Entry 1 _ Nguyễn Quỳnh Trang

Item 1 _ Short story

We never told him he couldn't do it

My son Joey was born with club feet. The doctors assured us that with treatment he would be able to walk normally - but would never run very well. The first three years of his life were spent in surgery, casts and braces. By the time he was eight, you wouldn't know he had a problem when you saw him walk.

The children in our neighborhood ran around as most children do during play, and Joey would jump right in and run and play, too. We never told him that he probably wouldn't be able to run as well as the other children. So he didn't know.

In seventh grade he decided to go out for the cross-country team. Every day he trained with the team. He worked harder and ran more than any of the others - perhaps he sensed that the abilities that seemed to come naturally to so many others did not come naturally to him. Although the entire team runs, only the top seven runners have the potential to score points for the school. We didn't tell him he probably would never make the team, so he didn't know.

He continued to run four to five miles a day, every day - even the day he had a 103-degree fever. I was worried, so I went to look for him after school. I found him running all alone. I asked him how he felt. "Okay," he said. He had two more miles to go. The sweat ran down his face and his eyes were glassy from his fever. Yet he looked straight ahead and kept running. We never told him he couldn't run four miles with a 103-degree fever. So he didn't know.

Two weeks later, the names of the team runners were called. Joey was number six on the list. Joey had made the team. He was in seventh grade - the other six team members were all eighth-graders. We never told him he shouldn't expect to make the team. We never told him he couldn't do it. We never told him he couldn't do it... so he didn't know. He just did it.

Rhetorical devices:

- Climax: unable to run=>want to make the team=>run miles a day with high fever=>make the team

- Metaphor: the boy with his unhealthy feet: humans being with their own weakness.

- Repetition: we never told him he couldn’t do it

Message: ignore the weakness of yourself and let the time prove how great you could be through your effort.

Item 2 _ Poem

A Minor Bird

I have wished a bird would fly away,

And not sing by my house all day.

Have clapped my hands at him from the door


When it seemed as if I could bear no more.

The fault must partly have been in me.

The bird was not to blame for his key.

And of course there must be something wrong


In wanting to silence any song.

Rhetorical devices:

-       Metaphor: a minor bird: loving people around

                 Sing a song: complain about things

-       Rhyme: away-day, door-more, me-key, wrong-song

Message: ignore the weakness of yourself and let the time prove how great you could be through your effort.

Item 3 _ Cartoon

Rhetorical devices:

-       Over statement: the rich man has such a big stomach which can cover the poor child

-       Irony: the rich man uses binoculars to search the poor while he is right under his stomach.

Message:  the rich eats too much that their big stomach prevents them from seeing other poor people underneath => huge gap between the rich and the poor.

Source:

http://www.ganayo.com/2012/08/20/where-is-poor/

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/a-minor-bird/

http://www.thylacineslair.com/Reflections/NeverToldHim.htm