Primary School Teachers Attitudes towards Teaching and Testing Vocabulary

Introduction Research has been intensified on the teaching practice of teachers using English as a second language. The areas of research revolve from the teaching practice, writing, reading, and use of grammar, previous education background and the effectiveness of their teaching foundation (Alexander 2007).Advertising We will write a custom proposal sample on Primary School Teachers’ Attitudes towards Teaching and Testing Vocabulary specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More An analysis of primary school teachers’ attitudes and beliefs towards teaching and testing vocabulary in countries using English as their second language (ESL) have generated different attributes from scholars. According to Oppenheim, teachers using English as their second language have improved due to the level of improved research on their attitudes and beliefs (Oppenheim 2012). The augmented interest in the practices of the teachers matches the conduc tion of research on development of the teachers and their education on the diverse contexts in teaching languages. Theoretical Framework The research conducted in early 90s indicate that teaching have improved in the classrooms from improved teacher practices in matters concerning teaching practice (Resnick 2009). The learning of students in classrooms depends on the knowledge and learning practices acquired by the teachers. This point out that information is transferred from the teachers to their students and the occurrence of an error in teaching results to similar results from the students. The teachers’ beliefs and attitudes on teaching grammar and knowledge on grammar are the basic foundations on the second language teaching research (Pajares 2013). The positive attitudes and beliefs of the teachers results in better results in classrooms. The students depend on the information gathered in the classrooms; hence, their teachers offer positive attitudes and beliefs in thei r teaching to produce better and significant results.Advertising Looking for proposal on education? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More The level of acquired knowledge from the teachers’ demonstrates equivalent teaching practice. The higher the level of knowledge acquired by the teachers from the countries and areas where English is a second language the higher their level of expertise and teaching practice in the classrooms (Resnick 2009). The teachers’ knowledge and modes of teaching should be dynamic to cater for the different levels of understanding of the students and to produce clarity in the classrooms. Various research practitioners have conducted research on the teaching practices and attitudes of teachers and their use of vocabulary. According to Arends, the research on teachers using English as a second language indicates that the teachers’ use of grammar is directly proportional to their knowledge and level of active participation on individual learning (Arends 2008). Significance of Research According to research, the basis of teaching grammar and vocabularies depend on individual determination. This illustrates that the use of English as the second language does not determine the level of teaching expertise (Watkins 2007). According to research conducted on the teachers having English as their first and second language, the teachers using English as a second language have an upper hand in the provision of better learning materials and information in learning. This shows that the teachers level of determination and need to learn and teach the English language ranks his/her level of expertise higher than that of the native speakers. The use of explicit and implicit knowledge on languages is evident in this factor (Watkins 2007). The native English speakers teach English with respect to their frequent use of the language. However, the non-native teachers make the use of their learnt knowledge in their teaching practice.Advertising We will write a custom proposal sample on Primary School Teachers’ Attitudes towards Teaching and Testing Vocabulary specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More This leads to the conclusion that the teaching practice of the teachers using English as a second language is better in vocabulary and grammar than the teaching of the natives. This is the result gathered from the use of implicit and explicit knowledge in teaching practice. Effects of Second Language The review of the research conducted by different research practitioners on the knowledge of the teachers using English as second language give implications of a broad and conceptual room for further research on the same topic. From the research conducted, the teaching practice, knowledge, components used during teaching and the relationship between the modes of teaching and need to capitalize on individual improvement on le arning are the basic requirements for a successful transformation of the teaching and learning fraternity. The teachers’ knowledge is usually analyzed and based on the outcome of their teaching practice (Pajares 2013). The higher the performance levels of the students the higher the teachers’ knowledge. The detailed research on the level of knowledge in teaching practice, reading, grammar and writing has resulted in determination amongst teachers. Vocabulary teaching and learning occupies a considerable location in the teaching and learning of languages. In conclusion, the use of vocabulary in second language teaching is essential but research indicates that it does not improve in the acquisition of the second language. However, proper vocabulary teaching using relevant and improved strategies leads to better teaching and learning methods. According to Nisbett, the modes of teaching depend on the teachers’ ability to acquire knowledge and the existing level of t heir knowledge (Nisbett 2011).Advertising Looking for proposal on education? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More A clear understanding on the effects of the teachers’ knowledge on the students indicates that it is directly proportional to the students’ performance. The higher the teachers’ knowledge the higher the performance levels of the students. References Alexander, G 2007, New concept English, Longman, London. Arends, R 2008, Learning to Teach, McGraw-Hill, Boston. Nisbett, R 2011, Human inference: Strategies and shortcomings of social judgment, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ. Oppenheim, A 2012, Questionnaire design, interviewing and attitude measurement, Pinter, London. Pajares, MF 2013, Teachers’ beliefs and educational research: Cleaning up a messy construct, Review of Educational Research, vol. 62, no. 3, pp. 307-332. Resnick, LB 2009, Knowing, Learning, and Instruction, Lawrence Erlbaum, Hillsdale, N.J. Watkins, D 2007, Learning and teaching: A cross-cultural perspective, School Leadership Management, vol. 20, no. 2, pp. 161-173. This proposal on Primary School Teachers’ Attitudes towards Teaching and Testing Vocabulary was written and submitted by user Andrea Flores to help you with your own studies. You are free to use it for research and reference purposes in order to write your own paper; however, you must cite it accordingly. You can donate your paper here.

McCarthyism and The Crucible What to Know

McCarthyism and The Crucible What to Know SAT / ACT Prep Online Guides and Tips In studying The Crucible, you will inevitably be faced with questions about the play's connections to the "Red Scare" of the 1950s and the phenomenon known as McCarthyism. These connections are important because they demonstrate that The Crucible is not merely a (highly adapted) retelling of historical events but also an allegorical reference to the timelessness of certain central human flaws. In this article, I'll provide historical background on McCarthyism, tell you about Arthur Miller's personal involvement with the investigations of alleged communists in the 1950s, and explain how and why interpretations of The Crucible are so closely tied to the political attitudes and events of that decade. Background on McCarthyism Let’s start off with some background on who Joseph McCarthy was and what role he played in American politics. McCarthy was a Republican from Wisconsin who rose through the political ranks in the 1940s and was elected to the Senate in 1946. When it looked like he might not be reelected in 1950 after a few unremarkable years of service, he decided to try a new political strategy: targeting communist subversives. To see why this was even an option, you have to understand the political climate at the time. The 1950s marked the beginning of the Cold War, an era of great tension between the US and the communist USSR. Conservatives in the US feared that anyone who had any affiliation with the Communist Party was a potential threat to national security because they couldn’t be trusted to remain loyal to the US. McCarthy was able to use this fear to his advantage. On February 9, 1950, he claimed to possess a list of the names of 205 people in the US State Department who were members of the American Communist Party. The public, in the throes of a communist hysteria, demanded an investigation of these supposed agitators within the government. Though many of the people on McCarthy’s list were not, in fact, communists, he still managed to become the chairman of an organization called the Government Committee on Operations of the Senate, which proceeded to investigate "dissenters." These investigations went on for two years, during which the questioning spread to numerous government departments, and there was a continued proliferation of communist panic. This persecution of alleged subversives became known colloquially as "McCarthyism." McCarthy finally lost power in 1954 soon after proposing an investigation of the military to root out communists. President Eisenhower, who never liked McCarthy and had great respect for the military as a former commander, decided things had finally gone too far. He worked behind the scenes to discredit McCarthy. The Army sent inside information about McCarthy’s abuses of power to his critics, and a storm of bad PR finally led to the loss of his position as chairman of the investigatory committee. He died soon after in 1957, four years after the opening of The Crucible. Though the modern-day witch hunt philosophy carries his namesake, Joseph McCarthy was far from the only driving force behind the investigation of suspected communists during the Cold War. Another congressional group called the House UnAmerican Activities Committee played a similar and, some would argue, even more dramatic role at the same time. HUAC was a congressional committee originally established in 1938 with the primary goal of investigating communist and fascist organizations that had become active during the Great Depression. After World War II, as Cold War tensions mounted, HUAC became even more intent on investigating communist activities. HUAC gained significant power in tandem with McCarthy; in fact, HUAC provided inspiration for many of McCarthy’s tactics. Members of the committee were convinced that disloyal communists had managed to infiltrate the US government, educational system, and entertainment industry. Anyone deemed suspicious was issued a subpoena by the committee and subsequently questioned about their political activities and the activities of other potential subversives. People who refused to answer these questions or name any names were arrested for contempt of Congress and even sent to jail. Many were subsequently denied employment opportunities in their industries because they were universally "blacklisted" or shut out by employers who feared that hiring them would be a public relations nightmare. How did McCarthy come up with his catalog of commies? He asked everyone in Congress if he could borrow a pen. The ones who said yes were on the list. YOU WON'T TRICK ME WITH YOUR SHARING WAYS! I BUY MY OWN PENS BECAUSE I'M AN AMERICAN! Arthur Miller’s Connections to McCarthyism Arthur Miller had great distaste for McCarthy’s investigations in the early 1950s, and he claims to have written The Crucible in 1953 largely as a reaction to this tense political climate. He had become fascinated with the environment of paranoia and how it affected society as a whole. When he stumbled upon the story of the Salem witch trials, he finally came up with a way to express those themes on stage.The Crucible was also a reaction his personal disappointment at the decision of his friend, director Elia Kazan, to name some former colleagues as communists in 1952 in front of the House UnAmerican Activities Committee. Many believe The Crucible's high profile as a criticism of McCarthyism partially led to Miller’s own investigation by HUAC. In 1956, Miller was subpoenaed by HUAC after attempting to renew his passport before traveling to Belgium for the opening of The Crucible. He was suspected (not incorrectly) of possessing close ties to the American Communist Party. Miller did in fact write communist theater criticism and was a greater private supporter of communism than he portrayed himself to be at the time, but he never actually joined the party. When he appeared before HUAC, Miller refused to name anyone else who was involved in "subversive" political activities. To be fair, Miller had less at stake than many others who were called before HUAC to testify. Because he worked mainly in theater, he didn't have to worry as much about the effects Hollywood's unforgiving blacklist policy would have on his career. Miller was found in contempt of Congress for refusing to betray his peers, but the ruling was overturned two years later as HUAC lost power and relevance. Many professionals in the entertainment industry found themselves jobless in Hollywood after falling out of HUAC's good graces. The government's influence on movies at this time was much greater than it is today. The Crucible as an Allegory for McCarthyism It’s not difficult to see the parallels between McCarthyism and The Crucible's plot. The abandonment of reason in the face of hysteria is a clear common theme. Arthur Miller wrote an essay in 1996 entitled "Why I Wrote The Crucible: An Author’s Answer to Politics" that provides insight into his view of the play’s connections to the communist panic. Early in the essay, he relates the US State Department’s fear of China after the communist takeover to the fear of black magic in The Crucible. Miller writes, "There was magic all around; the politics of alien conspiracy soon dominated political discourse and bid fair to wipe out any other issue." Miller saw these sorts of irrational thought processes (weeding out officials associated with China in the US government with the goal of diminishing China’s power overall) as corollaries to the supernatural beliefs of his characters. As communist hysteria built, Miller was even more convinced that he wanted to write a play based on this form of collective insanity. He was especially fascinated by people who disagreed with the communist "witch hunt" but chose to keep their heads down and go along with it to avoid their own persecution. He writes, "But by 1950, when I began to think of writing about the hunt for Reds in America, I was motivated in some great part by the paralysis that had set in among many liberals who, despite their discomfort with the inquisitors' violations of civil rights, were fearful, and with good reason, of being identified as covert Communists if they should protest too strongly." This sort of behavior is one of the biggest contributors to the panic that grows throughout The Crucible. For example, John Proctor hesitates to expose Abigail as a fraud because he fears repercussions from the court, and Parris is eager to turn on others to preserve his reputation. In another relevant quote, Miller writes, "The Soviet plot was the hub of a great wheel of causation; the plot justified the crushing of all nuance, all the shadings that a realistic judgment of reality requires." In The Crucible, Miller translates this concept into the Satanic plot that the officials believe is at work in Salem. Danforth claims that there is "a moving plot to topple Christ in the country!" (pg. 91). Danforth also insists that "a person is either with this court or he must be counted against it, there be no road between" (pg. 87). Nuance cannot be tolerated because the people in charge feel that the stakes are too high. Communist infiltration of the US government and the Devil’s infiltration of Salem are both disastrous scenarios that must be prevented at all costs, even if it means throwing innocent people under the bus. Some people (including his former friend Elia Kazan) predictably complained that Miller’s analogy between the Salem witch trials and McCarthyism was bogus. After all, communists are real, and witches aren’t. Miller, however, says he viewed the analogy as perfectly sound. He argues that, in the 17th century, "the existence of witches was never questioned by the loftiest minds in Europe and America" because the Bible spoke of their existence. Witches were just as real to people in the 1690s as communists were to people in the 1950s. He adds, "The more I read into the Salem panic, the more it touched off corresponding ages of common experiences in the fifties: the old friend of a blacklisted person crossing the street to avoid being seen talking to him; the overnight conversions of former leftists into born-again patriots; and so on. Apparently, certain processes are universal." Miller was fascinated by what happened in Salem because of the parallels he could draw to the events of his life amidst the Red Scare. The Crucible has resonated across time because it expresses central truths about human nature. People will go to great lengths to avoid being ostracized by society, including, in many cases, betraying their true beliefs and selling out their friends. If patriotism is taken too far, it can transform itself into a hatred of "outsiders" rather than a love of political freedoms. This type of harmful attitude remains an issue in the US to this day. Why Does the Relationship Between McCarthyism and The Crucible Matter? Miller closes his essay by saying, "I am not sure what The Crucible is telling people now, but I know that its paranoid center is still pumping out the same darkly attractive warning that it did in the fifties." Though we like to think of ourselves more enlightened than the people who conducted the Salem witch trials, virtually the same course of events has occurred many times in more recent history. The fear of witches only seems archaic because most of society no longer holds serious beliefs in the supernatural. Today, scenarios like this can be even more insidious because "witch hunts" are conducted for types of people that really do exist. There were, of course, communists in the US in the 1950s, but the vast majority of them had no designs on overthrowing the US government or becoming Soviet spies. The danger lies in assuming that purely because someone holds a political or religious belief, he or she must pose a threat. People who are viewed as "other" continue to be persecuted out of fear and ignorance. The Crucible and McCarthyism can be compared to other modern forms of rumor, persecution, suspicion, and hysteria such as: The AIDS scare in the 80’s and 90’s Fear of terrorism in the past 15 or 20 years and how that’s affected US views and policies The Obama "birther" movement The many rumors perpetuated by gullible people on social media Afterword: Discussion Questions Now that you've read the article, you can try your hand at answering some of these discussion questions. I've included a few different types of questions on this topic that you might encounter in your English class: Discuss how Miller’s point of view influences the reading of the play. How did his own experiences shape his writing? Where does "fear" come from? Why, as a nation, do we fear others? Why, as individuals, do we fear others? Describe the political climate of the 1950s. Why did Senator McCarthy become a powerful figure? How did he influence politics in the fifties? As a socially conscious writer, Miller intended this play as a comment on McCarthyism. What are the parallels between the incidents Miller dramatizes and the acts of Senator McCarthy in the 1950s? Compare the events of the play to other historical or current events where innocent people are used as scapegoats. Is this a timeless cautionary tale? What's Next? Check out our full book summary of The Crucible so you can see for yourself how the play fits into its historical context. Need some quotes to fill out your essay for English class? Read this article for a list of all the most important quotes in the play, categorized by theme. To fully understand the messages of The Crucible, you need to get to know the main characters. We've written detailed character analyses for Abigail Williams, Rebecca Nurse, Mary Warren, John Proctor, and Giles Corey. Interested in what witchcraft and magic in America looked like in the years leading up to the publication of The Crucible? Learn who Aleister Crowley was and what influence he had on counter-culture with this article. Want to improve your SAT score by 160 points or your ACT score by 4 points? We've written a guide for each test about the top 5 strategies you must be using to have a shot at improving your score. Download it for free now:

Concept paper Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Concept paper - Assignment Example The need for able leadership in the retail sector was upheld in the ‘Retail Davos’- the Retail Leadership Forum held on the 13th and14th of September 2011. This event hosted by the global business advisory giants like Goldman Sachs, Korn/Ferry International and OC&C Strategy Consultants, discussed the role of leadership in the modern era of retailing. According to the speakers at the forum, the retail leaders in future will require â€Å"a new set of leadership skills in order to adapt to the changing dynamics in the fact paced industry.† (Harrison, 2011) This has become a pressing issue on the regional as well as global level. And this is what makes this research problem a matter of substantial business interest. In the present business era marked by fierce competition, many global and local retailers are awakening to realize their most critical survival challenge in the forthcoming years. Already caught in the cobweb of competition, pricing, consumer preferences and global extension, the new challenge that has baffled the retail industry is the need for competent leaders. (Florida, 2006; Higgs, 2001; Stalk, 1992) The retail heads across the world have understood that in order to achieve successful organizational growth, it is vital to find and engage the right leadership. (Lengnick-Hall, 2003; Shim, 2002) Studies in retail leadership conducted by Korn/Ferry in collaboration with the World Retail Congress have shown that the lack of right leadership talent can severely affect the development and expansion of retailers, thereby hampering their business growth. (Morel-Curran, 2008) My study looks forward to critical evaluating the need for restructuring of leadership training in retail managem ent. The research methodology to be used is a quantitative study with a quasi-experimental design and the method to collect data will be through surveys. The purpose of the study is to critically evaluate the need for restructuring of leadership training in retail

Labor Boss Sees Racism in Romney Welfare Attacks Essay - 1

Labor Boss Sees Racism in Romney Welfare Attacks - Essay Example In preparation for the upcoming presidential election in the United States, Schlesinger has purposely written and published this article to make his target audiences realize that racism still exists in the U.S. politics. According to Schlesinger, Hoffa revealed that the Republicans’ â€Å"race baiting† attack on President Obama is just one kind of political strategy used to manipulate the voters’ decision on who to vote for in the upcoming presidential election (Schlesinger). By letting the target audiences know about the racism strategy used by the Republicans, the author could somehow remind the people to disregard the presidential candidates’ color and race when choosing the best candidate for the upcoming U.S. presidential election. To be able to determine what racism is really all about, it is necessary to define the term â€Å"racism†. According to Fredrickson (189), racism can be defined as â€Å"the doctrine that a man’s behavior is determined by stably inherited characters deriving from separate racial stocks and usually considered to stand to one another in relations of superiority and inferiority.† It means that racism is all about developing an ideology that makes men become prejudiced against another person due to their racial differences. During the class discussion, it was mentioned that there is a strong racial discrimination that is going on between the white and black Americans. In most cases, it is the white Americans that are considered more superior as compared to the black Americans. Since it is the white Americans who have a higher status in the society, it is the black Americans who are often at a disadvantage when it comes to political agenda. This partly explains why James Hoffa has been defending President Obama from the Romney-Ryan’s group and the Republicans. In class, it was mentioned that the U.S. historical trend, common beliefs, and practices have something to do with racis m. For example, based on the U.S. history, it is the African Americans (blacks) who once became the slaves. For this reason, a lot of the white Americans have developed the wrong perception that the African Americans are less superior in terms of knowledge, power, and financial capabilities as compared to them. In reality, there are some African Americans who are better than the white Americans in terms of knowledge, fame, and financial capabilities. Despite the continuous promotion of diversity in the school, there are still people who are unconsciously being racist. With regards to the case of Obama’s administration, a lot of people are continuously blaming him for the downfall of the U.S. economy. Is the U.S. experiencing a slow economic growth simply because America is being ruled under the leadership of the first black American president? Would the process of having a white American president be enough to make this country regain its economic stability in both the domest ic and international market? Or is it because most people in America have failed to develop their knowledge and skills in accordance to what is being in demand in both domestic and the world market? Based on the real-life scenarios presented in this paper, it is clear that the presence of racism could only disrupt the peace and order in our society.  

Fiction and Literary Works Essay Example for Free

Fiction and Literary Works Essay With that said, it is important to remember that all literary works cannot always be easily classified into a single genre. Moreover, literary works which might be classified as belonging to one genre might possess many qualities more typical of other genres. For example, Shakespeare’s Macbeth is classified as drama, but in many respects takes the form of poetry. In other words, sometimes the differences between categories like drama, poetry, and the short story are not so easily defined. Often a short story might contain poetic or dramatic qualities, or a poem might include narrative and dramatic features. In your post, summarize the major similarities and differences between the forms of drama, poetry, and the short story. Demonstrate your ideas with textual examples from the course readings. In your response, include at least one example of each literary form. If you wish, you may also point to examples which indicate the blurring of literary genres (e.g., the poetic qualities of Macbeth or the dramatic elements of Gift of the Magi). There are so much to say when it comes to similarities with drama, poetry and a short story. Personally I see that all three have some subliminal message for the audience whether it is lessons learn or an experience personal to the writer. In literary perspectives, like mentioned above, sometimes a poem or short story can merge with another genre such as drama. An example of a short story that can be drama is perhaps â€Å"The Necklace† because the story is about a lady who borrows and loses something her friend lent her and went through so much trouble to replace it instead of coming clean with the friend. A drama is meant to have characters that perform and we see this is a short story known as â€Å"I’m Going† where we see the characters clearly speaking and also we get narrative information to help the audience understand the plot and setting. Poetry is written in different formats or rhythms but can also tell a story but does not always have a plot. All have some sort of tone to set the seriousness or relax humor of the literary work. â€Å"My Papa’s Waltz† is a poem which tells a story of a father and son yet there are also dramatic features as the story is told.

Baden-Powell :: essays research papers

Robert Stephenson Smyth Baden-Powell, more affectionately known as "B.-P.", was born in London, England, on February 22, 1857. At the age of 12 he received a scholarship from Charterhouse School, one of England's famous public schools. The school was then located in London, but it soon moved to Godalming in Surrey. There were some woods just outside the school, these were "out- of-bounds" for the pupils. It was here that B.-P. practised stalking wildlife. He is said to have snared rabbits and cooked them over a small fire so that smoke didn't give him away to the school masters. (This was to be valuable training for later in his career.) Choosing a military career, B.-P. served in campaigns in India, Afghanistan and South Africa. He became world famous during the Boer War for the defense of Mafeking, a small town in South Africa. With 800 men, he was besieged by a force of 9,000 Boer soldiers. His small force held out against these immense odds for 217 days -- until a relief column of British soldiers arrived. At Mafeking B.-P. organized his "Messenger Cadets". Trained in efficiency, obedience and smartness, they performed many tasks -- relieving soldiers for active defense of the town. After the Boer War, B.-P. organized the South African Constabulary and designed a uniform for them that later became the basic Boy Scout uniform. While still in Africa, B.-P. wrote "Aids to Scouting" -- a manual designed to train soldiers to become army scouts. Many youth and organizations in Britain used ideas from this manual as the basis of adventurous programs. He discussed this matter with Sir William Smith, the founder of the Boy's Brigade, and other leading youth workers. He planned a camp to test his program ideas. The camp was held from July 25 to August 9 in 1907 on Brownsea Island. The "Scoutmaster" was Lt.-Gen. Robert Baden- Powell. His assistants were B.W. Green, H. Robson and P.W. Everett. The camp was a tremendous success. Based on this experiment B.-P. wrote his book "Scouting for Boys" which was published in 6 parts starting in January, 1908. It has been printed in many editions -- the current edition is the last one edited by B.-P. By the end of 1908 this book was translated into five other languages. The sketches in the book were all done by B.-P. -- most of them based on his own exciting career. In 1909, King Edward VII, who had taken a great deal of interest in this new Movement, made the founder a Knight in recognition of his work for boys. At this time B.-P. was Inspector General of

Human Nature Essay

Human nature is based on self-preservation and selfishness in both Rashomon by Ryunosuke Akutagawa and The Lottery by Shirley Jackson. In The Lottery human nature is selfish because they kill someone in the community for their own personal gain. Selfishness also has a negative effect in Rashomon due to the harmful extremes the servant takes to stay alive. The way human nature is portrayed in these two stories is sometimes similar to the way people act in real life. In Rashomon the servant turns into a thief for the purpose of staying alive. He knows better than to steal from a woman who is already poor and living amongst corpses but he steals from her anyway. He tries to justify his actions when he says â€Å"You won’t blame me, then, for taking your clothes. That’s what I have to do to keep from starving to death. † His words show that he knows what he is about to do is wrong, but stating his reasons for why he needs to do it makes him feel better. At the beginning of the story he has no intentions of becoming a thief. Soon he realizes how bad his conditions are, this weakens his morals and his first priority becomes survival. This shows that when it comes to staying alive people become selfish and less concerned with other humans well being. Humans will go to extreme measures to get what they need even if that involves harming others. This story uses a lot of animal imagery to show how people become violent and tend to forget their morals when it comes to survival, it becomes almost like â€Å"dog eat dog. † An example of this is when the woman is picking hair out of the corpses to make a wig in hopes of selling it for money; this behavior is animal like. Why is it that people resort to crimes and immoral acts before considering other options when it comes to survival? In The Lottery the community is selfish because they sacrifice someone so their crops will grow. They need their crops to flourish so they will not go hungry; this is a form of self-preservation. In real life we have laws to stop people from committing various crimes. In The Lottery there are no laws to stop them from acting like animals and stoning each other. The fact that we have laws proves that we have them because some people do not have morals or choose to ignore them in certain circumstances. Laws were created to keep communities in order and civilized. Self preservation makes people forget about the well-being of others and instead focus on themselves. We see this in The Lottery when it says, â€Å"Mrs. Delacroix picked up a rock so large she had to use both hands to lift it. † In the beginning of the story Mrs. Delacroix and Mrs. Hutchinson are friends but at the end of the story when it comes down to her crops flourishing or her friend; Mrs. Delacroix is selfish and stones Mrs. Hutchinson to death. This example shows people are selfish and put their own needs first. Another example of this is when Mrs. Hutchinson say’s â€Å"it’s not right, it isn’t fair†, she is not talking about the lottery she means it is not fair that she was chosen. She would have no problem stoning someone else to death so that she could live and her crops could flourish. Human nature is portrayed the same way in Rashomon and The Lottery. In both stories the people are selfish and harm other people to benefit themselves. In Rashomon he beats up a woman and steals her clothes so he can survive and in The Lottery the community kills Mrs. Hutchinson so their crops will flourish. Their reason for being so selfish is self-preservation. The servant doesn’t want to die so he steals from a woman who has less than him. The community in The Lottery needs food to survive so they take part in the lottery. In both stories the people act like animals because they have no laws or rules to stop them from doing so. The difference between these stories is that in Rashomon it is only two people acting immoral but in The Lottery a whole community is acting uncivilized. In both stories human nature is portrayed negatively. In comparing this to current times, I find that Hurricane Sandy brought out the worst and the best in people. I live in a waterfront community that was badly affected by the hurricane. Some people’s homes were destroyed or flooded but that didn’t stop people from robbing homes in my neighborhood. At night we had police driving around with spotlights checking on homes and properties. Some people chose to steal generators right off others driveways. News reports talked about opportunist who broke into damaged businesses and stole whatever they wanted. Criminals broke into flooded homes and took what little salvageable items were left. When faced with a problem people have the option to rise to the occasion or not too. Unfortunately more people choose not to. This is what makes human nature selfish for the most part. After reading the newspaper this morning stealing generators seems pretty insignificant. I came across a story I can’t seem to get past. The Sandy Hook elementary school shooting in Newton Connecticut. I cannot understand how someone could go into an elementary school and shoot innocent children for their own selfish reasons. I cannot comprehend how someone could kill his or her own mother over a petty argument and feel no guilt. It scares me to know we live in a generation where human nature is so selfish that sending your children to school has become dangerous. Because human nature is so selfish children at such a young age are exposed to so much hatred. No six or seven year old should have to watch their classmates die for no reason other than the killer was simply having a â€Å"bad day† and needed to take his anger out on someone. The one aspect from this story that shows me human nature is sometimes still selfless is Victoria Soto. Victoria hid her students in closets and other spaces so the killer could not find them. When the killer approached her classroom door and asked where her students were she replied the gym; she was then shot. Victoria Soto may not have been able to save herself but she saved an entire classroom of innocent children. It is sad that a horrific event like this needs to take place before human nature changes because for twenty-seven children it’s a day too late. In both Rashomon and The Lottery the people go to immoral extremes for selfish reasons. In The Lottery the community stones someone for their own personal gain. In Rashomon the servant harms a woman in worse conditions than him self for the means of survival. The way human nature is negatively portrayed in these two stories is unfortunately similar to the way people act in real life.