Pawhuska OK USA - Movie Reviews

I dropped a DVD into the tray just to have some background noise while I was working on something at home. I pushed play, and the movie started up. It wasn't long, though, before I stopped what I was doing and started watching the movie. I had chosen "Freedom Writers" not knowing that I'd soon be watching people change their lives.

Erin Gruwell came to Long Beach, CA to teach Freshman English at Woodrow Wilson High. She came face to face with an indifferent administration and students so involved in surviving their daily lives and hating each other that education was the last thing on their minds.

Erin more than rose to the challenge. She involved the students in penning their life stories in a daily diary. What came out of that was a surprise, to her and to them. From one of the freedom writers, "We began writing anonymous journal entries about the adversities that we faced in our every day lives. We wrote about gangs, immigration, drugs, violence, abuse, death, anorexia, dyslexia, teenage love, weight issues, divorce, suicide, and all the other issues we never had the chance to express before."

Because Ms Gruwell came up with a way for her students to tell her what their lives are about she came up with a way to help them. Again, an excerpt from a freedom writer, "She gave us books written by teenagers that we could relate to, and it was through these books that we began to realize that if we could relate to a little girl who lived on the other side the world, (Anne Frank) fifty years before we did, we could certainly relate to each other."

Erin Gruwell brought hope to a hopeless situation, to many lives without hope. This is a movie I can heartily recommend to parents, teachers and high school students. PARENTS - please note that there is some language and violence in the lives portrayed by this movie. In spite of that, the benefits of seeing Ms. Gruwell and her students far outweigh the problems of living in the inner city.

Michael

Resources:  http://www.freedomwritersfoundation.org/ where you can get involved!

Movie Review - Freedom Writers

Date: 5/8/07

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