In my church you need to be a youth to get baptized. That means you need to be in middle school, high school, or older. You also have to take classes and it’s a big responsibility. I love my church which is why my third cultural universal is religion and shared belief. I’m a Baptist and I go to Greenwood Forest Baptist Church. I care about my religion very much. I hold God very close to my heart and always try my best to think about Him and use Him in m daily life. I was introduced to church at a very young age since my parents and extended family are either Baptist or some other form of Christianity. I personally think that people descend to heaven, but I try not to question that too much. I love my church so I’m going to be baptized there at about 14.

Without Communication, I won’t be able to express myself. I had a difficult situation about this topic in my life. When I was young, I couldn’t pronounce the “r’s,” the “l’s,” and the “th’s.” People couldn’t understand me and made fun of me. My mom and I went to places for speech therapy, but I didn’t get better. In my school, I had a poetry contest. At first, it was frustrating and I was crying when I couldn’t pronounce the words correctly. Then, my mom told me to repeat the verse Philippians 4:13 “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” With my family’s help and God’s help, I was able to speak properly and I placed first overall in my school! This cultural universal is significant is significant in my life, because it has changed the way I am now.

By: Alex Dietrich

In 2016 the Presidential election will change my life. I will be 12.83 years old so I won’t be able to vote. The Different presidents could do many different things so I don’t know who will be elected or what they’ll do. It will greatly change the government as the new president well have different opinions than the last one. Many laws could be added or changed for good or for bad. Our rights could be taken away or they could be added. Hopefully the president won’t have terrible diplomacy so he won’t make all the other countries mad. But hey, you never know what could happen.

The universal Arts and Recreation connects to the Camp Hanes trip. Camp Hanes wasn’t my first overnight school trip but it was the first one without my parents. Camp Hanes was connected to Arts and Recreation because it was all fun. It wasn’t related to any subject, no worksheets to fill out, and it was all fun. I was nervous because it was my first trip but there was nearly no reason to be worried. It wasn’t exactly leisure time because it was during what was supposed to be a school day but it was full of sports and games. I went zip lining for the first time and Camp Hanes was an overall good experience.

First day of Elementary school- Social Structure:

My first day of elementary school was related to social structure because it was the day I started building my social structure. I made friends that would always be there for me and teachers that would teach me things I would use my entire life. On the first day of elementary school I made friends that would be by my side throughout grade school, and some that I would hopefully have forever. My first day of elementary school was an amazing experience that I will never forget. It was so exciting to make new friends and beginning my social structure.

When I was 9, I travelled to India to attend my cousin Jatish’s wedding. His wedding was very different compared to the weddings I had attended here in the United States. The biggest difference I noticed was the ceremony was in a different language. The weddings I went to in the United States were all Christian weddings and this was a Hindu wedding. The cultural universal is religion and shared beliefs. It was very interesting because I was able to experience a different culture and religion. I was able to see firsthand my father’s culture compared to my mother’s culture. This has helped me as I got older because I am able to understand things from different perspectives.

          When I was 3.76 years old, I was given my first toy cash register for Christmas.  When I received this gift, I played with it every single day.  This cash register taught me about an important cultural universal, economics.  The cash register came with fake coins and dollar bills.  This fake currency allowed me to experiment with different ways to use currency, and how much different items were worth.  I loved calculating different amounts of money using the calculator on the cash register.  Currency is used to get items that we need.  This monetary system is used every day, and is more efficient than trading and bartering.  It eliminates “having to make a deal”.  Currency is used all throughout the United States of America.  All of the people in the United States of America use the same currency.  This is important because when someone travels to a different state they do not need to exchange currency.  This small toy cash register had a large impact on my knowledge on currency.

When I started playing hockey I was only 5 and ¾ but it has become a huge part of my life and my “Cultureverse”. I love hockey because I think that the sport is hard and that I can always get better at it by trying even harder than before.  Hockey is the cultural universal of arts and recreation because it is a sport. Arts and recreation is a huge part in my life and my “Cultureverse” because I am very active and I like to draw. That is why hockey plays a huge part in my “Cultureverse”.

When I was about four to five years old, I first started playing the violin, and although I play the viola now, I still am impacted by it, as I played the violin for about 6 years. Because the violin (and viola) are an art or a skill, it would fall under the category of Arts and Recreation. I have truly enjoyed playing the viola and believe Arts and Recreation is a very important Cultural Universal. It is also my favorite! Go Arts and Recreation!!

Arts and Recreation is part of my life because I play the violin, and want to be the most famous violinist in the world. I have been playing since I was 3.75 years old. My life dream is to go to The Curtis Institute of Music. That is where all the famous musicians went. It is a really hard school to get into, so you have to be exceptional to get accepted. (The acceptance rate for Curtis is way lower than for Harvard.) My passion is making music; I am a violinist! I have fun playing chamber music, and enjoy taking part in orchestra. I also love to listen to classical music, perform and attend chamber music concerts, and go to famous violinists’ concerts. Music, and therefore the arts, is a big part of who I am!

Arts and Recreation

Every year my elementary school hosts an event called Spring Celebration. During the Spring Celebration students preform concerts, dance, and sing, there are also food trucks! During the Spring Celebration the PTA (Parent Teacher Association) also announces the winners of the Reflection Contest. The genre to the contest is announced at the previous Spring Celebration (May), in this way students will have time to create their work of art. The art can be visual art, a photograph, a dance, and skit, or song, entries must be submitted by the fall of the new school year. When I was in second grade the genre had been diversity. I drew a rainbow colored night owl. The owl was perched on a branch. In my description I said that the owl was diverse from the other owls because it was rainbow colored unlike the other owls which were some dull shade of gray, brown, or white. My owl also had designs on it and every design was colored in a different color with my set of forty eight colored pencils which my mom had ordered online especially for the drawing. I said that each feather was a different color which made each feather diverse from the other feathers. Turns out I won a blue first place ribbon for my drawing! The night owl drawing is still displayed on the shelf in the office in our house, it is framed in a black frame.