Katie's Blog! :o)

My Essay (plus some other stuff)

Well, I have figured it out. The comments are the problem. When I have comments, my blog is messed up. When I don't, it's not. So that's the way it is. And here's my essay.


I opened the book without enthusiasm, fully aware that this was what had caused my unavoidable grief two years ago. I opened two others in a similar fashion. Johnny Tremain, The Witch of Blackbird Pond, and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer were not on my must-read list at the time, so to speak. But now I believe that if one seeks insight into the lives of everyday people in historical times, these books are your saviors. I learned a lot about life for average people in the times these stories were placed in. I saw normal events through the eyes of a teenage boy, a growing young girl, and now from the perspective of a cheerful 10-year-old male.

Johnny Tremain started out slowly, as if the author, Esther Forbes, was trying to explain everything before telling the story. I wasn’t interested at first, what with all the descriptions similar to "On rocky islands gulls woke. Time to be about their business." I stood by patiently as the author detailed endless piers and fully packed ships. And then Johnny’s hand became crippled. His life would never be the same. This definitely hooked my eyes to the words. I learned about the Revolutionary War and plans that led up to it. Johnny Tremain helped the rebels by allowing secret meetings to be held in his living quarters and running around town telling, in secret code, when the next meeting would be. Johnny was also interested in helping his older friend Rab with his duties as a rebel against England. It was very intriguing what the rebels thought would solve the problem, and very surprising how it worked out. Before reading this book, I also had no real knowledge about the Boston Tea Party. I discovered that the rebels dressed as Native Americans and that the time they did this dramatic task was crucial and strictly accorded to how long ships had been in port, what ships were where, etc. It seemed as if the rebels would have to have done it (poured out the tea) at night as to be more secretive, and later I learned why they didn’t. This tied in to what I was learning in US History at the time, but I liked how the book gave more personal, in-depth experiences than the textbook did.

The Witch of Blackbird Pond began very differently than Johnny Tremain. Kit was riding on a ship to a new land, and the reader empathizes with her as the author explains the hard life she had been living for the past few weeks. In this book, I learned about the differences between life on Barbados for Kit and life in colonial New England for her relatives. When Kit came to New England, I was surprised with her about the tasks that people in New England found important. Things like cooking, cleaning, mending, and going to church outnumbered the tasks that Kit had in Barbados. Of course that wasn’t the main point of this book, though. The Salem Witch Trials I had heard about in passing but I never really knew the specific reasons that the Puritans had for suspecting the so-called witches. Apparently if one could swim, was old and lonely, or was a friend of one who had these characteristics, they were witches. The Puritans believed that witches brought illness, bad luck, storms, and disappearances. It was surprising to me how people would actually want to find a reason to hate another person. I haven’t yet learned about this time period in US History class, but I hope to find the technical reasons and facts such as how many people suspected as witches were killed, brought to trial, etc.

I haven’t read enough of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer to write what I have learned from it. But as you can see, I have learned a lot from these books and reading them helps me understand what I am learning in US History a little better. I enjoy how the authors of these two books intertwine factual information with good descriptions and dialogue to create a good story.



At first I wrote a really funny, good essay, but I guess it didn't have enough about what I have learned, so this is the worse, less fun version.

posted by *Katie* @ 7:45 PM