Ch. 17-21 Questions Deja Anderson

1.How did he find inner peace with himself?

2.How did Victors character change from the begining of the story to the end?

3.What were some of the major changes that have effected him?

4.What did the dolphins represent to Victor?

Ch. 13-16 summary Deja

Joseph recovered from his illness and returned home. Victor took him on a horse ride to the west and when Victor was ahead just fell into the shallow swamp like grass and broken leg.while their parents we're away on a business trip his cousins took care of him  during a reckless car ride Victor jumped out of the car and broke his leg after talking to Joseph about the incident he was lectured  about not making good decisions. Joseph got sicker and Victor took that really hard and began to be depressed and didn't really want to seem to do anything but his friends stuck by his side through the rough time and after being challenged to a marble  match, he lost. Joseph eventually died and the family was at the  loss and the funeral.

Chapter illustrator 13-16 Ishmael Fernandez

This scene is when Victor and his brother are going through the marshlands, and because of Victors impatience his brother and his horse fall into the marsh further aggravating his injuries.

RESEARCH (CHAP 8-12)

Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For the National Guard camp in Virginia, see Camp Pendleton (Virginia).

Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton
San Diego County, California
MCB Camp Pendleton Insignia
Type	Military base
Coordinates	33°20′N 117°25′WCoordinates: 33°20′N 117°25′W
Built	March 1942
In use	September 25, 1942—present
Controlled by	United States Marine Corps
Garrison	I Marine Expeditionary Force
Current commander	Brigadier General Vincent A. Coglianese[1]
Shown within San Diego County, California

Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton is the major West Coast base of the United States Marine Corps and serves as its prime amphibious training base for Assault Craft Unit 5.^[2] It is located on the Southern California coast, in San Diego County, and bordered by Oceanside to the south, San Clemente, Cleveland National Forest, Orange and Riverside counties to the north, and Fallbrook to the east.
The base is split into North and South and was established in 1942 to train U.S. Marines for service in World War II. By October 1944, Camp Pendleton was declared a "permanent installation" and by 1946, it became the home of the 1st Marine Division. It was named after Major General Joseph Henry Pendleton (1860–1942), who had long advocated setting up a training base for the Marine Corps on the west coast. Today it is the home to myriad Operating Force units including the I Marine Expeditionary Force and various training commands.
















 Original source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marine_Corps_Base_Camp_Pendleton

Red Ryder BB Gun

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Red Ryder BB Gun is a BB gun made by Daisy Outdoor Products and introduced in 1938 that resembles the Winchester rifle of Western movies. Named for the comic strip cowboy character Red Ryder (who also appeared in numerous films between 1940 and 1950, and on television in 1956), the BB gun is still in production despite the fact that the comic strip was cancelled in 1963.

  Two Red Ryder BB Guns in box. These are a relatively recent reissue. The boxes promote the gun as being "just like the one your Dad had!"

 

Original source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Ryder_BB_Gun

MARBLES
A marble is a small spherical toy usually made from glass, clay, steel, plastic or agate. These balls vary in size. Most commonly, they are about 1/2 inch to 1 inch (1.3 to 2.6 cm) in diameter, but they may range from less than 1/30 inch (0.111 cm) to over 3 inches (7.75 cm), while some art glass marbles for display purposes are over 12 inches (30 cm) wide. Marbles can be used for a variety of games called marbles. They are often collected, both for nostalgia and for their aesthetic colors. In the North of England the objects and the game are called "taws", with larger taws being called bottle washers after the use of a marble in Codd-neck bottles.

Original source:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marble_%28toy%29

Chpt. 17-21 Illustration

Chpt 21: When Victor swam out towards the dolphins and the rock where he had seen Joseph and Jesus.

Critical Thinking Questions Chpt. 13-16

1. What distracted Victor from thinking right after he first told his brother to cross the clump of thick marsh grass and then changed his mind?

2.Why was Victor proud of having peed on his fathers face when he was small?

3.When Chemo asked Victor to keep a secret, why does Victor find it so hard to keep quiet?

4. What do you think the flash Victor saw, of the red truck coming from the bottom of the hill, represented?

5. Why do you think Joseph was not surprised and so calm when he found out his brother jumped out of the car?

6. Do you really think Shep took off in the morning towards the hills to intercept with Josephs Soul? Why?

Bi As The Travel Tracer (Chap 13-16)

CHAPTER 13: Victor's brother, Joseph, came home after he was feeling better. Joseph went to a horse ride to the West end with Victor at night and fell into shallow grass. Joseph broke his leg. Victor's cousin and his sister took care of Victor while his parents gone for business. On a ride, Victor refused to remain in the car because of his cousin's incautious driving so he jumped outside and broke his leg.

CHAPTER 14: Victor told Joseph what happened at the incident. Joseph lectured him that he should learn to make good decision his own sake.

CHAPTER 15: Victor got depressed because of his brother illness. He didn't have any mood on winning marbles. His friends stick with him everyday to explore about "blackmail business." Older kids challenged Victor in a marble battle. They ended up beating each other. Victor losed but he felt ease for not being the champion.

CHAPTER 16: Joseph died. The family sadly opened a funeral. Victor is in great pain and his parents got frustrated because their children died. The death incident had been a burden

Chapter 8-12 Summarizer

Chpt. 8

     After being transferred to a new school Victor and los vatos began the second grade at a school in which he considered awful because of the treatment the teachers gave to Mexican kids. At that school he met Whitakin, a new kid at school whose parents owned a bakery and would always share his cream puffs with Victor before riding their bikes to school. He also met Gus, a Texan kid who introduced him and the school to playing marbles.Victor was not good at playing marbles so he asked his brother Joseph for techniques. Joseph taught him what voting was about and insisted he wait two weeks before he played against Gus. When he finally played Gus. he won at first, but then lost due to the fact that he did not know how to play with big circles.After receiving more techniques from his brother Victor played Gus again winning more marbles but letting him win more so he could come back to play. Victor was amazed of all the good strategies his brother knew that he had learned from his father.

Chpt. 9

     At school Victor learned how to multiply and became a math genius, yet when the teacher asked for students to read aloud he was shy because of his trouble with reading. He bribed several classmates to volunteer to read for a nickle so they wouldn't call on him, but one day Mrs. Morlo, the teacher, noticed and convinced him to stay after school for extra reading time. Though, Victor tried to understand to read he did not succeed and was told he would have to repeat the third grade. One rainy day while Victor and Gus were headed to school they encountered many snails and a lizard that they stepped on and set on fire. That night Victor imagined a big lizard and a frog he believed would eat him. He was told he had to ask God for forgiveness and so he prayed so that his he could be free of guilt.

Chpt. 10
     When Victor's family house was completed, a man came looking for the owner of the mansion. Victors father lied, telling the man that the owner was very important and he was just a worker. He invited Ford to the celebration "his boss" was throwing. The next morning they had to slaughter the steer, Joseph was feeling weak but he asked his brother to not tell anyone of how he was feeling. The day of the celebration Victor began to realize people called his dad the Al Capone of the West, and he began to think his father was a bad guy. Though he was curious, he payed no much attention to it and began to celebrate like everyone else.

Chpt. 11
     Two weeks after the party, two men from Carlsbad barrio came where they lived looking for Victors dad claiming he was a trader for now wanting to be with the white people. They were insulting him in front of his children but he was still calm about it and offered them whiskey. The men were discouraged to be given a "women drink" and did not appreciate the bottle so Victors dad smashed the bottle into one of the guys face. As the others tried to start a fight, the two cowboys came supporting Victor's dad with their guns telling the, to get off his land and so they did.

Chpt. 12
     In chapter 12, Victor's brother is sent to Scripps Hospital because he was sick from his liver. He had been getting the wrong treatment from his previous doctor. Victor was afraid his brother would die, and hearing his mother plead for God to take her instead of Joseph he became sad. He didn't want no one from his family to die. He believed that if God had to take someone it should be him because he was unworthy. His father had a talk with him and told him God was not going to take anyone.

Summary 5-9 Ishmael F.

In chapters five through nine and we find our how easily influenced Victor really is. Early on in chapter five  a new kid from Boston recently arrived at Victors school he got to be really good friends with Victor and was able to connect to him. When he found out that Victor was Mexican their friendship took a turn for he worse once again Victor had someone calling him a dirty filthy Mexican. Victor was really depressed to here these word from his friend and was hurt deeply. The rest of Victors year in kindergarten was as horrible as the first days his teacher was still the same mean and Victor became a daily bed wetter. By this time Victor's families new house was under construction, and one day when Victors dad was working with dynamite he made a careless mistake and a big stump of a tree ended smashing the constructors car. Victor saw his dad apologizing and calling himself stupid something he had never seen before. Then that same afternoon he saw his dad  go with him to the dealer and bu him a brand new truck. In this occasion Victor learned the importance of generosity and that if he knew who he had to be generous to it would help him in the long run. In the next chapters we find Victor finally enjoying school because he was good with numbers and all they were focusing on was math. This episode in his life helped rise his hopes up and gave him just a little more courage. But wen he found out that if he didn't catch up with his reading by the end of the year, he would have to repeat the class this once again brought him back down into the slumps and made him feel useless again. In chapters 5-9 we can clearly see how easily influenced of a person Victor really is and how it affects his personality thought the book.

Discussion Chapter 9-12

1. Explain what Victor's father tried to say to him after went out the teacher's office.
2. What obstacle do you think that held him back from getting better at reading?
3. After the lizard and snails incident, Victor has prayed God and the animals to forgive him. What respond did he get and what was the lesson/value that he achieved?
4. What was the irony that Victor was laughing about while he was watching his father and Ford?
5. How did Victor feel about his dad after his dad explained to him why he made the man ate his own tanates?
6. Why did Victor draw stars? What was stars symbolized in this situation?
7. Why did Victor conclude that he was the one that supposed to "leave" the Earth?
8. After the argument between Lupe and her husband and father-to-son talk, what do you conclude about Victor's family bonding ?
CHAPTER 12 IS SO SAD.
I'm sorry for the late post. Things have been going quite messy these days and there was many works to do. Don't be hesitate, we will finish this book hoho.
QUOTE OF THE DAY: "You see, to be a good hombre a las todas is to be - just like a man's balls - soft and tender inside your heart, and yes, easy to be hurt."

Chpt. 5-7 Travel Tracer/ Tracker

- Victor meets Howard, a white freckled kid that gave him the idea of carrying knifes to school.

-When Victor went home, he began to look at his family as "dirty, bad. people you couldn't trust", he didn't want to be a Mexican.

-At school Victor took two pocket knifes and was showing them to his friends.

- He was caught handling them and was accused of being in a knife fight.

-When he went home, he decided to run away.

-While trying to run away on his horse, he came across two cowboys who came from Arizona.

-He introduced the cowboys to his father and asked him if they could stay.

-The cowboys stayed for the night with the Mustangs they had.

-At school he saw Ramon carrying his fathers pocket knife and asked for it back but Ramon didn't give it to him. His dad ended up buying another one.

Illustration 5-8 Deja Anderson

Chpt. 1-4 Researcher

CATE- California Association of Teachers of English; a convention that took place in Oceanside where teachers from New York and Eastern States met together

Macho!- Victor's first published book. It was published after 260 rejections and he only got paid $4,500 for three years that it took to write it, which is like making $1,500 a year

vaqueros- Spanish word for cowboys

Army Navy Academy- the Middle School Victor went to in Carlsbad

Our check list

Summaries chapter's 5-8

5. In chapter five we see how easily influenced Victor really is. When a kid from Boston came to their class he got to be good friends with Victor but when he found out he was Mexican. He screamed in horror because he thought Victor had a knife. Of course Victor didn't have a knife but at the time he felt that if his friend said it it must have been true. At the end of this chapter Victor feels sick being a Mexican because we he was being persuaded at school that Mexicans were no good dirty people.         

6.In. The beginning of this chapter Victor brings two knifes to school because he now believed that all Mexicans carried knifes. In school one of his knifes gets confiscated by his teacher and Ramon takes the other one. Victor gets in trouble with the teacher and gets taken to the office, with his parents being called to school. His mother gets mad at him while his father actually takes Victors side and exclaims that the knife was unusable in the first place therefore harmless. By the end of chapter six Victor is running away from home when he encounters two cowboys with a herd of mustangs on their way to Hollywood and he ends up leading them into his ranch so they can rest their herd. Victor learns from these two cowboys that Mexicans can actually be warm oving people and his faith in his race is partly restored.

7. In this chapter Victor learns an important lesson of generosity from his father and how one can never be to generous. He also learns that school didn't get worse and he felt really depressed about having to go back even refusing to go back to school shopping. Victor became a daily bed wetter and was terrified about school and worked very hard to keep up with the class to fit in but sadly he just couldn't. Victor realizes that he needs to really appreciate what he had and just slowly get better.                                        

Chapter 1 Scene

An image that illustrating the situation happened in Chapter 1 of Burro Genius: A Memoir

Victor was criticizing English teachers for being cruel towards their students. One of the teachers was angry and left.

Critical Thinking Questions (Chapters 5-7)

1. Howard, the new kid at school, told Victor that he could not be around him anymore because Mexicans were bad, dirty, and untrustworthy people. What kind of effect did this comment have on Victor? Do you think Victor can be considered an easily manipulated and influenced boy?

2. Why do you think Victor's parents had different views and reactions on why Victor had gotten in trouble at school for bringing the pocket knives and "being involved in a knife fight?"


3. How did meeting the two American cowboys change Victor's mind about what he had heard in school about Mexican people?

4. Why did Victor's father decided to buy the man that was constructing their new house, a brand new truck,  and what did he teach Victor and his brother, Joseph, about making mistakes?

5. Victor always finds new reasons to look up to his father, mother, and older brother, but when he goes to school, he is troubled because he hears all kinds of bad comments about Mexican people, to the point where he becomes confused and does not know what to believe or if he should look up to his family the way he was taught to. Why do you think this happens?

These questions are for chapters 5, 6, and 7. I know we have a lot of stuff going on the weekends so I tried not to fill us up with a bunch of reading.

Summaries Chapters 1-4

CHAPTER 1

Victor is invited by his publicist to a conference for English teachers to meet authors, and his publicist asked if he would like a booth for him to introduce his new book, Macho, to the many different English teachers. At the conference, he volunteers to give the opening speech, since the author they had arranged to have got drunk at the hotel's bar before it was time for him to give the speech. Even though the lady in charge of the conference was not so confident about having Victor give the speech due to the fact that he was not a known author, and the way he was dressed, she agreed to have him give the speech. Victor was very nervous, and as he got to the podium, he became enraged at the fact that they were all English teachers, and gave a speech about the cruelty he faced while he was in school, and how teachers would belittle him because of his race. Some teachers were offended by the speech, while others listened to what he had to say and were proud of his courage. After his speech, many of the teachers started buying his book, and complemented him for such book. That same night, at the hotel's bar, he met a teacher, who congratulated him for his speech and book, and advised him to also talk about those good, and kind-hearten  teachers that helped him, and had a positive impact on his writing.

CHAPTER 2
That night, as Victor rested on his hotel room, he thought about what the English teacher he met at the bar had advised him, and he had a flashback about the substitute teacher he had for about three days while he was attending military school, and how that substitute teacher had inspired him to write without limits. He also had flashbacks about how he was treated back in military school, and how he had decided to be free from all the unfair treatment, after he became enraged at the fact that his teacher had insulted his name, Edmundo, a name he was proud to have because his father had given it to him, because of a book his dad had read in jail. He also remembered how his classmates used to treat him and beat him, and how there was one that was nice to him. He also remembered how he caused a fight between two classmates to get back at the kid that was always bullying him, and how the guy that had beaten the bully up became friends with him; even though he became friends with a strong looking guy, his teacher still treated him badly, but he didn't send the other kids to beat him up anymore.

CHAPTER 3
Victor finds out that he is being requested to give other talks, and that he was going to get paid for it. He also  meets the prolific writer Louis L'Amour, since L'Amour was having a speech at the luncheon. Victor met him before his speech and he gave him advice on what a writer is and how he should keep up his good work. Victor then went back home, thinking about everything that had happened to him in such a short amount of time.

CHAPTER 4
Victor describes his first day at school. He first talks about how the day before his first day of school, his dad gave him a talk about what he should do, and how he should always remember who his people were, and that he needed to start studying girls because he needed to find the right woman to marry. His dad told 5 year old Victor that he needed to act like a brave boy, and not like a little kid picking his boogers because the girls would not find that attractive. The morning after, Victor felt really nervous, and he didn't want to go to school. Once he got to school, he didn't want his mom to leave him alone, and he started hysterically crying, holding on to his mother's leg. Once his mom left, Victor and the other mexican kids in the class got in trouble because they were speaking Spanish, and the teacher yelled at them saying that only English was allowed in school. Victor ended up peeing his pants because the teacher didn't allow him to. Then, during recess, a teacher started hitting Ramon, another mexican kid Victor met in school, because he was the only one that would not stop speaking Spanish and he kept telling the other mexican kids that they should not be afraid of the teachers. After a horrifying day at school, Victor started having nightmares and wetting the bed in his sleep.

Critical Questions of Burro Genius

Critical Questions                                                                                                       Ishmael F.

1.How many rejections did Victor Villasenor get until he got his first published book? Did or did he not get fazed after that many rejections?

2. What did Villasenor talk about in his speech? Who was his audience?, and how did they react?

3. In the beginning of the second chapter Villasenor has a flashback, what do you think sparked the flashback? Do you believe this flashback had a significant impact why or why not?

4. How was Victor's first day of class? How would you describe the teachers attitude towards the Mexican children in the room? With all chapter four in mind, what time frame do you think this scene was taking place?