Bridge Builder

Dani Witham's Page

Reflection:

             A lot was to be learned from a book like The Yellow Birds. It teaches you about war, about depression, and recovery. This book also shows that not only should you respect the people in the military for risking their lives in another country, but to respect them for having that burden on them when they come back. This book shows how hard it is to go to war to kill people and watch others (some who are close to you) get killed and come back and tries to be the same as you were before. The Yellow Birds shows the real struggle and pain of a post-soldier through Bartle. Given that my job was “Bridge Builder” I was to make connections between the book and real-world situations, myself, and another text. When making these connections, you learn more about the book and characters because you’re applying yourself and stuff that you know. When you apply these things it makes you understand what is going on and feel the feelings that the characters feel, which draws you into the book. For example, I related most of this book to my dad considering the fact that he was in the war in Desert Storm. It made the book easier to read when you can relate it. There were also events that in the book that I related to another text, A Long Way Gone, and being able to compare to another text that I have already read made the concept easier to grasp. I think that was the most useful part about my job. I also helped Keenan, who kept track of where everyone was at in the book, with a reading schedule which I think helped stay on track of the groups reading. Overall, the book taught me a lot about recovery after a tragic event like war (as in a battle war and a war with yourself i.e. depression) and I’m glad I was assigned the job that I was because I don’t think I would have connected with the book the way that I did.