Close Reading Kathleen

In the movie, Kathleen, a girl named Kathleen lives in a large house. Her father is always out at work, and her mother is dead, so he hired a governess to take care of her. (Mrs. Feril) Kathleen dreads Mrs. Feril, and when she tells her father, he fires Mrs. Feril and hires a new governess. Mrs. Feril tells this to Kathleen, and Kathleen gets upset because she thinks the new woman will be just like Mrs. Feril. I chose to close read the relationship between Kathleen and the new governess, Matha.

Mrs. Feril has been Kathleen's governess for a long time. During all her time as the governess, Kathleen  finds that she is snoopy and untrustworthy. Mrs. Feril looks through Kathleen's room when Kathleen is out. Kathleen frequently finds Mrs. Feril looking through her things lying about it. Kathleen comes up with an idea to prove that Mrs. Feril doesn't mind her own business and looks through her things without permission. She finds a box and fills it with firecrackers. On the box she writes keep out, do not touch, private. Just like Kathleen hoped, Mrs. Feril opened the box. Later, she complained about Kathleen to Kathleen's father.

 When Kathleen hears someone new is coming to take care of her, she gets angry and kicks her dresser. When Martha comes in to meet her, she sees that Kathleen has a bruise on her foot. She helps put a band-aid around her toe. She doesn't ask any questions and doesn't say anything. Then, she introduces herself, and leaves the room. This causes Kathleen's first impression of Martha to be that she is caring, and minds her own business, unlike Mrs. Feril. Kathleen realizes that Martha is very different from Mrs. Feril, and decides to give her a chance to prove that she really is different from Mrs. Feril.

During Martha's time at the house, Kathleen asks if she can help unpack Martha's things. When she is helping unpack books, she finds Martha's initials on the inside of the front cover. The initials show that Martha is her middle name, and she has a first name starting with the letter A. She asks Martha what the A stands for. Martha decides to tell Kathleen her name, and says Angela. By telling Kathleen her first name, she proves that she is different from Mrs. Feril. Kathleen had to call Mrs. Feril Mrs. Feril. Martha lets her call her by her first name, and reveals a secret to Kathleen. By letting Kathleen call her Angela, she is showing she trusts Kathleen not to make fun of her or tease her.

By helping Kathleen with a bruise on her foot, and putting her trust in her and telling her her first name, she proves she is very different from Mrs. Feril. All Kathleen wanted was somebody she could talk to about her problems, and a good friend. Mrs. Feril was the opposite of what Kathleen needed and wanted. Mrs. Feril broke into Kathleen's room to steal things. She didn't treat Kathleen like she should have, instead she treated her like she was just a big waste of energy. Martha treats her like an equal. She tells her secrets, and gives her all of her attention. By doing that, she causes Kathleen to have an almost instant liking for her.

          After reading the story The Stolen Party, it made me think that Senora Ines was cruel and unkind and rude. Now, after rereading and focusing on certain parts of the story, i realize that what senora Ines did was very important. The story was about a girl named Rosaura, who's mother worked as a made for a rich family. Rosaura was invited to a birthday party at the house her mother works in. When she told her mother, she said that Rosaura couldn't go, but Rosaura went anyways. At the party, she learned that not everybody is the way you thought they were.
          The conversation Rosaura has with her mother, Herminia in the beginning of the book shows that Rosaura took charge over her mother instead of the other way around. Rosaura yelled at her and didn't believe a thing her mother said about the party. Her mother told her that people would treat her like the daughter of  maid instead of how she should be treated, which is as a guest. And her mother made it very clear that she didn't think fondly of rich people, which cause Rosaura to say, "Rich people go to heaven too."  
          During the party, Rosaura is convinced that her mother was wrong. She has fun talking to all the other children at the party, playing games, helping the magician, and helping Senora Ines hand out food and drinks. She tells a guest at the party that she is the daughter of the employee, and is proud of it. Even though she didn't listen to her mnother about coming to the party, she listened to what her mother told her to do once she got there.
          Once I read the end, I thought Senora Ines was terrible. Now, my views on the end have changed. Rosaura's mother told her almost exactly what would happen at the party, but Rosaura didn't believe her. She had to live through it and experience it herself for her to understand what her mother was telling her. If Herminia took charge over Rosaura and kept her from going to the party, Rosaura would have never learned about people and the way they think and feel. She wouldn't have learned that not everybody believes in equality.

         At the end of 7th grade, i read a book called Milkweed by Jerry Spinelli. I chose to write about this book because of the characters. I think that in every book, there should be at least one character that you love. In Milkweed, you love the main character, Misha. Another one of my favorite books of 2013 was Make Lemonade, by Virginia Wolff. The way she wrote parts of the book put a very clear picture in my mind. It wasn't hard to get pulled into the book for a long time.
         Milkweed is a book about a small orphan boy named Misha, who lives in Warsaw, Poland, during World War ll. He has to steel food to survive. He meets another thief named Uri, who decides to help him and take care of him. Soon, he is living with a large group of homeless boys. While he is out steeling food, he sees German soldiers invading Poland. He doesn't realize the danger he is in when they are around. Instead, he admires them and says that he wants to become a soldier when he is older. Soon, he meets Janina, a "little girl" who lives in a nice house with her big family. The book is really about the friendship between Misha and Janina. Both the characters are likable, and you are able to connect with them.
         The book Make Lemonade, by Virginia Wolff is about a girl named a girl named LaVaughn. She is very interested in school, and going to college. She had been looking forward to college for a long time, and began saving up money. In school, she sees a poster asking for a babysitter. She decides to take the job. When she goes to the address the poster had on it. She finds that she signed up to take care of the two children of a 17 year old, Jolly. She becomes good friends with Jolly and learns that she lives by herself in a small house. She was fired from her job and can't seem to get another one. The book is about the relationship between LaVaughn and the two children. I enjoyed this book because of the characters. Books need a good character to connect to and to look forward to reading about. I liked the character Jolly because of her struggles and how she handled them.