Michael Lee

Part 1
One conversation that I started was about Lucy’s connections with Levi versus her
connections with Windy. We as a group talked about some of the reasons why she trusted Levi
quicker, but why Windy was attached to her and enjoyed her company. I think that this topic is
especially important because the books core values, to me, is about acceptance and
relationships. I like that we could as a group decide how each relationship was markedly
different but also valuable to Lucy as an individual. I think that Mortiz made a really good point
about how while both relationships did totally different things for Lucy’s experience in school, it
would have been impossible for her to succeed in middle school without both of them there the
whole time.

Part 2
As a middle school student, I had a lot of friends and a large group. However, no one in
my friend group was my best friend like Lucy had with Windy, where they would do everything
together and were closer beyond the group. Because of this, I often understood how Lucy was
feeling to be left out of things. I may have been in the friend group, but struggled to connect with
a lot of people in it. Lucy did a good job of learning how to accept herself and place her
validation and need for acceptance within her own thoughts, and used the love of her friends as
supplementary, which would be helpful for any middle schooler who may feel like the world is
falling apart.
As a teacher, I think a big thing that I learned was how different teachers interacted with
students. The math teacher was calm, always helping her when she needed it and seemed like
he understood her well, despite not even knowing her condition. However, her English teacher
was very volatile and angry when she did not conform, not very accepting of her thoughts and
opinions. I understand the frustration of the English teacher, but never thought about the
reasons why someone like Lucy would turn down simple instructions. I think I learned how
valuable it is to be calming and understanding of the students, and remember that many of them
know themselves better than we do.

Part 3
I really liked that we all had pretty differing opinions on the book. Huy immediately said
he was frustrated with the book and did not enjoy reading it. When prompted more, he talked
about how there was not a lot of depth within the characters and topics produced, so it was too
easy to read, and Mortiz said that a child that she had heard read it had said the same thing. I
think I would not have thought about that, as I thought the reading was really fun and airy. It’s
important to think about how different students value different things in the reading that they do,
and not everyone reads things for the same purpose.