The Voice In School

4 posts
User avatar
Gender Female
Points 1119
Reviews 10
“Being alive is the hardest thing one could ever experience. You’ve got a lot of things to do, aside from keeping yourself alive. Then you’ll add another burden into your life, something to think about, again. And man, that sucks.”
-Tiffany Hazard (Cross Species)








My Own Idea of Life

-Life can be associated into friendship. This is also one of the truths about our life cycle. Nothing much more to say about that.

Passed by:
Tiffany Hazard
II- Mendel
Life Education
March 12, 2010








At school…..




Success!

Last day of school, what more can a kid ask for?

Well, I’ve got one thing. DON’T GIVE US SUMMER PROJECTS. Let us relax our brain. I think mine’s going to blow up.

I just finished our output for Life Education, which is by the way, my cupcake. No worries. Any minute now, I’ll be out of school with two months vacation at least. I’ll be able to play dodge ball like I wanted to. I’m going to have so much fun!

I glanced at my surroundings. Sigh. I think I’m gonna miss my classroom. Our poster for the school contest which won the “Most Meaningful Art of the Year” lay beside the blackboard in front of me. It’s already gray and dusty, since it had been there since last year. Big old blackboard’s already dusty too. He really needs to be vacuumed.

The scarlet curtains donated by Queeny Rosmey still looked pretty, while they flutter endlessly at their hanging places. They gave our room a slight color of translucent red, which I think, fits my skin color perfectly. Sorry for the boys though. They look much closer to fried hotdogs, which they think, is hot. But, it’s not. They smell more like dried fish to me. Yucks.

The freshly swept, weekly waxed floor still looked, well, pretty clean. That’s the class’ pride. You can never beat us when it comes to cleaning the floor area. I’ll bet my allowance for the week with you. Seriously, I’m not kidding.

Richard Gomez’s work of art: the “Quotes to Live by” paintings were glued proudly on the walls. I must say, I’m pretty impressed with his works. They are so damned meaningful and fabulous! He’s the one who made the ideas for our class poster, which is not surprising, since it won the most meaningful art. Two thumbs up for you Richard!

Oh, in case you saw our book shelf which is about five meters high, that’s Crizzy Royale and Ray Montes’ work. Their fathers are both architects, so there’s nothing to be surprised about their sons making a book shelf. Anna Rosal, Rachelle Anne and Mikee Villa donated their old books. Anna’s mother is a librarian and has stacks of books at home; Rachelle’s father is a publisher while Mikee’s born rich. So, they make the perfect trio to donate lots of books for the class. And not just ordinary books, these guys stacks a load of rare and first class edition books, and updates their revisions every month. I gotta ask my mom to buy me some of those.


My classmates on the other hand, are so busy talking about their summer plans. Sam Orozco, the computer geek, seems to be planning about building a website of his own. Ida Michaela and her group looks like to be going on a trip to the Himalaya Mountains. Good luck with them. Freddie Ojano and Maritess Clooney are going to continue studying for the next school year. But, majority of the class seems like to be just staying at home and play their laptops to death. I bet they’d be looking like zombies when the school year starts. Well anyway, it’s up to them to spend their summer vacation. I have other plans in mind.


Mrs. Lourdes, our adviser, cleared her throat. Our class was suddenly brought to silence. Cool.



“Now class, this year, there are a lot of students who didn’t pass the test for the last completing grade. For those students who failed, they are going to take summer classes, unless they want to remain in my class for the next school year.”


Lots of groans. Well, I can’t blame them. For during that time, I’m groaning too. Please, that can’t be me.




“Now, let’s see. Abegail, Michaela, Randy, Mikee, Jordan……”



And she kept on announcing names. Please god. I promise to be good. Just please, don’t let me be one of them.



“……..Cora, Suzanne and Tiffany.”




Oh no…..




I take back that I’d miss my classroom. I’m not impressed by my classmates’ works. No, our class poster didn’t win any awards. Crizzy and Ray didn’t make a five meters high bookshelf…..




At Home…






“Mom please! Don’t let me attend summer classes. I’ll never survive! Come on!” I pleaded.

Mom just stood up from the couch and smiled. “Sweetie, I think it’s for your own good too.”

I stared at the door. I’m gonna make a run for this, any second now.

“But, don’t you think that’s hard enough? I tried my best, I really did. Now, I’m going to relearn them again! Wouldn’t that sound like an insult or torture to you?”

Mom just smiled. “I think it wouldn’t be anything personal. It would be really good for you anyway. At least, you will understand your lessons very clearly.”

I ran for the door. Behind me, mother called “You are still attending that class!”


I went straight to my room. I really can’t believe mom will even let me attend that! What about my plans? Those are really happy plans! And it’ll be ruined just because of this summer class!

A soft knock was heard from my door. “Go away! I’m not here!” I yelled.

The door opened anyway. Thank goodness, it’s sister Arvy.

“Well?” she demanded.

“About school?” I squeaked. We settled into my bed. Then I told her what happened.

“Mom’s right. You need to attend summer class. Your summer plans can be reserved for the next summer anyway.” Arvy commented, as soon as she heard my story.


“You’re a great help. Thank you.”


Arvy stared at me sternly. “It’s for your own good too.”


I sighed. “What’s good about it?”


She looked at me thoughtfully. “Do you really want to stay in second year for another year while you see your classmates in third year?”


I shook my head. Somehow, hearing their mockery and insults made me feel like I’m sinking. My stomach suddenly didn’t feel good.

She stared at me raising her eyebrows, as if she was saying, So?

“I’m going to summer class.” I sighed.

Arvin nodded. “That’s right.”
wrotalistic




User avatar
Gender Female
Points 130
Reviews 288
Yes! That was really good. You have made that very similar experience realistic and more familiar to other readers. What I really love about your piece is the dialogue. It is really subtle your language, and is very convincing. Keep up the good work: you have definetely got my attention.




User avatar
Gender Female
Points 1056
Reviews 11
I liked the transition of her opinions and the realism. I would immediately hate my classroom if I had to go back, too...

All in all, I think its a good piece. It made me feel like I was Tiffany, sitting there in the classroom and vaguely contemplating (I know) everything around me. Of course, I was never in that position before, but... I still enjoyed it, sitting there and being able to feel the atmosphere.

I sound like a hippie.

Anyways, I enjoyed it :)
See you, Space Cowboy.




User avatar
Gender Female
Points 1882
Reviews 66
I’m Emaly, and I suck at review introductions. Let’s just get down to it, shall we?

Nit picks:

DON’T GIVE US SUMMER PROJECTS.


Capital letters should only be used at the beginning of sentences and on proper nouns, my friend.




“Mom please! Don’t let me attend summer classes. I’ll never survive! Come on!” I pleaded.
Mom just stood up from the couch and smiled. “Sweetie, I think it’s for your own good too.”
I stared at the door. I’m gonna make a run for this, any second now.
“But, don’t you think that’s hard enough? I tried my best, I really did. Now, I’m going to relearn them again! Wouldn’t that sound like an insult or torture to you?”
Mom just smiled. “I think it wouldn’t be anything personal. It would be really good for you anyway. At least, you will understand your lessons very clearly.”
I ran for the door. Behind me, mother called “You are still attending that class!”


When writing dialog, each character gets their own little ‘paragraph’. I’d suggest spacing this out more.


Over all:

The character was a little dry, we didn’t really learn much about her besides the fact she’s rather whiny and childish. We didn’t even know her name for the longest time. You should also try to space out your paragraphs a little more, no one likes reading bricks.

You also have a lot of filler, you need less details and talk about the friends, more actual story.
"Even in the end --even in death-- I can't hate you." - Neri Hereford's last words.

"The Gods demand blood, for they... do not bleed." Jaska.

The Book.



I understand what you're saying, and your comments are valuable, but I'm gonna ignore your advice.
— Roald Dahl