Oh! The Things I Have Learned!

!!!So I went to the writer's workshop and I got to show off my blog to the class because I was the only one who had a blog!!! Mel Odom taught us about how, once you have a blog, you can review things you've already seen/experienced such as books/movies/TV Shows etc. You sign up on this website: blogcritics.com then you click on 'writers' and 'Become a Blog Critic'. And if the people running the site like your writing style and think you have something to say and the more reviews you write the more popular you become and eventually they will send you FREE STUFF to review! How cool is that?! Definitely signing up there! We also learned about Cafepress.com If you have a story idea for example and you publish it and it becomes popular, you can take an original drawing and cafepress will make mugs, and shirts, and merchandise and you get part of the proceeds!

Let's see.... what else did we learn *flips through notes* Hmmm... We learned important elements of a story. Such as 'A character must want or need something'. Because other wise the story is fairly pointless. We also learned that the villain and the hero should be very similar with one small dividing difference. It makes the conflict more exciting. Another good site to check out is: Fictionwriting.about.com It talks about what an individual scene should have.

Mel talked about word length a little bit too. In today's market 1,000 - 7,000 words is a short story, 75,000 - 100,000 is a novel.

And finally if you go to Melodom.com you and E-mel... haha his joke not mine :p and I don't know if he would help you seeing as how you didn't meet him but he said he'd help the people in the workshop i.e. me!

Let's seee....oh! The Christmas music is coming along great! Most of it is really easy when you actual practice it hehe..... There are only a few songs that I need to work really hard on. That makes me happy!!

This Friday our volleyball team - Excalibur is going to Mid West City to scrimmage Wolf Pack! I'm excited! I was nervous but Cara said that it's just for fun and practice and doesn't count for anything like league or tournament or anything and that helped. I'm only a little nervous now...it's mostly just excited! For those of you who are wondering: league is where all the teams of Oklahoma who are part of this group, such as Southern Thunder, The Incredible's, Wolf Pack, Excalibur, Mustangs etc. come together to play games. Then depending on how well your teams do places you for tournament which is a two day, all day thing in Norman. (P.S. Correct me if I'm wrong about the way all that works please, Ellen.)

In January there is going to be a state-wide science fair of Oklahoma and I'm going to be part of it! I still have A LOT of work to do for it but I'm starting to get excited because I read like the entry forms and rules and stuff today and it sounds like it's going to be fun. If you're in 1st - 12th grade, are home schooled, and live in Oklahoma you can join. (P.P.S. If you're interested, let me know and I can send you the information.) My project is going to be on 'The Life Cycle of a Monarch Butterfly'! Anywho, that's pretty much all that's going on with that.

I finished Jane Eyre! (Not sure if I already said that in an earlier post but if I did you will just have to get over that now, won't you? :p ) I also watched the Timothy Dalton movie of it! So good! That story (in any form) makes me all happy! It's so genius and interesting and moving! Last night I wrote my outline for my book report on Jane. It's coming together nicely! I've already started Tuck Everlasting. (I'm actually about half way through and we haven't even finished all of our Jane Eyre stuff, hehe....)

Okay peoples thats enough for today! Check back later for another glimpse of what's going on

inside my head! :p Sincerely, Alissa M. Lindsey (In case you haven't gotten that down by now! :p )

Books, Books, Books!

The Power of Books

by Alissa Lindsey

They're all around! They consume me. Each one whispers it's intricate story to me while I sit, wide eyed, learning the travels of each wonderfully real character. The stories control my thoughts, rule my actions, and edit my speech. I'm Winnie, Harry, or Jane. Elizabeth, Stargirl, or Anne. Mia, Mathias, or Peter. Ethan, Alice, or Wanda. I'm all of them, really. Their entertaining personalities compose my own. Their mannerisms and style meld with mine. I become them. They become me. We are one. My eyes see what they see, my fingers touch what they touch, my heart beats with their emotions. Exploring, laughing, crying - together. In an entirely different place - the docks of the sea, the abbey of Redwall, the moors of England, or the brick walls of Albert Einstein High School. Where ever I may be in my world, it takes only seconds to be transported to the 1800's, a magical wood, or a gaping cavern. This is the power of books.

Today when I opened my blog, and clicked 'new post' I had every intetion of documenting the names and titles of the five books I'm currently reading (which I will still do, by the way) but when my fingers started typing a poem appeared instead. What do you think? Did you like it? I did. :)

The five books I am currently reading are:

1. Redwall by Brian Jacques

2. Tuck Everlasting by Natalie Babbitt

3. The Magician's Elephant by Kate DiCamillo

4. Hunters of the Dark Sea by Mel Odom

5. The Princess Diaries: Party Princess by Meg Cabot

Hehe, what can I say? I like books. No that's an understatement - I LOVE BOOKS! :D Always have, always will. Anyways, let's move on to another topic, because I believe I have sufficiently covered books for today. Let's see....

We got our new music for band! Some of it is fun, most of it is hard - but I will master it!

The choir solo was not given out the week I skipped to go to my band concert - YAY! And I'm trying out for it in two weeks! yay! Hope I get it! :D

Hmmm, the writers workshop I wrote the prologue to 'The Guardian Fairy' for is tomorrow! I'm excited! :D The book I'm reading called 'Hunter's of the Dark Sea' is by the speaker/teacher for the workshop! So, how cool is that!? I like meeting other writers, it's always cool to hear advice and tips and stuff from them. *Sigh* Someday, I'll be the published writer giving advice and tips....Someday... *groan* someday when I actually have time/motivation to write something....

Well, that's all for today kids. TTFN!

P.S. Everything I post here - my poems, stories, ideas, and just general ramblings are copy righted. And if you wish to continue to be my friend you will leave them here, where they should be. :p

Two Hours of Work and Nothing to Show for It!

Hallo!

So today we didn't start school at 10 because I was at the orthodontist getting my braces off! (Which didn't hurt by the way.) But anyways when we got home I started on math. I finished the homework problems, and took Quiz A. If my grade was good I'd be done but it wasn't so that was my 'practice' test. So I took Quiz B. And my grade WAS WORSE! I was so happy about getting my braces off and was ready to do school and get a lot done and was even having a fairly good time doing math...until I got a C. So now I have to take a Quiz C that my mom has to write!!!!! Good grief! I spent two hours working on math and have no grade to record after all of that!

Ahh, let's change the subject. On Monday, mom and I drove around the neighborhood and picked up all the bags of food people had placed on their front steps. I would say about 2/3 to 1/2 of the people donated food! Dad and I took it all to Ashley's (the drop off spot) later that night and then today (Wednesday) Mom bought some food to donate specifically from our family! How exciting! I did pretty well if I do say so myself! :p

We are having volleyball this week after all (they were either going to cancel the beginners practice or send us all to Norman to scrimmage) but we're having practice at the normal gym. Only it's 45 minutes short! :( But oh well, at least it's practice!

Also the band concert was last night! Ahhh! It went pretty well! I didn't miss the key signature once but I made some other mistakes so it pretty much evened out but I had fun and my sister and parents were there, too! They said our band (Advanced Band) sounded great! So that's what counts! It was sad though because my friend Ashley had a solo (she plays flute) and she sort of messed up and also was very quiet. I felt so bad! But there wasn't anything I could do! Now she say's she's going to be taking a break from her flute for awhile.... boo!

And I had to miss choir to go to the concert which made me mad because there is a solo in one of the songs we are doing that I was going to ask to do and he said he might give it out yesterday...boo I hope no one else got it! Because I'd love to sign it! It's in the song we are doing called "Schlafe, mein Liebster" (Sleep, My Beloved in German). The solo goes like this "Schlafe mein Liebster, geniesse der ruh x2 Wache nach diesem vor aller gedeihen x2" Which means "Slumber, beloved, and take they repose. Soon wilt thou waken, our joy and salvation."

Pronounciation Guide:

Schlafe - Schla-fuh

mein - mine

Liebster - It's like that toy called a leapster on a 'b' instead of a 'p' and and more of a 'stir' sound than a 'ster' sound.

geniesse - guh-knee-ee-suh

der - day

ruh - rue

Wache - vach

Nach - Knock

diesem - di-sem

vor - vor

aller - ah-ler

gedeihen - guh-die-hen

It's a very slow song but the music was composed by Bach so I like it. :) Hopefully, I get the solo! :)

That's pretty much all that's new school wise. Check back later for more!

Ever yours,

Alissa Marie Lindsey

Guardian Fairy

Boo!

Weekly Test Update:

So I took my french test - 99%! Woo hoo! Most recent Math test - 92.5% not my best grade but still an A-. So all in all not horrible.

So I'm part of a group of teens in the Shawnee area who want to graduate with people they know in a sort of 'class'. So we formed a group to hang out and have fun and also to help the community. So far we've had one meet to plan, one time to hang out (we played sardines, scatergories, rumikub, and had snacks), and now we are collecting food to donate to a local food bank. We are also possibly going to all volunteer to serve a meal at a soup kitchen! To help collect food I found 50 plastic bags and printed up the following notice:

Local Shawnee Homeschool Students

Collecting Non-Perishables to Donate to Local Food Banks

Our group of high-school aged homeschool students are asking for donations of your extra canned goods and other non-perishables to give to local food banks. We would be extremely grateful if you would donate. Please place donations in the provided plastic bag and place the bag on your doorstep on the morning of Monday, October 26th for pick-up.

Thank you!

I then proceded to put the notice in the bag tie it shut and tape one bag to each of the door nobs in my neighborhood. All of this took several hours. Especially considering I had to walk around my whole neighborhood (1 block - 4 streets) twice because I kept walking back to the car to get a new one and wanted the door to be on the side I was on. We are going to take the food to the food bank around the beginning of November. It was a pretty cool thing. I only wish we could have done the actual 'hanging of bags' thing as a group because I got a little lonely.

So what else is new you might ask? Well I'm entirely stuck on my novel. The plot is full of holes and makes no since and I apparently do not have the brain capacity to fix them. So I've temporarily moved on to a different story. The whole thing started when my friend Ashley's mom told me about this 'Red Dirt Workshop' they library was hosting for teens. It was going to be this day of learning about writing and stuff and you had to submit a writing sample to get in. But it had to be under 750 words which is a really hard thing for me (I've never been good with word limits as you can prolly tell). So I was looking through all my word documents trying to find something that was good and the right word count when I found an old story prologue and some notes about the story. I wont post the prologue here because of copyright issues and me wanting to actually become a writer someday but I can tell a bit about it. Maythia, a guardian fairy, was murdered and the child she guarded kidnapped. Maythia's sister then tries to solve the case with the help of some other colorful characters. I'm very excited about it! If you would like to read what I have so far (the prologue) please see me in person (unless you are related to me by blood) or call me and I'll read it to you over the phone. :p I'm serious about this copyright thing I even found the will power not to post it on facebook (aren't you proud of me? seeing as how my entire life is pretty much documented on facebook).

Tonight I read about what Yale college looks for in it's applicants. It's scarily vague. "As it selects a freshman class of 1,300 from over 20,000 applicants each year, the Yale Admissions Committee is mindful of two questions: 'Who is likely to make the most of Yale's resources?' and 'Who will contribute most significantly to the Yale community?'... As Yale is above all an academic institution, academic strength is our first consideration in evaluating any candidate. The single most important document in the application is the high school transcript. We look for students who have consistently taken a broad range of challenging courses throughout their high school careers... The Committee also gives serious consideration to such qualities as motivation, curiosity, energy, leadership ability, and distinctive talents. The personal essay, as well as evaluations by a counselor and two teachers, provide a great deal of insight into these qualities. We hope to find students who have made significant contributions to their school or community..." Pretty generic, huh? But oh well, every little bit I learn helps. (In case you were wondering Yale is my target school. And Mom - they accept both SAT and ACT!!! yay!)

Well anyways that's all for now. Check back later for more on the school life of Alissa Marie Lindsey. Over and out faithful readers.

PSAT

Yesterday I took the PSAT. I know I know, I'm only a freshman so I can't be entered into the running for the National Merit Scholarship until I'm a Jr. (Which will possibly be next year...) But it's good practice because if you bomb the test as a Jr. you can't take it again (unless you get held back, haha :p) But not only do I not plan on getting held back I plan on graduating a year early by working through the next three summers. So I will possibly be a jr. this time next year. Which means it's good I took it this time around! :) But anyways about the actual PSAT. I think it went fairly well. I mean I haven't taken geometry so what do expect on the math section? - a lot of skipped questions that what! But the reading skills and writing comprehension sections when well. And the math that I could do (the algebra) wasn't bad at all. So my scores - which I don't get back until December - should be good. I took the P-PSAT (Prep test for the PSAT) and my scores on that were good especially for a freshman! :D So I'm not worried - at all.

Now you may be wondering about this whole 'graduating a year early' thing. Since my Birthday is in September the state of Oklahoma said that as a Kindergartener I would have 'started late' (that's the term they use) so when I moved to Oklahoma I was put in 7th grade at co-op instead of the grade that was rightfully mine - 8th grade. That was when my 'complex' started. I was always 6 months older then everyone else in my grade and would graduate highschool in 2013 at the age of 18 1/2! This fact just about killed me! Because you know how the older you get people say to you on you 14th Birthday for example: only 4 more years! Well you couldn't really say that to me because while technically I would be 18 in 4 years I wouldn't graduate for 5! And I'd still have to be at home because I'm HOMESCHOOLED! So I decided to do things my way and work through summers instead. Now that I've made that decision I tend to wonder what the heck in wrong with me! But I'm sure I've made the right one.

There is no volleyball this week because of fall break (but apparently choir, youth, and band don't believe in fall break because those are going on as scheduled. Personally, I would rather have volleyball and not the other three than the way it is now. :( But I apparently do not get a say in the matter. Oh well.

The band concert is soon! I'm starting to freak out about it, seeing as how I can't play a good portion of the music and am constantly forgetting to practice! But it's not for a grade, it's for fun so I'm sort of taking a backseat in band this year.

That's all for now,

TTFN!!!!!!!

It's Me again!

I'm back! With more knowledge than I had last time I was here! :D

We have started reading Jane Eyre! Which is a fabulous book that I love! It's not hard to read either, especially for a book written in the 1800's. But apparently somewhere between the 1500's and the 1800's people learned how to talk because Shakespeare is pretty much impossible to understand unless you analyze every single sentence. (We are going to be reading A Mid Summer Night's Dream later in the year - that should be interesting! XD) In Jane Eyre we've been learning words like opprobrium, effluvia, antipathetic, imbibe, and physiognomy. Doozys huh??! If you happen to know their definitions (yes - knowing the definition means not using Google or a dictionary - only your brain!) you can post them in a comment(which means 'how much' in French. Funny huh?) and I'll tell you if your right or not.

I've also improved somewhat at flute. The concert is speeding at me like a bullet though and I'm afraid it's going to hit hard. But hopefully even if I completely fail there will be many others flutes to fill in where I'm not playing. Nahh - I'm just being hard on my self. I have improved considerably. I can almost completely play all of the pieces. Although the director handed out like 11 different songs so I'm not 100% sure on which ones we are playing.... but the ones I think we are playing I can pretty much play.

Another big accomplishment - drum roll please - I served the ball over the net TWICE on Friday! I was so happy I almost did a dance! Right there in front of everyone! It was quite exciting.

My French is getting better too. Today we learned 'je voudrais sept tickets' (I would like seven tickets). I have a French test Friday... I think. (*EDIT* Tomorrow. Studying would be a good thing to do tonight) It's on um, whatever is on pages 5,7 and 8. Hmm, that's all I wrote down. LOL. I do know page 8 was learning the French words for things in your living room i.e. clock, telephone, chair, sofa etc... Hopefully that goes well.

Math has been progressing - although all this review is making me feel like I got held back (The review starts with pre-algebra - what I did in 7th grade - and then will move into algebra 1 - 8th grade for me - and then 2 -9th grade.) But I'm thinking this review is a good thing after my 4 month long summer I'd sort of forgotten how to add...jk! Today we 'learned' (the quotes are there because I already knew this) about the commutative, associative, and distributive properties. (P.S. I spelled 2 out of 3 of those right - take that spell check! Someday I won't need you anymore!)

So that's my life right now. Notice I didn't say school life because they are no longer spearate. It's like getting married. School do you take life to be yours? I do. Life do you take school to be yours? I do. I now pronounce you one! That's it. The End. Au revoir!

No Volleyball! :(

Bonjour,

Today is a Friday! Normally, right at this moment (12:37) I'd be at volleyball! My favorite thing that happens all week long! :D But the team couldn't get our normal gym so they had to change gyms and only had a small amount of time to practice. So sadly only the advanced and intermediate teams are practicing which doesn't include me. I am a beginner. But oh well. I can play volleyball next week.

Today for school we did Current Events Friday! Last night I found an article about the William's sisters - you know the tennis champions - and marked the important parts. Then today we wrote a small oral report about it. Explaining that they didn't have a good routine or discipline skills (which surprised me! They've been in tennis since they were teenagers and are now in their late twenties. You would think they would have it down by now. But we're all human, I guess. And if your a William's sister who is reading this - keeping playing and don't think I'm insulting you.) Anywho, so the sister's worked with a coach and their father to set up a good practice routine and nutrition regimen and now after a bit of time to work with their new schedule they are back and better then ever! The 2 are the favorite to win an upcoming tennis competition! Great job, girls! :D

Also this year we are doing biology! At the moment we are studying the monarch butterfly or Mariposa Monarca(Spanish) or Monarque Papillon(French). For those of you out there who don't know what that means it means Monarch Butterfly. For this unit of biology we are going to plant a butterfly garden, raise a monarch butterfly and release it, and design a paper butterfly to send to Mexico (hence the Spanish) for the winter. Then in the spring time Mexican students will send me their butterfly or flies. It's quite a neat project, really and I'm enjoying it a lot! :D

To explain the French I used back there - I'm taking French this year and thought it'd be fun to have that translation too. French is going really well do you know what 'Ou est la banque?' means? Take a guess. What did you say? If you said 'Where is the bank?' then you guessed right! 'Ou est la banque?' (In case your wondering) Is pronounced oo ay lah bank. But you barley say the 'N' in bank. I've also learned 'Quand le train arrive-t-il?' (When does the train arrive?) and 'Combien est-ce?' (How much is it?). For more French ask! :) I'd be happy to post more because I LOVE IT!!! That's all for now, kids.

TTFN!

Alissa Marie Lindsey

Where Did My Life Go, Exactly??

Hello Again,

Today's blog is about the fact that I no longer have a life. On a typical school day I do school from maybe 10am-4:30pm. But today I had band at 3. So we did school from 10-2:30 and left for band, which goes until 4:30. We stayed to chat for a while and got home around 5:30. I didn't finish all of my school earlier so I now get to, A. Write this blog, B. Journal for 30 min., and C. finish up math (Bluck! :p).

After finishing my school I will probably have an hour or so to chill and then it's time for homework! Read 2 chapters of Alice and wonderland, pick a new character and write down three character traits about that person. Memorize a Bible verse. And cut a board to glue a puzzle onto.

With the mood for the evening set by a 'wonderful' Staples trip, causing the evening to include many 'engaging' exchanges of words.

Then it will be bed time. Day well spent, I think. But either way (well spent or not) my life of four months, containing much time to play sims 2, surfing the net, and chilling at my leisure is now no more. WHERE DID MY LIFE GO???

Let me apologize for the prospect I dangled in front of you about the ability to comment. I'm still learning how this site works and (pointed out by the lovely Angelica) failed to set up the comment section correctly. I am going to fix it after I finish writing this post and it should work fine after that.

Thanks for reading,

Alissa Marie Lindsey

IK and It's Meaning

Hello All of My Soon To Be Avid Readers,

This is a blog to document my homeschooling career, if you can call going to school a career. It's part of a class I will be taking (Courtesy of my Dear Mother, the Creator) called Inventory Knowledge AKA. IK. In this class we will be SCRAPBOOKING both with digital and 3-dimensional pages, creating an encyclopedia about me and the things I'm interested in, birthing a timeline, inventing a webpage, designing a calendar, gaining game production experience, morbidly making a book of bucket lists, putting together a newsletter, building a museum(in a room in our house), and of course this wonderfully interesting BLOG! Hasn't my mother been busy? I'll answer that for you - YES!

Anywho, now that you know what IK is I expect not to have to explain it again. If you forget come here and 'refresh your memory' because the paint is already wearing off of the keys on my cell phone and while I do love you (or you wouldn't be reading this, I don't let un-loved people read my blog) I am in high school now and OhMiGosh am I busy.

I say this with the experience of 2 days under my belt, but I'd say that is enough to make an informed decision - High School is A LOT OF VERY HARD WORK! I will be blogging here frequently about how school is going, what I am doing/learning, and anything else I care to grace you with.

Questions, comments and even snide remarks are all welcome. So feel free to leave any or all of them in the comments section.

Thank you for reading and enjoy the rest of you day, which I'm sure has shortened considerably while you were reading this,

Alissa Marie Lindsey