PEER EVALUATION

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FREE REFLECTION

Nowadays, it is easily observed that there is an increasing interest in beauty. Many people want to seem more beautiful; consequently, they spend a lot of money on cosmetics and they undergo plastic surgery. There are three main reasons for the increasing interest in beauty. First of all, feeling lonely and depressed may lead to changing appearance. For example, in our daily lives, we could easily observe a woman who breaks-up with her boyfriend initially wants to alter her appearance. Due to the fact that she thinks she can deal with these feelings by changing her appearance. The second reason is the desire to attract the opposite sex; however, it is said that inner beauty is more important than physical appearance in general. Actually, in real life people unfortunately look at the physical appearance first. Thus, it is perhaps not surprising that people seek a means to alter their appearance to conform to societal ideals of attractiveness. The last and most important reason is the media. On magazines’ cover, in TV series, and in movies there are so many attractive people. They all look beautiful, charming, and flawless. When we see them, inevitably, we compare ourselves with them and we ask ourselves why we are not so beautiful as they are. Then, we are looking for ways to look beautiful. To sum up, it is certain right that there is an increasing interest in beauty and it will quite likely continue increasing day by day. 

REFLECTION TASK

Music can be defined as the nutrition for our spirits and in 2015, there was a significant musician who was listened and loved by many of us eagerly and passionately, it was Adele. After her wonderful album, 21, Adele released her new album 25, after for years, on 20 November 2015. Adele won countless awards with her album 21. In that album there were songs which remembered by many of us even now. These songs mainly “Rollin in The Deep”, and “Someone Like You”. 25 will be also considered winning many awards. In the album, 25, there were songs which will build the path taking Adele to many awards. Those are “Hello” (mainly), “When We Were Young”, and “Million Years Ago”. Towards the end of 2015, Adele released her music video for her song “Hello” which has now been watched more than a billion times. “Hello” both reached number one in the USA and UK lists which shows that she is doing pretty well in music industry. With the assistance of her amazing song “Hello”, Adele scooped up a double win at the BBC Music Awards; further cementing what's proved to be a landmark year for the artist following the release of her record-breaking album, 25. The song is already a smash, debuting at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and having the biggest sales week since Elton John's Princess Diana tribute in 1997. Adele has broken yet another record by now laying claim to the fastest video to break the 1 billion views barrier on YouTube. The singer’s video for “Hello” broke the record in 87 days, faster than Psy’s “Gangnam Style”, which was the first to reach the number, doing so in 158 days. All in all, if I had chance to choose the person of the year, I would choose Adele because she is loved and listened by many people and as an artist, she is really intelligent, emotional, and innovative in her works.

REFLECTION TASK

Freedom Writers is based on a true story. A young teacher Erin Gruwell, starring Hilary Swank, assigned to teach freshman English at Wilson High School in Long Beach, California. Woodrow Wilson High School was high-graded school before the voluntary integration program. After the voluntary integration program, it lost its successful students and its success was declined. However, Erin chose this school on purpose because of its integration program. Erin was unprepared for the nature of her classroom. Many students were in gangs and almost all of them knew somebody that had been killed by gang violence. The class also divided into groups such as Blacks, Latinos and Asians. Idealistic teacher Erin applied her own curriculum to try to get the kids to learn more about themselves and the world around them. When she wanted students to write a diary which would be not graded, the students began opening up to her. At the end of the movie, inspired by Anne Frank, Erin and her students collected journals in The Freedom Writers Diary. 

In my opinion, Erin Gruwell loves her job very deeply. She makes learning meaningful and joyful. She tries to accommodate herself the class environment. For example, she plays music on the tape and she tries to dance with the students. She also makes learning proper to the students' differences. She tries to connect lessons to students’ difficult lives and experiences. She encourages her students, motivates them. I think the most important part is that Erin Gruwell helps her students to trust themselves by believing them first. It is very significant because by doing these students feel themselves special. Erin also organizes her lessons according to the class environment. She thinks where students are coming from, what their lives are like outside of the school and how that affects their willingness to learn. In the movie, Erin accepts her students, however, the students initially do not like her, shows them respect and work hard to understand them. She is also a very devoted person. She finds a second job to meet students’ needs. She inspires students with trips to the Museum of Tolerance, Juvenile Detention Centers, and bringing speakers such as Elie Wiesel. At the end, the whole class becomes a family.

REFLECTION TASK

Nowadays, Italian cuisine is considered the most delicious food in the world. However, Japanese cuisine is becoming very famous because people are newly discovering it. Both Japanese and Italian food are tasty, famous, use basic ingredients, and include healthy and unhealthy foods, but they include different main ingredients and dishes. Also, they differ in styles of cooking. Firstly, Japanese cuisine uses basic ingredients such as rice. Their main food sushi, which is very popular, is made from rice. In addition, seafood and vegetables are as important as rice. On the other hand, Italian cuisine uses some different ingredients such as whole grains and flour. The whole grain is used in making pasta whereas pizza is based on the flour. Both of these dishes can be served without other ingredients, but pasta dishes use usually meat and vegetables particularly tomato. Second, both Italian and Japanese cuisine include healthy and unhealthy foods. However, Japanese cuisine is probably a bit healthier than Italian cuisine. Japanese are said to have the longest life expectancy in the world, consequently, many people want to eat Japanese diet which consists of mainly rice, seafood and vegetables. In contrast, Italian food contains too many calories due to the fact that they include flour, grain and too much sugar. Therefore, eating a tasty Italian dish is not always a healthy option. Finally, both Japanese and Italian food are famous and popular because of globalization. Japanese cuisine has recently become more popular than before because Japanese culture is becoming more open to the world. In addition, there are many Japanese restaurants around the world, especially in big cities such as Paris, London, Berlin, and Istanbul. On the other hand, Italian restaurants are more popular than Japanese restaurants because Italian culture has been more open not just now, but also in the past. As a result, Italian cuisine has spread around the world more largely. To sum up, as the above points illustrate, Japanese and Italian cuisine differ from each other but they are both tasty and known all around the world.