Final Moments...

What surprised me the most about the book was the ending because I didn't think that the Wave members were going to react the way they did, when Mr. Ross said that the Wave was over. I thought that they were going to start a riot or attack Mr. Ross. But they just sat there in shock and nobody said nothing. The two major themes in the book from me is conformity and upstander. Why?? because almost everybody in the school conformed into being a Wave member. Also conformity was all over the book. Like when the wave began in Mr. Rosses class nobody objected or questioned him. Then upstanders because Laurie didn't believe what Mr. Ross was doing is good because everybody is in a trance.

I have learned from reading this book that something like the Holocaust can happen again anywhere at any time. I have learned from blogging how to write a better paragraph that is good to read. Also a projected like this is important for teenagers to be apart of because they can learn lots of stuff from blogging a reading a novel. Finally I want to give a thanks to all the contributors that replay to my blog post.

Final Thoughts

I really liked The Wave. It was really interesting to learn about how a teacher tried an experiment on students and almost brainwashed the whole school and they would follow it. It was crazy to see how some of the people would change because of the wave. I was really surprised that they did stop the wave at the end. One major theme for the book is conformity. Because almost the whole school followed the wave. Every time somebody joined the wave their friend could have followed the wave too. This is why the wave was so powerful more and more people would join.

I have learned that a lot of times when events happen people change. Like in the story laurie was the one that didn’t change but she knew what was going on. I have learned from this blogging assignment that it helps you understand the book a lot better and you could get a lot more into it. This project is important for teenagers because it helps understand what really went on during the Holocaust. You understand things a lot better because you try to find themes while you’re learning about it.

Final Thoughts about the Novel

The end of the book surprised me because everyone took it so well after being so into it. Everyone took it so seriously, but people didn’t seem to mind that Ben was ending it. It’s like they were already thinking about ending the Wave, like they already dealt with the emotions. One major theme that stood out to me was ‘Upstanding’ because there were multiple times where there were moments of upstanding. Some moments of upstanding were when the anonymous student wrote the letter to the Grapevine staff. The student was speaking out by writing the letter to tell what happened to him, and not keep quiet, just to be a bystander. Laurie throughout the novel spoke out against the Wave. Laurie wrote articles, saying the Wave is bad, she went to Ben with David to tell him about it. Last. Ben’s wife, Christy, kept telling him to stop the Wave on many occasions.

My final thoughts on this  project are that power can go to anyone's head, even though that they have a plan. A project like this is important for teenagers to become a part of because they can learn a lot from reading a nonfiction book, and doing blog posts so they can analyze what they’re reading so they have a deeper understanding of that/those topic(s).  Also another thing that teenagers can pull from a project like this is that some things that they read, is things that they never thought about, or knew before, so there knowledge will grow from what they already knew.  Also, I would like to thank all the people who contributed to the blog, I think that you gave thoughtful feedback with your comments about what you agreed and disagreed with, what you thought about what we were writing, and everything in general.

Final Thoughts on the Novel

Final Thoughts

What surprised me the most was when everyone got into the wave, and that their was no leader, and Ben said that the wave was going to end. He said that it had no leader, and Hitler was the leader, and since Hitler was dead  there was no more leader, so it had to end. This part surprised me the most, because since one person can’t be there to lead it, that does not mean that there can’t be another leader. This also surprised, because I thought that the when the seniors were trying to get them to join. Also many people just followed people, and just went along with them and joined the wave.

My final thoughts on the novel is that I thought that the wave was going to go on forever, and it would never end, because people just kept on joining and it seemed like it was going to be a life long thing. What I have learned from reading this book, is that people might try and get you into stuff that you don’t want to do. What I have learned from doing this blogging project is that people are interested in contributing to you when their is something that seems interesting to them. When you write a lot of stuff, and when you put pictures, it draws in more people. This is a project that teenagers should be apart of, because this could teach people rights from wrong. wave was going to go on forever, and more and more people would be joining , and the wave experiment would be doing way more stuff than it had been. I liked this book, because it was a very interesting book to read, and it was easy to understand. One major theme that encompasses the whole novel is, conformity, because people went along and joined the wave

The Letter.

‘Dear Editors of The Grapevine,

This is a story I have written for  The Grapevine. Don’t bother looking for my name because you won’t find it. I don’t want my friends or other kids to know I wrote this.

Welcome to the Wave - or Else

I’m a junior here at Gordon High. Three or four days ago me and my friends heard about this thing called The Wave that all the seniors were getting into. We got interested. You know how juniors always want to be like the seniors.

This senior started telling us how great The Wave was. He said that the more kids who joined, the better it would get. He said almost all the seniors at school had joined and most of the juniors too.

Pretty soon my two friends who said first they didn't know changed their minds and said they wanted to join. Then the senior turned to me. “ Aren't you going to stick with your friends?” he asked.

I told him they were still my friends even if I didn't join. He kept asking me why I didn't want to join. I told him I didn't feel like it.

Then he got mad. He said pretty soon people in The Wave wouldn't want to be friends with people who weren't in it. He even said I’d lose all my friends if I didn't join. I think he was trying to scare me.

But it backfired on him. One of my friends said he didn't see why anyone had to join who didn't want to. My other friends agreed and we left.’

It takes lots of guts to turn down someone older or somebody that is in higher authority than you. Also if your friends are joining and you aren't. It will make me feel like I’m a loner or like an outcast that I’m not with everybody else. So it take a lot of courage to say “no”. Especially if it’s to somebody you look up to like in this kids case a senior.

This quote reminds me of resistance and up-stander because the anonymous writer resisted the seniors offer on join the Wave. Then his friends were up-standers and left when he threatened the kid and they all left.  This reminds my of the resistance that occurred in Poland, Warsaw ghettos.  They attacked the Nazis from building tops and jumped from building to building. The Nazis had to level the whole city to get the resistance people out. After that they killed everyone who resisted.

Power Is Taking Over

“‘Mr. Ross,’  said Laurie, ‘we know how important this is to you-but  it’s gone too far.’ David added, ‘It’s taken over, Mr. Ross. You can’t say anything against it. People are afraid to.’ ‘The kids at school school are scared,’ Laurie told him. ‘They’re really scared. Not only to say anything against the Wave, but of what might happen to them if they don’t go along with it.’ Christy told him and thought back to the original goals of the experiment, then the fears Laurie and David spoke of confirmed that the wave was a success.” - The Wave, p. 124

This reminds exactly of the poeple during the  Holocaust were scared to go against the Nazis. People were scared that if they helped the Jews that it they would have to face consequences with the Nazis. The Wave took over the school just like the Nazis did and everybody was scared about what was going to happen. I think it’s crazy that somebody is trying an experiment that showed what life in Nazi Germany was like that took over the whole area. This experiment shouldn’t be tried with these kids they are getting scared to go against it the don’t want to have something bad happen to them.

This quote reminds conformity, fear, power, and resistance. Conformity means to follow somebody else and in this quote it shows that the Wave is a successful experiment because everybody is following it so more people are getting caught up in it. Just like when you have a friend and he decides to be someone who is bad you might try and follow him because you think it’s the right thing to do. This shows a lot of fear to me because students are scared to go against the wave which also reminds me of resistance because resistance means you want to go against but they fear facing the consequences. It’s like resisting to fight someone but you fear of getting made fun of. Also, in the Holocaust people wanted to help the Jews but they would fear what the Nazis would do to them so they resisted helping Jews. It also, shows power because the Wave had too much power because almost the whole school followed it so it would take a lot to end it because so many people just got so caught up in it.

Dead Leader? Taking it Well?

“There!” Ben shouted at the auditorium full of students. “There is your leader!”- p. 139

My reaction to this quote is that I didn’t see it coming. It’s a picture of Hitler, and Ben is saying that it’s their leader. Hitler is dead, but somehow he’s their leader. Unless  if he influenced them that much, that he became a leader again that couldn’t lead. My reaction to the end of the book was that everyone took it well. Almost everyone was really into the Wave, and I thought that at least someone would stand up to sat not to end it. Another thing I was surprised about was when Ben put up a picture of Hitler on the projector from the movie that Ben showed only a few weeks before and said

A theme I can connect the end of the book to is ‘identity and individuality’ because Ben is giving it back to them by ending the Wave. I think this because Ben is trying to make things right and stop things from getting worse. Examples are: the kid being beat up that religion was Jewish, because of resistance; forcing people to join or else; etc. Another theme I can connect to is ‘upstanding’ because Laurie was upstanding for most of the Wave once she saw what going on; David once he got over came with anger and pushed Laurie; and the anonymous kid who wrote the letter the senior asked him to join, and then tried to force him; and Ben’s wife, Cristy. I think this because there’s a few people who are going against it one way or another because they realized that the Wave isn’t what most people think, it also has a bad side to it.