]]> http://wamash.com/2010/04/mrs-baldwins-booktalks-spring/feed/ 0 http://wamash.com/2010/04/bones/ http://wamash.com/2010/04/bones/#comments Mon, 12 Apr 2010 13:40:31 +0000 mrsmith http://wamash.com/?p=3638

How do you remember 19 bones and 4 joints in 7th grade? Through Music! Have a listen.

Bones Song by Susie Shepardson

Mrs. Anderson’s 7th Grade Science Class

There will be four groups of 8th grade students all led by Outward Bound staff and one Worcester Academy Faculty chaperone. Each chaperone will be blogging via their cell phones to the following blogs. Please follow along as the 8th grade class navigates their way through New York City this week.

• Mr. Smith’s Crew
• Ms. Hale’s Crew
• Mrs. Clark’s Crew
• Ms. Iaccarino’s Crew

Salifu Kamara speaks to the eighth grade.

By Molly R.

The class of 2014 just finished reading the book A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah, the story of Beah’s journey as a child soldier during the civil war in Sierra Leone as part of our African Connections unit. We were fortunate to have Salifu Kamara, another former boy soldier from Sierra Leone, come to talk to us on March 31.

The room was silent. The air was thick. We all were waiting for Salifu Kamara to speak. At first glance Salifu looks like the average college student: collared shirt and tie with a leg injury forcing him on crutches. But Salifu is far from average, for hiding behind his eyes is the haunting past of his childhood.

Salifu grew up in Sierra Leone during the civil war. He grew up in a poor house on a small farm where he had no bed and little education. But nonetheless he was happy. He would play soccer for hours on end like any other African child. When Salifu was nine, the army rebels came to his village and destroyed everything he once knew. He watched his family die, his sisters get raped, and his life change forever. Salifu became a child soldier in the rebel army at the age of nine.

While most nine-year-old children are learning how to multiply and do long division, Salifu was learning how to use a gun and how to kill. He stayed with the rebel group for about two months, making little friends along the way. The one boy Salifu was able to connect to was gruesomely ambushed while sitting next to Kamara. If there’s one thing Salifu remembers about being in the rebels’ army is that he was taught to be forceful, and was taught to kill. “My gun was my everything.” Salifu described, “Without it, you were gone.” Salifu didn’t even know what he was fighting for. It wasn’t until his arrival in the United States that he learned the war was over diamonds.

After running away from his fellow comrades, Salifu went into hiding, yet still acted as a rebel by being forceful. Not a day went by that Kamara didn’t think to himself and say, “Today I could die.” Salifu wasn’t able to escape Sierra Leone until three years ago; when he was 20 years old, he came to the United States with a few friends. Since his arrival he has been attending Clark University in Worcester, MA and enjoys speaking publically to raise the awareness of the plight of child soldiers that still exist across the world.

“Glory I lost in childhood I will regain,” Salifu says. Salifu is still haunted by his past but he’s striving to move on and make a brighter tomorrow. He likes to publicly speak in front of the younger generations to help make a difference for future child soldiers. Yet as positive as Salifu strives to be there are still moments were he becomes truly depressed. He says, “On parents day for Clark University all my friends would come introduce their families to me. Oh this is my mother and father, they would say. And I was happy for them. I was. But afterwards I went to my room, thought about my own family and cried.” At a young age Salifu was deprived of the one thing everybody needs – love. He was never able to have his mother hold him when he was scared, or tell him it was going to be okay. He had to make do for himself. “Love was forcefully taken from me,” he acknowledges. Having survived through Sierra Leone’s living Hell, Salifu has twelve goals he emphasizes people to strive for:

1. Love others as you love yourself.
2. Give to others.
3. See others for who they really are.
4. Rejoice through suffers
5. Never laugh at others
6. Be mindful
7. You can always find your way
8. Be vigilant
9. Give hope by loving others
10. Be the first voice to say no, fight for freedom from inequality
11. Be the change you want
12. Love always deeply and be there for others.

Salifu Kamara is one of the most inspirational people I have ever seen. Even throughout all his daily challenges, adapting to American culture and walking on crutches, he strives to be a good person. When people ask how he managed to turn his life around he simply replies, “I don’t know…God?” or “God brought me here.” Salifu is trying to forget the past. The people he knows from Sierra Leone he considers to be a part of his family, greeting them by “brother.” Yet the former child soldier has no desire to return to his homeland: “The trust is gone, I’m afraid if I return the rebels will show up again, burning down houses and the violence will be back.” Salifu refuses to read the book A Long Way Gone, and even though he is friends with the author, they never talk about their experiences or Sierra Leone.

Salifu Kamara is an amazing person. His personal strength and ability to love is something we should all strive for. The major issue he stressed during the presentation was your ability to love. “Just hug a child and say I love you. Kids need to be protected, and we all still need love.” Salifu has gone through hardships that my worst nightmares can’t even compare to. To embrace the world alone, with no family, is a scary thought. Yet somehow Salifu managed to overcome seeing the world at its worst, seeing suffering, villages burned, gruesome sins and his whole family gone. Salifu finds comfort in speaking publicly for he feels that the more he can educate younger generations the higher chance change will come.

When Salifu was finished with his inspiring speech, the air was once again thick and everybody sighed in relief and counted their blessings. With a thunderous applause, I think its safe to second what Salifu said and say that, “My heart is with all of Sierra Leone’s surviving refugees.”

Photo Credit: Peter Smith

The winners from Worcester Academy are:

• Ashay Athalye
• Cameron Smith
• Julian Kallanian
• Sidharth Sadhujan
• Danae Alexandrou
• Alyssa LaCoy

Recently I was given a detention for leaving campus during the academic day. I was not going to do any illegal, frowned upon, or mischievous things, I left campus simply because I had free period and a friend of mine forgot his cleats for lacrosse so we left campus to go to his house and get his cleats. I feel that this rule regarding seniors leaving campus is unfair and needs to be changed. The idea of a senior getting a detention simply because they had to go home to grab something they forgot, or because they wanted to take a quick drive to Dunkin Donuts and grab some breakfast, in my eyes is preposterous. As seniors I feel we have earned the right to leave campus as we please, as long as we are not doing anything destructive. We should be able to take the three minute drive to Dunkin Donuts and buy a coffee without worrying about getting a detention. Many seniors are responsible students, eighteen years of age, who have spent almost four years working extremely hard to expand their minds and become smarter wiser individuals and I feel that this hard work has earned us the right to leave campus without punishment. It’s not like I am asking for an extensive amount of freedom, I just want to, as a senior, have some privileges, the most important being the allowance for seniors to leave campus during the academic day. As long as seniors are not missing classes and behaving inappropriately I see no harm in allowing us to leave during extra help to get a coffee or leave during lunch to go to Regatta and buy some subs. On a different note, this rule is unfair because it negates the fact that we all forget things. We all forget things and I feel that just because someone forgets something does not mean that they should be punished for simply going home and retrieving this forgotten item. Now I understand the other side of this argument, if seniors are allowed to leave campus during the academic day they are going to behave poorly, miss classes, and do a number of other things that are looked down upon. But here is my argument, why just because one student behaves poorly do all other students have to be punished. For those students who take advantage of the rule by missing classes or leaving campus for other bad reasons take their privilege away and for the students who follow the rules and just go to Dunkin Donuts to grab a coffee or for students who forget their cleats and have to go home to get them, allow them the privilege to do so, it is only fair, as seniors I feel we have earned the privilege.

Mrs. Carter’s 7th grade advisees spent some time this week creating Valentines for residents at the Radius Health Care Nursing Home near our campus.  These masterpieces will surely bring a smile to the faces of some of our senior citizens.

Here is a brief look at some of the sports offered in the Middle School for the Winter Season.

Boys’ Basketball

The Worcester Academy Middle School Boys’ Basketball Team ended a great season last year; however, with new eight graders coming back, they have greater skills. Sam Joaquin, an eighth grader, thinks that the team will have great chemistry this year due to the eight graders, who are great leaders on the court.

When interviewed, Sam Joaquin, told us that he is excited for the up coming season and to play with his friends.  Joaquin also predicts a good season for their team, due to all the new players coming in. Sam, a“6 foot 2 monster”, says that he has a lot of trust in his eight grade teammates to lead the team to victory.

Girls’ Basketball

Worcester Academy Middle School Girls’ basketball team is currently 7-1.  The team’s captains are Alex Radel and Carly Heman. They practice four, hard times, a   week, with many drills. Many new girls to the team do not know what to during these complicated drills. Their coach, Mr. McCarthy, tries to bring drills and hard aggression to the team. The team brings great enthusiasm to every game and they give it 100 percent.   Girls’ Basketball plans on finishing the season with as many wins as possible and on bringing great success to the Middle School.

Wrestling Team

The Worcester Academy Wrestling team is having a rough start to the season going 0-3; however, they never give up and never surrender. The team is led by Byron Leigh and Johnston Wheeler, who bring experience and leadership to the mat. While some wrestlers are new to the sport, others are experienced, such as Aman “the darkness,” Byron “the freak” Leigh, Johnston “Philipe” Wheeler, Connor McCarthy, and Chris “Snappy” Hunter. The team has and will always bounce back from any loss and come back determined for victory.

During the winter months, the 6th graders in Mrs. Baldwin’s English class each chose a fiction independent read book. After completing the book, a list of eight possible projects was given to the students. The completed projects were presented in class. Click here to view the projects… and enjoy!