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These children had all experienced so much heartache and devastation. Her willingness to not give up enabled these children to shake loose the shackles of their past and became successful.
It gives people a better look at the lives of today's teens, especially the lives of those from "the hood". I believe everyone should truly read this book.
This is an awesome book. Gruewell for her dedication and love she showed the teens.
It also lets people know that they do have a chance to succeed and that they can overcome any obstacle placed in front of them no matter where they may be from. I think that it really shows how love can truly change a person.
I really admire Mrs.
Now I wish that I had done more with those children who needed more than a day at school but rather a "family-like" figure who would listen, challenge, inspire and find ways to really make a difference in their lives. As a retired teacher and social worker, who worked with at-risk preschoolers I found this book very moving. I was moved by the changes these teens made after becoming a member of the Freedom Writers and by just the simple fact that they were still alive despite their family lives, their neighborhoods, drugs,alcohol,poverty and the lack of inspiration and encouragement offered by so many of their teachers throughout their school years.
At times the comments of these teens were "So self-absorbed and teen-like". With the lives they were living what a joy it was to see that a little candle of just being a teenager was able to thrive. [Although I think that several were written by the same person as the story line of some entries seemed to follow one person's life]. I wish that the author of each entry could have some sort of identification so the reader could have followed the growth of the teen.or maybe each entry was written by a separate teen.
Gruwells of the world was the norm for teachers instead of the exception. To have such global insight at such a young age is remarkable. As I read the diary entries I could picture the diarists as children that I worked with who had grown to teenagers and had had no one to keep them following the path they started as a preschooler. I really like how these teens looked outside themselves and could see the similarity between the pain and intolerance they faced and that of Anne Frank and Zlata Filipovie.
I thought I had done a good job. How different so many at-risk children's of United States lives would be if the Ms. I remember being a first time teacher.
Eventually she wore them down. They were just polished up before publication.The main point of the diaries is that there are a lot of intelligent articulate people in crappy situations who are marginalized by their situations. But the main thing that makes this book decent is that it's about the students. To expand on that theme, these writers overcame their situations because they had someone who believed in them and respected them. There's a lot of hard work but there's also natural ability. This is one of those inspiring teacher books. And like most of these inspiring teacher books it's a little heavy on the moralizing and light on the actual hard work involved. Most of these hardcore inspiring teacher books seem to have a rightwing bias in which the teacher is a Joe Clark like crazy DISCIPLINARIAN who makes them knuckle under like it's a boot camp before they can learn.
And the fact of the matter is that she succeeds because she did respect her students and she cared about their welfare. Some can overcome their social limitations but most can't - not on their own at least. The first editing process is choosing what to put in and what to keep out. Everyone needs that; but for some it's a very rare commodity. Obviously the early entries are a little too polished to be believable as 9th grade journal entries, but Jim Carroll edited The Basketball Diaries and that didn't make them any less "authentic". She's more the kind of teacher that becomes an example of what not to do when teaching. The diary entries are put up against each other in order to tell a story. The great teachers are like the great writers, painters and athletes because they have so much natural talent that they can't really explain how they do most of what they do.
Yes, there is some definite editing in the book. Erin Gruwell could be an idealist because she was new and she was also very stubborn in her idealism. And this one has a distinction of being the story of a teacher who is an unrepetant liberal. As in the story of "that Americorp volunteer who stupidly gave his address to his students and two of them tried to rob him and killed him." But there's a terrific earnestness going through this book that trumps one's natural cynicism.
I was further saddened to see that all the journal entries were written with the same voice. Gruwell". Like many other reviewers, I was looking forward to this book as an inspirational read and was disillusioned on page one. Finally, if you're going to edit the heck out of something, then leave out all of the "I love Ms. BS. The journal entries are clearly not written by youth, especially those with negative attitudes toward learning. I'm really sorry that people might believe such a polished journal entry would come from an angry teenager on the first day of school.
They think she doesn't care about them. Whenever something intense happens, which is often, being in a big ghetto in California, the teens react in different ways. By the end of the book, you can tell Mrs. This book is different, in that it's real entries from real teens, working to better themselves and their reputations. Gruwell, tries to change all that. Do you think you could ever be the teacher of a handful of students that don't know what the Holocaust is, but have been shot at, at least once. Read The Freedom Writers Diary to learn about the hard and challenging life these teens went through and how they resisted any kind of instruction. Mrs.
The students think she's just another teacher who thinks she knows what it's like to grow up in the ghetto but really has no idea. You can experience through what they write, how the girls and boys change their outlook on life and everyone around them.Anyone who likes to read about the real world and the ups and downs of life will love this book. You wish you were there, witnessing the improvements every single teen made as they change their lives, the lives around them, and the world. This is the real deal.Natalie You want to know what every teen's perspective on a given situation is. Gruwell, the brave teacher who taught these students everything they know, worked hard to change the reputations of the kids and the way they think about themselves. This book, filled with real entries, is hard to put down. One teacher, Mrs.
Gruwell really does care for the class and everyone in it by what the students are writing. Gruwell and the way she teaches. The Freedom Writers Diary, taking place from 1994 to 1998, is all diary entries from the real students at Woodrow Wilson High School in Long Beach, California. In the beginning of the story, you can tell by the entries that the teens in the class don't think very much of themselves and don't respect Mrs.
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