A News Story

Everyone should know that Japan has been through the earthquake and tsunamis recently, right? I have been very concerned on this situation as I like Japan a lot. The news had said that the food in Japan has been contaminated and spread across the entire globe. This is very concerning as the people in Japan could no longer eat their food nor drink their water, these 2 stuffs are the key essentials for a person to survive. The story had conveyed this message through a very sad and empathic way which made everyone very emotional affected. Thus, this could help bring Japan more donations as people will think that the people in Japan is seriously in a dying state. There are also pictures of the event which made people even more affected than before, convincing them that Japan is in a very bad condition. This entire news story has covered all the latest updates on Japan, including nuclear reactors, earthquake and tsunamis. Most importantly, the number of people died, missing and injured.

In conclusion, this news story has been one of those I feel that seriously get people emotinally affected from the words and the pictures.

Term 2 Online lesson 1

Group #4: The Civil Rights Movement
a. When did the civil rights movement begin?
b. What was the civil rights movement about?
c. State some of the significant incidents that took place in the civil rights movements (choose 2-3 incidents and state them briefly not in great detail)
d. Which American President supported the civil rights movement?
e. What was the outcome of this movement?
f. In what way is the Civil Rights movement related to TKAM?

Group #4: The Civil Rights Movement
a. When did the civil rights movement begin?
b. What was the civil rights movement about?

c. State some of the significant incidents that took place in the civil rights movements (choose 2-3 incidents and state them briefly not in great detail)
d. Which American President supported the civil rights movement?
e. What was the outcome of this movement?f. In what way is the Civil Rights movement related to TKAM?




Samuel- #a)

Started before World War 1 during the Great Depression. During the Great
Depression took place around 1929 and the early 1940s, it is believed that the seeds of the
Civil Rights Movement were planted at that time, and this would spark the Civil Rights Movement
later on. However the spike in the world wide Civil Rights Movement was around the 1950s and 1980s. And In
1948 Truman signs an Executive Order, which states the everyone in the armed forces are equal, and this was
the first step of the Civil Right Movement in the US.





Wei Jun- #b)

The civil rights movement was a political movement aiming for equality before the law occurring between the 1950s and 1980s. It was then followed by civil rest and in many countries, this movement did not reach its goals. It did let to many improvements in the law and legal rights of previously oppressed groups.

Alex- #c)


May 1961
The "Freedom Riders"

In May of 1961, a group of civil rights activists sought to "test" enforcement of a recent Supreme Court decision outlawing segregation in bus terminals. The group consisted of black and white, male and female. They boarded two busses in Washington, D.C. and were bound to New Orleans. Over the course of the journey, the Freedom Riders and sympathizers were beaten at an Alabama bus terminal. One of their buses was firebombed as well.

September 15, 1963
Birmingham Bombing

On Sunday morning, September 15, 1963, a bomb exploded in the 16th Street Baptist church in Birmingham, Alabama. The explosion killed four young girls who were in the church for Sunday school and injured another 20 people.

The FBI sent agents to investigate and four suspects were identified. However, the Director of the FBI, J. Edgar Hoover, refused and claimed that civil rights activists themselves bombed the church to gain public sympathy. The FBI initially closed the case in 1968.

The suspects were four members of the Ku Klux Klan. It took nearly 40 years for them to be brought to justice.



Yu Hao-#d)

President Kennedy support for a civil right bill in 1963 was celebrated internationally. He also hope to put off addressing civil rights as he hope that the civil rights initiative does not affect his domestic proposal. Assasination of President Kennedy was to stop the pass of 1964 civil rights act. Thus, President Kennedy was the one who supported Civil Rights Movement and nearly died in the support.

Sheng Xiang- #e)

Because of the Civil Rights Movement, the Africans’ society changed drastically and have the same equal rights as the whites now. More and more opportunities and chances are given to the black and more of the leadership positions are taken up by the black, such as the President of United States, Barack Obama. The perspective and viewpoint of the white is also changing and they begin to accept the black slowly.

Yong Chun-#f)

The Civil Rights Movement is related to To Kill a Mockingbird as in To Kill a Mocking Bird, there were many examples of racism occurring in the country, as well as the fact that the people there were too stubborn to change. This is shown in the Civil Rights Movement as they had faced the problem of racism being influenced in the minds of the people, such as in To Kill a Mocking Bird despite 1 person having mental problems,
stabbing his parents’ leg, the judge still thought it was “inhumane” to place him together with the Negroes, or black Africans from the South, this is one example of racism in To Kill a Mocking bird, in the Civil Rights movement, whose aim was to clear racial discrimination and promote Human Rights among countries lower in the south such as Missisipi,and the problem of the KKK, preventing the black people from voicing out their opimon in TKAM as well, disallowing them of their rights.


Reflection:
Personally, I feel that the setting up of Civil Rights Movement was a very good decision by the American President, President Kennedy. It helps to bring peace among the blacks and whites and settle the misunderstandings between the 2 races that lasted for many many years. This would further enhance the whole country's infrastructure as having peace for both sides, it would boost the country's economy by a lot as production would not be affected due to a peaceful workforce. Civil Rights movement provided a policy for both the white and blacks so that there would not be any bias for either one side. This is to maintain equality to stop all the "disastrous situations" to happen again. When they are united, no problems such as recession could blocked their way to succeed for the next few decades.

In conclusion, having this policy, USA has improved tremendously as both Blacks and Whites worked peacefully for 50 years down the road.

Short letter to the editor about Japanese disasters

Dear editor,
I am a Hwa Chong Institution student and would like to comment on the recent Japanese earthquake and tsunamis. It has been a tragic to them as disasters came up one by one. First, it was an 9.0 earthquake, then a 2.6 feet high tsunamis which wiped across Fukushima, leading to many houses rooted up from ground and 10000 over people died from the latest news report. There is still 17649 people missing and 7000 plus people injured. But the Japanese people were still quite strong as a nation as no stealing of property or food has occurred which is a very good lesson to learn from them. They are still uphold their qualities and knew that there would be people out there helping them.

From this disaster, we could also learn that we need to anticipate such situations happening, although Singapore is at the equator with no natural disasters, we will have to be still prepared for such situations so that Singapore would not be erased out from the world map. Due to Singapore's low land, we could get wiped out completely when a tsunamis come.

In conclusion, I give my condolences to the people in Japan and had donated a small amount of money to our Red Cross society and hope that people would follow me and do such act to "save" Japan!

What is Literature to me?

Literature seems to be a form of abstract art to me, bits of every piece of literature essay would form this big abstract art for me. It resembles my entire life, what I have learnt as a language and lessons in life. This abstract art needs creativity, logic and language to be able to see the meaning of it, just like how we study literature. It would be full of lessons in life that I have learnt and apply, also, it would also be a shining light for me when I feel down. It would shine a possible way of path that I could take out of the miserable situation. It helps me differentiate right from wrong as it continues to shine brightly on the right path I should go and not letting me regret for anything I have done wrongly. It also acts like a diary, helping me keep track of all the things I have done in lessons and constantly reminding me not to make the same mistake. This little but great abstract art in my heart would always be in my heart in the years to come.

Racism

I think that there has been enough done to combat racism. Racism is something that could not be eliminated, so what we could do is only to minimize it by letting different races interact and understand each others' culture and live peacefully together. But there would be still a minority that would purposely "destroy" this peace between the different races by accusing the other races by stating some sensitive stuffs that would agitate its own race, resulting a misunderstanding and riots to occur.

In Singapore, racism was not that common as before Singapore Independence, leaders of Singapore already convinced the citizens that all of them are equal and there is no bias on any particular racial group. In addition, under the lead of Lee Kuan Yew, he assigned a racial harmony day for all races to get together and chat with each other, reminding one another that they have to be united in order to fight against other countries.

CIP on Founders' Day

Well, yesterday was a wonder struck for me! I am actually, supposedly, to bring elderly around in a grand shopping centre named Jurong Point. I was nonetheless excited but afraid at the same time as I am not very good at interacting with old folks! But after reaching there, everything had changed totally. I realised that the old folks were very friendly and talking to them is much much simpler than I thought it would be. First, I brought them down to have their breakfast in KFC and then proceeding to Fairprice Xtra (NTUC) to shop! It was a very fun and enjoyable day together with them in just a short period of 2 hours.
But after this CIP, I realised that I did not talk too much with my grandparents nowadays as I do not meet them very often and I do not know how to strike a conversation with them! Also, it made me thinks of how would i really treat my parents when they also reach such an age? This is seriously a good reflecting activity that I had done. Interaction with Elderly......