Lorenzo Grandison

10 Grade Reflection
th

During my 10 grade year at Vaughn I gained a lot of personality and became a better person. Mostly from the
projects I experienced throughout the year. Projects such as the Chicken Soup for the Soul project, Indian Perspective
Project and the Butterfly Project. These projects helped me understand a lot of different perspectives and understand what
was going on around the world.
th

The first project I did in my 10 Grade English class was the Chicken Soup for the Soul project. The purpose of
the project was to find someone who you were appreciative of and write about them and your previous experiences that
you have had with them that makes you appreciative of them. Doing this project helped me figure out how much of selfish
person I was. It was my job to turn that around and recognize other peoples perspectives and take their feelings into
consideration. I did so by figuring out that it wasn't all about me because by reflections on my previous experiences I
figured that I had to change my ways and it really helped me connect with people more. People were more willing to help
me with my work since I wasn't just looking for situations that just benefited me but instead both of the parties so in turn
my grades improved. For example I started keeping a planner so I would check it and then do my homework. This project
also helped me with my skills for academic success. It helped me by being able to know that it was okay to ask for help.
For most projects where I have to write a narrative about myself, it always seemed hard because I didnt know what to
write. In this case, I had to ask my English teacher for help to decide what to write on. She asked me lots of different
questions and when I answered the questions, I was able to figure out what to write about. For example, she asked who has
helped me through difficult situations throughout the few previous years. I decided to write about one of my best friends
Anthony. I wrote how we grew apart during middle school but reunited during high school. I originally thought that it was
his fault instead of blaming myself for how we didn't talk but after reflecting back I realized that it was my fault because
every time he talked to me I would be busy. Anthony and I had a conversation about it and that's how I realized this was
what he was talking about. He said how I get to busy for him but I thought he was the one too cool for me but actually I
was the one neglecting him. I ended up doing pretty well on the project; I got a B on the paper. It was an accomplishment
because at this time I wasnt really putting much effort into school. I was just trying to get by and I noticed that if I put a
little effort towards my work then I can get a better grade. So after this project I started putting a lot more effort into my
work.
th

Another project that helped me was the Butterfly Project. This project helped me understand what was going on
around the world. This project was about the people of the Holocaust. I was given a poem from a journal of a person in the
concentration camp. I was supposed to create a butterfly with images that would represent my person. I was supposed to
sympathize with person and feel their pain. Afterwards I gave a presentation about my butterfly to my English class. I
remember as I watched my classmates give their poem I felt the power of this project. At the end of my speech my teacher
told us whether or not our poet died. I happened to have one that lived but others didnt. So to represent those who died we
cut our butterflies and we hung them all around the room. There were literally 120 of the butterflies. When I came back to
school the next day after the rest of the classes had presented there were only mine and 5 others. That basically meant that
only 6 out of every 120 people survived the concentration camps. These camps were a deadly force that killed millions of
people that didnt deserve to die. This helped me open my eyes to the world and realize that the world is sometimes an
evil place but reading and hearing all of the different poems from children and adults of all ages I also learned that the
world is full of people who have great hearts and sometimes unspeakable things happen to them. It opened my eyes
because before I didnt know exactly what went on in the camps, I mean I knew that people were killed but I didnt know
how horrible it was. When I found out it was 1000 times worse than I had previously thought. Now though I have a better
understanding of what went on. Now I pay attention more to whats going around the world.
A project that really helped me understand who I was was The Ripple Effect project. The basis of the project was
to write a persuasive essay trying to persuade students to do one thing and at the end of the process we had to present it to
our classmates in the auditorium on the stage. It was a big presentation so we had to invite family members to come watch

us speak. It was a scary thought but it gave me a good college readiness skill. In college you will have to present to a lot
bigger crowd than I did but with doing this it gave me a little added confidence in my public speaking ability. I was always
scared to speak in front of crowds but now Im still a little scared but nothing as much I was before this. For this
persuasive essay I tried to convince my fellow students not to procrastinate and I also told them about my experiences with
procrastination. Even now I still am a procrastinator, its not as bad as it was. Admitting that I was a procrastinator in
front of a crowd helped me. I made sure that I try to not do things last minute by taking my time to plan out what and how
Im going to do something. For the presentation I got a perfect score because of how confident I was and the flow and
coherency of my speaking.
The last project that helped me in my 10 grade year was the Indian Perspective project. The point of the project
was to find a person who was from India who moved to the United States and ask them about the difference between
American culture and Indian culture. I learned that there are tons of differences between us but there are also lots of
similarities. This made me recognize a different perspective. In this case it was someone from India. Hardik Patel had told
me all about Indias morals of family, respect, religion, education and money. He told me how the difference of respect
between the U.S and India is outstanding because in India if you dont follow the ideas of your family then you would be
disowned. I actually agreed with him on that it seems that there is no type of respect between anyone anymore. Kids dont
listen to their parents about getting a good education but instead just try to be famous or try to get rich quick, which
doesnt usually work. This really helped my knowledge grow although. I realized that I must be more ambitious because I
have to compete with people,like Hardik Partel, who moved to America from India to make a better life for himself and his
family. He is now an alumni of UCLA. After this encounter with him I started into looking into what Im going to do with
my life. I looked into schools that I would be interested in applying to my senior year. Even though I still didnt know
what I wanted to do but I kept up my research.
th

In conclusion during my 10 grade class I learned a lot about myself the world and people around me. I learned
how to respect all three also. This was the best year for me to learn who I was and what I was about. I embraced the values
of mine that were good and took out most of the values that were bad and tried to replace them with better versions.
th