the time I read and learned new techniques and completed my portfolio assignment, I was up to about six to seven times through the ABC?s in a minute. At this point in the semester, I can key the alphabet about 10-11 times in a minute. This proves just how my ability to read has helped me in the keyboarding I class. My ability to key will also look good on my college and job resume, especially considering I want to go into a field working with computers. So far, in just four classes, I went from being qualified for not even a minimum wage job, to starting on my way to a career in computers thanks to my skill of reading. I also plan to keep reading and improve in my Keyboarding class in both my typing skills and reading skills. In the R5-36 assignment I made one small error, partly because I did not read my paper over thorough enough. So I plan to work on reading my papers over more thoroughly, and maybe even use the technique of re-reading it incase I might have missed a minor mistake.

The fifth class that has helped to improve the skill of reading is my English II Honors class. Reading is one of the most valuable skills in my English class. When I get home from a long day of football practice and lots of running, reading is the last thing I want to spend time doing. That is the last thing I want to do, but I know I must is to make sure to completely comprehend each word of the reading while I try to get it done as quickly as possible. I have to admit, reading quickly is not the best thing when trying to read and completely comprehend a novel. But I know that in class the next day we will be quizzed on the reading from the night before and then have a class discussion. If I did not read and comprehend what I read, I will do very poorly on the quizzes and not be able to participate in the discussion. This can be a very bad feeling, because you are left out and don?t know what the other students are talking about (not like that has every happened to me). A technique that I have learned to better help me understand and comprehend is to re-read. I do not always fully understand everything I read the first time, so I have developed the very helpful skill of re-reading. The summer reading essay in my portfolio shows the skill of re-reading and comprehending. Sometimes I did not understand things I read over the summer so in order to write a quality essay I had to re-read certain things that I read over the summer. A good example of when re-reading has helped me is when I read the book My Antonia. It was the summer and my mind was not completely in the reading and sometimes I would not fully comprehend parts. That is when I used the skill of re-reading to go back and re-read the parts I did not completely comprehend. I found out that the more I read, the quicker I become. Reading has also helped me extend my vocabulary. Our teacher expects us to look up a word when we come to one in a reading that we do not know. This has dramatically helped my vocabulary to expand to new lengths. During my junior and senior year when I take the SAT test (two-thirds of which has to do with English and vocabulary) I will do fairly well. The higher I score, the better chance I have of getting into a better college. Then if I finish college I will have a successful career. This is why reading is so important in preparing me for a good future, the real world and the skills to survive in such a competitive world. I believe my reading skills have improved greatly, but I also realize there is much, more room for improvement. I must ?make? time to re-read things, even if it means making some sacrifices. It will be hard but I need to take time away from the TV and radio and re-read something I did not fully comprehend. Another sacrifice I might have to make is to stay up a little late, I can always catch up on my sleep the next day by going to bed early. It will only make me better and help me in class as well. It is something I do not like but must do it in order to improve my skill of reading.

Writing is a very important part of countless career fields today. There are some jobs in which the skill of writing is not a necessity, but with most jobs it is very important. What is necessary to get into a good college or get a good job? Well, you have to write a resume. I do not think, in fact I know that they will not accept you if they can obviously see that you are weak when it comes to writing. Sure, the fast food job is great at $5.75 an hour, but I do not think it is sufficient when you are 34 and still working at McDonalds and can barely afford the rent to your one room apartment. Resulting because you never learned how to write so that you could go to college and have a good career. This is when my English, Spanish and biology classes come in. In my biology class, I have to be able to write and describe what I am observing. My description has to be so detailed that some one else could read what I am writing and know what I am describing. This is why descriptive writing is so important in my biology class. The evidence I have provided in my portfolio is a lab that I completed. This lab followed a strict format. We had to have certain processes in different orders and have the proper structure to the lab write up. An example of the process is if we placed the iodine on the slide before the water the whole experiment would be ruined. We had to be very specific in our descriptions, such as exactly what we used and then how we used it, etc.

In my Spanish class, writing is very important. Not only do we have to know how to speak in Spanish, but we also have to know how to write in Spanish. We have to know how to properly spell things and also know how to punctuate properly in Spanish. We have to use the right process, which can be very different from English. Many things in Spanish are backwards compared to the way we write in English. There are some words that are spelled exactly the same way but mean two totally different things, all because of an accent mark. This makes it very difficult to write in the Spanish language. The evidence which I have provided is a little book that we wrote in Spanish that shows all the proper writing techniques that I have learned to use. The ability to be able to read and write Spanish will give me many advantages and opportunities in the real world.

I believe English is the most important class when it comes to the development of my writing skills. In my English class we write from almost every aspect possible, which has brought me to a new level in both thinking and writing. We have looked at other authors styles and imitated their style. We have made our own styles and written in almost every style heard of. Using the proper writing strategy is incredibly important. To be honest, the proper writing strategies are a pain in the butt, but they are for my own good. The hard and correct work pays off in the end when I am happy with the work that I have turned in. In English, we have set guidelines that we must follow, and certain strategies that are expected of us. Our teacher does not necessarily require a pre-write, it is never collected. Yet it is expected that we do it anyways. I am glad I did it though, when I sit down and write a quality essay the first time I write it. I have a quality essay because I am prepared and organized and have both good ideas and bad ones to distinguish what I want to use. Using the proper process is also an important part of writing in English class. We do things, such as have another peer edit our paper and give their opinion of what is good and what is not good about our paper. Then we correct what is needed and do a self-edit, where we carefully go through reading our own papers and critiquing them. Once each process is done I have a paper that has been read by others and changed some of the things they felt degraded the quality of the writing. By the time the entire process is done, I have a paper that has been read and re-written many times to become what I believe is the best quality paper I could have. An excellent example of this process is the summer reading essay that I wrote quite a few times and turned in what I believe to be a quality essay. Another important part of writing in English is the different aspects of writing. We as a class look at all different types of writing, such as a narrative style work and romantic style works. My romantic literature evaluation is an excellent example. In this portfolio piece I evaluated a piece of romantic literature and discussed why it fit into the classification of a romantic literature. Then we would use the same style to write an original piece using the proper writing strategies and process. It is also very important to be very descriptive. One thing we have really worked hard on this semester, is being concise. I know I have to be concise and hammer the point home but not go on forever making aimless arguments and being repetitive. I believe my skill of writing has vastly improved thanks to these three classes and will become very important in the future. As I mentioned before, the SAT is very important when applying for a college and another big part of the test is writing skills. I realize I still have at least two more years of English classes, and my writing now is not nearly as good as it is going to be. There is always room for improvement, especially in such a diverse subject as English.

Listening is a very important part in almost any learning or career environment. When you are in school, regardless of what class it is, you will have to listen to an instructor and apply what they tell you. I believe the skill of listening and speaking becomes a large part in all six of my classes: English II honors, Keyboarding I, Spanish III, IMC III, Biology and Advanced football. In football, it is very important that we listen to Coach in the weight room, so that we learn the proper techniques. That way we get the most out of our workouts and do not injure ourselves. We have to apply the correct ways that we have been taught when we are working out. Speaking is also especially important in advanced football. When lifting, it is very important that we communicate, get a spotter, and let them know when you can?t take any more and need help. It is very important, because if we do not communicate we could very easily get injured.

The second class that shows the skill of Listening and speaking is Spanish II. It is exceptionally important not only that we listen to ?la profesora? (the teacher), but that we also take notes. Note taking is a very important strategy in Spanish II because when the teacher is explaining a new concept it will not be memorized so it is very important that I listen and take notes to go back to at a later date. In Spanish, we also have to present certain projects that we do, and we are graded on how well we speak and comprehend the Spanish language. The little book that I have placed in my portfolio from my Spanish class is an excellent example of a presentation. When I completed the ?libro? (book) I had to go up in front of the class and present the book, speaking only Spanish. That is when I had to apply all the concepts I had learned and use them to speak.

In math it is very vital that I listen to the instructor and take notes about the concepts that are being taught. I have learned that listening is incredibly valuable in math, because once someone becomes lost and does not understand a concept they will not understand anything until they understand the first concept. Math is like building blocks, in order to build higher there must be a base. And in order to further knowledge in math you must first understand everything before it. This is why the skill of listening is so important in my IMC III class. The next class which I believe shows the skill of listening is keyboarding I. In keyboarding, it is very important to listen to the teacher so that you understand what is expected in certain assignments. It is also important to listen during the timing test. The teacher very quickly reads of a series of predetermined letters in no order, and as the student, I have to be able to listen and type as quickly as possible and keep up. If I do not listen, then I will become lost and completely fail the test. I have provided an example of a typing test in my portfolio as the piece of work from my keyboarding class.

Biology is a very important class when it comes to using the skill of listening. One of the most important reasons is safety. In a lab such as the one I have placed in my portfolio, we deal with many things that could cause some dangerous problems. When the teacher is explaining a specific way and order we are to do something, it very important that we listen. When the teacher releases us to our lab, it is obvious who was listening and who was not. When it comes time to doing the lab and something has to be done in a certain order for it to work those students who were listening can not properly apply what they heard. And all the lab objectives are down the drain. Those students who were not listening do not follow the right procedure and end up with some very negative results, such as unnecessary injuries. I also realize that I am not the perfect student but I always listen and apply myself so that way I don?t make any safety mistakes.

Listening and speaking are a very important parts of English, just as reading and writing are. Taking notes is a big strategy that has been very helpful in English. It is very important to listen in English so that I pick up on everything that is being discussed. Listening and taking notes is really for my own benefit, so that I learn from other people. It is also important to listen when the teacher is explaining something new to me. It is once again to my own benefit because I will end up applying that new strategy in one of my papers down the road. It is also important to listen in the class discussions so that I see other peoples view points and I am able to speak and express myself to the rest of the class. The skill of speaking is shown by participating in class discussions. I apply what I have learned and comprehended from my skill of reading to express my view upon the literature. Speaking also comes into play in English when we had to make a speech in front of the class about ?America?s role for the next century.? While this evidence is not included in my portfolio, it also shows the skill of writing, but now it is being put into words in front of the whole class. My skills of listening and speaking have shown much improvement this semester, but I feel that there is still improvement to be made in both. I feel I need to put more effort in the speaking aspect. I will do this by taking notes during the discussions and asking more questions. I feel I need to become more involved in class discussions. The skill of listening and speaking will always be needed, from college to a career to everyday life. Listening and speaking are the basics to communication, which is very important in the real world outside of school. On the job it is very important that you are able to communicate with your boss and fellow employees. This can often be difficult with some people, but it is necessary that you attempt to listen and talk to them and apply what they tell you. It is also important to express your problems and how you feel.

I believe that to succeed in today?s world the three skills of reading, writing, speaking and listening are necessary. I believe that the lack of these skills is what eventually drives people to do some extreme things. It is because they are unhappy with their lives somewhere something was missing. Without all three of these skills, it is very difficult to go out into the real world that is filled with so much competition. Some people just don?t cut it because they lack the education. Sure, there are special cases, there are some people that can never be helped. But I feel with the proper education, there are so many doors and opportunities that there is no reason to feel that life is not worth living. I believe I am an excellent example, for the skills I showed in this essay have already opened a world of opportunities for me. I can now communicate with my grandma in Spanish, I can turn in what I believe to be quality work and receive high grades, which will be useful for my future. I believe the most basic and important skills are reading, writing, listening and speaking. These are some of the most important skills in order to a get a good job, a good education and essentially a happy and pleasing life.

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