Henry David Thoreau’s Walden, Jon Krakauer’s Into The...

Henry David Thoreau’s Walden, Jon Krakauer’s Into The Wild, and Werner Herzog’s Grizzly Man all tell the stories of a real-life character that makes the decision to venture out into the wilderness on his own. On one hand, Chris McCandless (Into The Wild), Timothy Treadwell (Grizzly Man), and Thoreau are similar in several ways. All three men record some kind of documentation about their journey; McCandless and Thoreau keep journals while Treadwell keeps a video log. Also, all three forced themselves to really live off the land using only the bare minimum of essentials. On the other hand, the men had several differences. In two of the stories, Into The Wild and Grizzly Man, the main character perishes as a result of his choice to live this†¦show more content†¦Having graduated high school and college, McCandless viewed the world as too materialistic and gave no importance to titles and honors. In addition to this, he felt quite distanced from his parents, especially his father. He wanted to prove to his family and to himself that he could be someone and do something significant; taking a trip into the wild was the best way he knew how. McCandless made a choice that ultimately led to his death in Alaska. Unlike Treadwell, he was not forced into the woods by his wants and needs. Had he chosen one of his many other options, he would almost certainly be better off. Because he was unhappy with society and its culture, McCandless might have tried moving abroad. Other continents have vastly different cultures than the United States and he may have appreciated a change in culture and scenery. Moving and succeeding in a new place would also demonstrate to everyone his ability to do something significant on his own. Instead of going on a reckless trip into Alaska fatally unprepared, McCandless could have saved his own life by considering and choosing another option. He could have accomplished everything he wanted to by just slightly altering a traditional life and avoiding drastic measures. Henry David Thoreau had more options than Timothy Treadwell, but not quite as many as Chris McCandless. Also, Thoreau’s reasons for going into the wild had less support than both Treadwell’s and McCandless’s. At some point, Thoreau

Abstinence Should Not Teach Students Safe Sex Practices

When people of today’s world turn on the television, it is easy to see why modesty is out the window. A good portion of the television shows aired have sexualized content, from sexual innuendos in jokes to portraying characters in the act. With this being a known fact, there is no doubt that sex education is important. However, schools are teaching more on the abstinence spectrum. Preaching abstinence does not teach students safe-sex practices or a clear understanding of contraception. Abstinence-only programs have the best intentions, however they are flawed due to a biased perspective. In the year of 1996, the United States government passed a bill that funded states who offered abstinence-only programming in public schools. Ever since†¦show more content†¦Schools receiving money from the government, in sponsorship of the program, must teach the students to â€Å"just say no† to sex until legally married. The schools are also not permissible to teach students safe sex and â€Å"may not mention contraception except to point out failure rates of various methods† (Brody). There are a few states that have stood up to the government and refused funds, so the state has the option to determine their own ways to teach sex education. However, 43 states still take part of the program and promote it. Millions of dollars are pulled from the government each year for the program and many schools support the abstinence-only movement. The programs have encouraging titles, such as â€Å"Teens in Control† and â€Å"ReCapturing the Vision† (Impacts). Students are greatly encouraged take virginity vows until marriage, carry an ATM card (abstinence till marriage), and conceitedly wear â€Å"purity† rings (Kelly). Programs, such as these, are used to develop a strong self-worth and to teach about the negative consequences that could occur from sexual activity, but there is a major flaw: abstinence-only programs are inefficient. S tudies have shown abstinence-only programming does not reduce the sexual activity of young people. In 2007, the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) released a study about the abstinence programs. The government-funded study

Smile And War Essay Example For Students

Smile And War Essay This story describes a place where war has destroyed civilization and created aruined landscape with people taking shelter wherever they can; ? ? citiesall junk, roads like jigsaws from bombs, and half the cornfields glowing withradioactivity at night ? First, the characters do not have much, if any,money to buy clothes or food; ?the soiled gunny sack clothing of themenit sold for a penny a cup, but not many were buying, not many had thewealth.? Tom and his family are no exception; ?in half silo, in that partthat still remained upright, he heard the sounds of sleeping, his family?Also, before the war the characters were probably farmers and factory workers. The war destroyed most of their workplaces and what was left they destroyedthemselves; ? ?there was that time they smashed a factory that was stilltrying to turn out airplanes. ? Furthermore, the characters are all verybitter about the ghastly world they live in, and destroying things is their onlyentertainment; ? ?Lord did we feel good blowing it up! ? Finally, thereis no civilization; there is no structured government and any attempteddictation results in chaos; ? The police ran to escape. The crowd was in fullcry? The characters want peace, but they accept the fact that war is amajor part their life.

Childhood Depression Essay Example For Students

Childhood Depression Essay What is Depression?Most adults and many children and adolescents have a few bad days here and there, sometimes three or four in a row. When this happens, your mood is bad, you feel like jumping on people for nothing. You sleep, but you do not rest. You eat, but you are not hungry. Your life is one big chore. Everything that was fun is work and what usually is work is like walking with lead boots. Often you have stomach aches, headaches, aching, dizziness and other symptoms, but the doctors can not find anything wrong. When family and friends want to talk, you do not listen. If you can, you stay alone and wish they would all just go away. And you think about what you have got to do, and you wish you could put it off for ever. And about what you have done, and about what could go wrong, and how you could never live like this for 30 more years. Of course not everyone has all those symptoms every time. When people are clinically depressed, they have this for weeks, months, and often year s. Nearly everyone knows someone who has been severely depressed as 6% of the worlds population has had an episode of severe depression like this. Suicide occurs in 15% of depressed people. Depression in school-age children may be one of the most overlooked and under treated psychological disorders of childhood, presenting a serious mental health problem. Depression in children has become an important issue in research due to its many emotional forms, and its relationship to self-destructive behaviors. Depressive disorders are of particular importance to school psychologists, who are often placed in the best position to identify, refer, and treat depressed children. Procedures need to be developed to identify depression in students to avoid allowing those children struggling with depression to go undetected. Depression is one of the most treatable forms of disorders, with an 80-90% chance of improvement if individuals receive treatment (Dubuque, 1998). On the other hand, if untreate d, serious cases of depression in childhood can be severe, long, and interfere with all aspects of development, relationships, school progress, and family life (Janzen, ; Saklofske, 1991). The existence of depression in school-age children was nearly unrecognized until the 1990s. In the past, depression was thought of as a problem that only adults struggled with, and if children did experience it, they experienced depression entirely different than adults did. Psychologists of the psychoanalytic orientation felt that children were unable to become depressed because their superegos were inadequately developed (Fuller, 1992). More recently, Clarizio and Payette (1990) found that depressed children and depressed adults share the same basic symptoms. In fact, only a few minor differences between childhood and adult depression have been found. Childhood DepressionDepression in children has become difficult to treat due to a lack of referrals for treatment, parental denial, and insufficient symptom identification training (Ramsey, 1994). In addition, recognizing and diagnosing childhood depression is not a simple task. According to Janzen and Saklofske (1991), depression can develop either suddenly, or over a long period of time, it may be a brief or long term episode, and may be associated with other disorders such as anxiety. The presence of a couple of symptoms of depression is not enough to provide a diagnosis. A group of symptoms that co-occur, and accumulate over time should be considered more serious. According to Fuller (1992), childhood depression may account for a variety of behaviors, for example, conduct disorders, hyperactivity, enuresis, learning disability, and somatic complaints. Fuller (1992) also reports that depression in children may coexist with irritability, low self-esteem, and inability to concentrate. Also, children may internalize depression maladaptively, perhaps expressing it through conduct disorders, hyperactivity, or attention deficit disorders (Fuller, 1992). DiagnosisMany School Psychologists are not required to diagnose affective disorders in students, but do need to assess and develop interventions for them. The DSM IV appears to provide much help to School Psychologists to determine the symptoms that indicate a particular disorder, and to relay that information to professionals outside of the school. According to Callahan and Panichelli-Mindel (1996), it may be difficult to provide a diagnosis when childrens symptoms do not easily fit any categories. A lso, a child that does not clearly fit into a diagnostic category may go without treatment when treatment is needed (Callahan ; Panichelli-Mindel, 1996). The childs diagnosis appears to be the most important aspect in planning the appropriate treatment or intervention. Thus, misdiagnosing a child could be harmful.Dubuque (1998) suggests that school staff should be alert to the symptoms or signs of depression in children, for example: persistent sadness or hopelessness, inability to enjoy previously favorite activities, increased irritability, frequent complaints of physical illness, such as headaches and stomachaches, which do not get better with treatment, frequent absences from school or poor performance in school, persistent boredom, continuing low energy or motivation, poor concentration, a major change in eating or sleeping patterns, poor self-esteem, a tendency to spend most of their time alone, suicidal thoughts or actions, abuse of alcohol or other drugs, or difficulty deali ng with everyday activities and responsibilities. Information on childhood depression should be passed on to community members, children, and families with children (Dubuque 1998). Training programs can be implemented for school staff about childhood depression (Dubuque, 1998). To assist in identification of children in need of intervention, a variety of instruments to assess depression in children are available, including: The Childrens Depression Inventory (CDI), The Childrens Depression Scale (CDS), The Reynolds Adolescent Depression Scale (RADS), The Reynolds Child Depression Scale, and The SAD Persons Scale (Ramsey, 1994). Reynolds (1990) reports that although School Psychologists do not usually use clinical interviews but they appear to be one of the most effective means of assessment of depression. Clinical interviews allow an exploration of symptoms, information regarding whether possible symptoms are related to depression, or other factors (Reynolds, 1990). According to Dixon, (1987), there are four types of depression: normal, chronic, crisis, and clinical. the four types are distinguished by degree, intensity, duration, cause, hopefulness, response to treatment and level of functioning (Dixon, 1997). Normal depression is defined as mild periods o f depression, linked to certain events that affect a students mood periodically (Ramsey, 1994). Chronic depression involves frequent bouts of depression, often without an identifiable cause (Ramsey, 1994). Depression in a crisis state usually reflects a lack of problem-solving skills, and can be accompanied by feelings of sadness, and despair (Ramsey, 1994). Clinical depression involves a predisposition in personality paired with a crisis state (Ramsey, 1994). Clinical depression in considered as having most severe prognosis due to the fact that after a long period of therapy, a clinically depressed student may or may not return to their normal level of functioning. Jackson 1 (2752 words) EssayBibliography1) American Psychiatric Association: Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, Text Revision, Washington, DC, American Psychiatric Association, 2000. 345-346. 2) Clarizio, H.F., ; Payette, K. (1990). A survey of school psychologists perspectives and practices with childhood depression. Psychology in the Schools, 27. 57-63. 3) Dubuque, S.E. (1998). Fighting childhood depression. Education Digest, 63, 64-69. 4) Fitts, S.N., Landau, C. (1998). Brief therapy doesnt work. Brown University Child and Adolescent Behavior Letter, 14, 10-11. 5) Janzen, H.L., ; Saklofske, D.H. (1991). Children and depression. School Psychology Review, 20, 139-142. 6) Ramsey, M. (1994). Depression in adolescence treatment: Depression in childrentreatment; Counseling. School Counselor, 41. 1-7. 7).Reynolds, W.M. (1990). Depression in children and adolescents: Nature, diagnosis, assessment, and treatment. School Psychology Review, 19,158-174. 8) Sung, E.S. Kirchner, D.O. (2000). Depression in children and adolescents. American Family Physician, 62, 2297-2308. 9) .Shure, M.B. (1995). Teach your child how, not what to think: A cognitive approach to behavior. Brown University Child Adolescent Behavior Letter, 11, 4-6Words/ Pages : 3,083 / 24