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What Is Your Life's Blueprint?

1/16/2011

7 Comments

 
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What Is Your Life's Blueprint?


Six months before he was assassinated, King spoke to a group of students at Barratt Junior High School in Philadelphia on October 26, 1967.



I want to ask you a question, and that is: What is your life's blueprint?

Now each of you is in the process of building the structure of your lives, and the question is whether you have a proper, a solid and a sound blueprint.

I want to suggest some of the things that should begin your life's blueprint. Number one in your life's blueprint, should be a deep belief in your own dignity, your worth and your own somebodiness. Don't allow anybody to make you feel that you're nobody. Always feel that you count. Always feel that you have worth, and always feel that your life has ultimate significance.

Secondly, in your life's blueprint you must have as the basic principle the determination to achieve excellence in your various fields of endeavor. You're going to be deciding as the days, as the years unfold what you will do in life — what your life's work will be. Set out to do it well.

And I say to you, my young friends, doors are opening to you -- doors of opportunities that were not open to your mothers and your fathers — and the great challenge facing you is to be ready to face these doors as they open....

And when you discover what you will be in your life, set out to do it as if God Almighty called you at this particular moment in history to do it. Don't just set out to do a good job. Set out to do such a good job that the living, the dead or the unborn couldn't do it any better.

If it falls your lot to be a street sweeper, sweep streets like Michelangelo painted pictures, sweep streets like Beethoven composed music, sweep streets like Leontyne Price sings before the Metropolitan Opera. Sweep streets like Shakespeare wrote poetry. Sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will have to pause and say: Here lived a great street sweeper who swept his job well. If you can't be a pine at the top of the hill, be a shrub in the valley. Be be the best little shrub on the side of the hill.

Be a bush if you can't be a tree. If you can't be a highway, just be a trail. If you can't be a sun, be a star. For it isn't by size that you win or fail. Be the best of whatever you are.

— From the estate of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

 

Final thoughts:

I believe that this speech made by Martin Luther King Jr. is important because it talks about your life's blueprint. You're at an age where you should be thinking about your future.  This speech makes you think about your future plans and the different opportunities that we now have.

 

Extra Credit Questions - you may answer on the blog or hand me your answers on looseleaf on Tuesday.  Extra credit will be given on how completely you answer the following questions:

1. After reading the speech "What's your life's blueprint?" by Martin Luther King Jr., what is your life blueprint??

2. How has this speech affected you or your future plans?

3. What are your final thoughts about these speech?


7 Comments

*** EXTRA CREDIT - Let's Start At The End! ***

7/27/2010

15 Comments

 
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History is usually taught is chronological order, from the beginning to the end of time.  Well, it's the summer, so let's do things a little backwards!

Do you all know who Billy Joel is?  For those of you who don't know him (shame on you), he's one of the most famous singer/musicians ever (was biggest in the 1980s -- you know, back in my day).  Anyway, Billy Joel often said that he wanted to be a history teacher, mainly because being a history teacher is waaay cooler than being a famous musician.  OK, I made that last part up, but he did want to be a history teacher.  Because of this, in 1989, he decided to write a song called "We Didn't Start The Fire."  In this song, he writes about what he feels are the most important people/events of the past 40 years of history (1949-1989).  Basically, it's a stream of consciousness list of events that Billy Joel thought were the most important events of the past -- events for which he didn't feel his generation was responsible.  Thus the chorus of the song, "We didn't start the fire, It was always burning since the world's been turning."  Many of the references are to the Cold War, a problem that his generation inherited, which we will study toward the end of next year.

Here is what you need to do to get extra credit.  You need to pick five different people/events/things from the different decades (one from the 1940s, one from the 1950s, one from the 1960s, one from 1964-1989, and whatever other one you like).  The event has to relate to WORLD history, NOT U.S. history.  There are many references to U.S. history, actors, musicians, baseball players, etc. - I'd like you to focus ONLY on the references to things that happened outside the U.S. (the same way that you can't write about the U.S. on the regents exam next year!)  There are a few things I'd like you to do with this video:

Pick a total of 5 people/events.  For each one, answer the following questions:

1.  What is the person/event/thing Billy Joel refers to?
2.  What year does it take place?
3.  What is the historical significance of the person/event/thing?  In other words, what was special/significant about it?
4.  Why do you think Bill Joel chose to include it in his song?  
5.  (Only answer this once, not for each)  Think about events that have occurred since 1989 (the year the song was written).  If you were to continue his song, what 3 events would you add?  Why?

Please answer ALL questions for the event/person you've picked.  DO NOT PLAGIARIZE from wikipedia or any other source.  Answer the questions in your own words.  You'll get extra credit for every event/person that you answer ALL of the questions for -- no partial credit.

All answers should be written on this blog, as a posting.  In order to post something, click on the "0 Comments" at the upper right hand side of this posting (under the heading of this post).  You will need to put in your name and comments in the comments section.  Then hit "submit."  If you have any problems figuring this out, just email me at mcohen@gmail.com.


I STRONGLY suggest that you write down your answers somewhere else first (by hand or in Word) and save them there.  Then cut and paste them onto the blog.  That way, if the posting doesn't go through for some reason, you'll have it saved to cut and paste again.  You will all be able to see one another's answers.  I will email you to confirm that I received your comments and add in any other comments I have.

The deadline for this assignment is midnight on September 7.  

Below are links to two different versions of the video -- you might want to look at both of them before you begin:

http://www.teacheroz.com/fire.htm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m50p-XScreM&feature=related


NOTE:  The odds are pretty slim that I'll be giving you any extra credit during the year (it's 11th grade now, so I just expect you to do your work and get a good grade, without extra credit), so you should take advantage of the extra credit while I'm in happy-go-lucky summer mode!  Enjoy the summer (and if you haven't started your English journals, start them!  Let's surprise the heck out of Mr. Lamb and all hand them in on time!)

15 Comments

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    It's me.  Ms. Cohen.  I'm the author.  You know too much about me already.  I'm not telling you any more.

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