My Book of Others
None of us is an island; instead, we all live in a social world where others impact our lives, contributing to who we are and who we will become.
My Book of Others encourages you to honor those with whom you are journeying through life. This section of your portfolio consists of ten separate pages, each with its own focus and writing challenge.
Imagine you have just written your first novel. Write a brief dedication to a special person.
Think about early mentors (day-care personnel, preschool, or kindergarten teachers, elementary, middle school, or high school teachers or coaches). Write about five (5) early lessons you learned and how these lessons still impact your life today. (Think about Fulghum’s All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten). Accounts can be both humorous and touching.
Pretend you have just won a million dollars on “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?” There’s a catch, however: you have to become a philanthropist and give away all your money. Who would you choose to help financially and why? You may give to individuals and specific organizations. Your choice of recipients and your explanations reveal much about you and your “heart of gold.”
Using the correct form for a friendly letter, write to a teacher, friend, or relative who positively affected you. Make an additional copy to actually send to that person.
Use the attached suggested questions to conduct an interview of your two oldest relatives. Write up each interview in narrative form. You may want to videotape or record the interview. Remember, you are recording part of your family’s history, so conduct your interviews with care and sincerity.
Think about your friends and the strongest characteristics and qualities of these friends. Think about the classes you are currently taking, both core classes and electives. Create the ideal staff of teachers for these classes by assigning a friend to teach each class. You must explain why the characteristics and qualities of each person make him or her a good fit for the job. Use your imagination.
Write a creative poem about a special person in your life.
Step into another’s shoes to better understand yourself. In other words, how do other people see you? How do you know? Choose three character traits/adjectives you feel others would use to describe you. Include a specific example from your life to support each adjective.
Using cooking terms, write a recipe that creatively shows the ingredients others in your life have given to you. Be creative! Be sure to give your recipe a title and include all the ingredients that help to make you who you are. Look at a real recipe to get ideas.
The final product should include: a.) A cover collage of pictures of others
b.) A title page
c.) Ten polished (edited) pages
*You may use computer graphics to decorate the pages, cut and paste from magazines, or draw your own illustrations.
Due Date _________________