Kozol --Chapter Sixteen-- Journal Five

One of the events that struck me in this chapter was event that happened with Damian when he was almost kidnapped in board daylight in front of his uncle's house. It was the reaction of the other children that shocked me the most while Damian was retelling his story, they understood what it meant without actually knowing the full name and the mood of the room changed almost instantaneously. Yet when Damian was done with the story, the kids went into the possibilities of why a person would take a kid. I think that while some of their ideas were somewhat realistic, its the fact that these are kids and should not be able to understand the concept.

            I am going to say that Benjamin is the most important character in the Chapter. He is 11 years old and has already had to repeat the fourth grade once. He is developmentally challenged and is unable to sit still for more than a few minutes at a time. He is important because he is the living embodiment of the phrase “Never judge a book by its cover.” Based on how he acts, one would think that he had more mental issues than what he let's on. But when Benjamin reads the Langston Hughes book and keeps on reading the poem over and over again trying to make sure that he understands what he his reading, able to pronounce and comprehend the words that he is reading. He showed Kozol that while he may have problems he is still going to learn and do the best that he can do.

The writing at its best, at least for me, is when Kozol using simple words to paint a very pretty picture. There was a time when Kozol just got done with helping the kids with their homework and they were all sitting down to eat supper, Kozol steeped outside for a breath of fresh air when he writes “After several days of snow weeping willow at the high point of the hill looks like a picture on a Christmas card. Its branches are bent down beneath big clumps that look like soft white comforters” (Kozol 213). A very serene scene for a book that is detailed on the level of poverty and what kids in neighborhood are having to deal with. I choose the quote because it reminded me that no matter how stressed out I feel or regardless of what is going on in my life that there is beauty everywhere in this world and one just has to stop and see it.