Character Extension Essay

In today’s world everyone goes through pressures, no matter who you are we all have to struggle with pressures. These pressures help you grow because while overcoming these struggles you not only learn about life but you also learn about yourself. Some of these pressures can be easy to confront, while others may be difficult. Let’s face it, no matter how hard or easy your pressure is, when you confront them it represents that you’re growing stronger mentally. Well, in the book Out of My Mind by Sharon M. Draper, Melody Brooks has a lot of pressures she has to deal with, but what stands out to me about this character is how she overcomes these struggles.

In this book Melody Brooks is a 11 year old girl who has a disability/disease called “Cerebral Palsy,” this disease affects her body movement but not her brain, which makes her have to sit in a wheelchair with a board of words to communicate with other people. All Melody wants is to communicate with her classmates, family, and other people verbally without having to point at words on a board and to just fit in with all the other people in school. But there was no way to actually make her talk and communicate to people clearly, and her classmates and everyone at school thinks she’s weird for being in a wheelchair. So she spends most of her time with her neighbour, Mrs. to study new vocabulary to make her smarter. Then using the knowledge of these words, Melody received a device that let’s her actually “talk and communicate” by a push of a button, this not only changed Melody’s life but she also got to use this knowledge to prove to people that actually she was really smart  

Throughout this book you can tell that Melody has many struggles in her life, aside from her disease another hard struggle she has is making friends. Melody only has one person who she can actually call a friend at school, and that person is Rose. Even though Melody spends most of her school day at a special class with other disabled kids, when she has a class with all the normal kids they either make fun of her or try to avoid her. Especially these two girls named Claire and Molly, but not only do these girls treat Melody badly but they also treat the other disabled kids badly. They say, “Hey Claire!” Molly said, twisting her arms above her head and bending her body so it looked crooked. “Look at me! I’m a retard!” She laughed so hard, she snorted snot. Claire cracked up as well, then let spit dribble out of her mouth. “Duh buh wuh buh,” she said, crossing her eyes and pretending to slip out of her chair.” (pg. 94.) This scene clearly shows that Claire and Molly always judge people by the way they look and not how the person acts, and also that they care more about people’s flaws instead of their own.

In conclusion of this pressure point, Melody changes mentally instead of physically. She doesn’t let people’s words hurt her too much, and accepted that she would never be like everyone else. In that way, Melody serves as a mentor for a lot of us. We need to accept ourselves for who we are even when it seems like it’s hard. So the next time you are faced with a huge pressure in your life, remember how Melody accepted herself that she will never be like everyone else and confront your own struggles.

Sportsmanship Assignment

1. Definition of Sportsmanship
Sportsmanship is when you make an effort to keep the game fair and encourage the other team/person. It is not to make the opponent feel bad about themselves or to dislike the other opponents. Sportsmanship is also about sticking to the rules. It is also not to chew on your teammates out when they messed up. It is also about respecting the referee's judgement, opponents, teammates, and yourself. Even when no one is looking you also need to be honest to not only yourself but your teammates. The Golden Rule should also be applied. And that is "Treat others the way you like to be treated."

2. Why Should You Use Sportsmanship?
I think that it's good to use sportsmanship because when you do use sportsmanship during a game you feel better about yourself when helping other people. Another reason why sportsmanship is a good thing is because when you do win or lose you can tell that you and your teammates tried your best to keep the game fair, even if the opponents won, at least you made an effort.

3.Reflect on How well you Used Sportsmanship in Badminton
I think I used sportsmanship from time to time during playing badminton with my classmates/friends. I made sure we were all playing fair, and whether my partner and I lost to the other team we would always make sure to congratulate them by saying "good job guys!" Even though we had some difficulties with agreeing on the points and who won, we talked it through quickly and got it all figured out without getting the disagreement too bad. I made sure I showed my respect to the team and my partners, by letting them serve the birdie from time to time instead of me just serving all the time. Other than a little disagreement I think I used sportsmanship pretty well.

4. List 3 Ways You and I can Show Sportsmanship in Real Life.
Well, as I said in the definition of sportsmanship, I said that you had to respect the other person. So, one way I think you could use sportsmanship in real life is probably when your playing a board game with other opponents. If you were playing a board game there are two or more opponents, so if they do lose or you lose you could let them feel better or the other opponents could compliment you even though you may not have won. But any other way you should always have a fun time without thinking whether you are going to win or lose. It's up to you, sportsmanship is if you make an effort to have a great game. Another way of showing sportsmanship in real life is in just working with a partner, for example in math you might need to work on a worksheet with your partner. Sometimes there can be two very different ways on how you find the answer, and maybe your partner got a different answer than you and you guys don't know which one is right or not. And even if your answer does happen to be the right answer you should be like "I told you so!" to make them feel bad about themselves, you should say "oh, it's okay," and make them feel encouraged to finish the worksheet. One of the last ways I think that you and I could show sportsmanship in real life is maybe you are running in a group, instead of running faster than everyone else you should wait for the others and try to keep in the same pace. And if one of those people get injured then you have to stop running and ask if that person is okay or not. Those are some of the ways you and I can show sportsmanship in real life.

5.  An Example Of Sportsmanship


In this video you can see that one of the players on the other team was injured but he still played against the other team, and when that injured player hit the basketball you can see that the opponents went up to that player and hugged him. In my opinion I think that this is a good example of sportsmanship because the other team showed that they respected and were just enjoying the game and it didn't really matter if they won or lost just as long as the injured player was okay.