The Freedom Writers Diary: How a Teacher and 150 Teens Used Writing to Change Themselves and the World Around Them
by Erin Gruwell, Zlata Filipovićbook data
1,489 ratings,
3.94
average rating, 395 reviews
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published
October 12th 1999
by Main Street Books
binding
Paperback, 304 pages
isbn
038549422X
(isbn13: 9780385494229)
description
Straight from the front line of urban America, the inspiring story of one fiercely determined teacher and her remarkable students.
As an idealistic twe
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avg 3.94
editions: all | this edition
editions: all | this edition
Read in September, 2004
Erin Gruwell was a first-year high school teacher. She was teaching tough kids in Long Beach, CA. Her students are the lowest at the school so she begins with diaries written by others to have them create diaries of their own. She was able to stay with these students for all four years of high school. The she decided to teach college to new teachers.
I teach. I teach well. An yet I find myself discouraged when I read books like this. Not because of the state of education or students i...more
I teach. I teach well. An yet I find myself discouraged when I read books like this. Not because of the state of education or students i...more
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Read in May, 2008
I work in an inner city school. This doesn't quite touch on the way inner city schools really are. For instance, all the kids' writing is in standard English. My kids, when expressing how they really feel, use what I call Urban English. I just couldn't hear my kids in this book. I related a bit to the teacher's writing. But there are a lot of realities that were not portrayed in this book. For instance, the teacher had her own room --- the same room --- for the 4 years she taught. The re...more
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Read in August, 2008
I had to read this after having seen an essay in Newsweek. We former teachers always want to to hear those great success stories and this is certainly one of them! My only wish is that the rest of the wonderfully creative and committed teachers out there were recognized like this one...the book itself was good. I found it a bit redundant. Worthwhile but I think you'll skip ahead after awhile. I don't want to take anything away from it...buy it, read it, pass it on, support them, give every ha...more
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Read in February, 2008
I was pretty disappointed by this book from the get-go. Diaries and journals are interesting because you are able to experience someone else's life in real-time. Part of that experience is being immersed in the language, personality, and emotion of the author. The students idolize Anne Frank and Zlata, but don't allow any of their own voices into their writing. Each entry sounds just like the next with only occasional sentences that feel "real" and un-edited.
Good writers ca...more
Good writers ca...more
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I will begin by stating that I did not read this entire book. I made it through 50 or 60 pages. I had not had any intent to read it, as I have heard more than enough stories about the fish out of water young white teacher who is able to "save" the inner city youth from the apparent inevitability of failure. A coworker strongly recommended the book to me and actually put it in my hand, so I decided to give it a chance.
As I read one journal entry after another, I was puz...more
As I read one journal entry after another, I was puz...more
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3 comments
Freedom Writers by Erin Gruwell is one of the most interesting books I've ever read.It is about how one teacher(Erin Gruwell) makes it her goal to change the way students in her class view the world.The students in her class view the world as one big war zone and have their own goal which is to be able to survive the streets without being killed.Mrs.Gruwell takes it up on herself to show the kids the theirs more to life then gang violence trying to do so she risks losing her job and husband.She ...more
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05/27/07
rachel
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Read in May, 2007
This is a diary compiled from 150 students in Long Beach, CA. They were almost all at-risk kids in gangs, who lived in the projects, and generally were expected to drop out of high school and not live to see 18 or be in jail. Enter the preppy very white idealistic Erin Gruwell who was a brand new teacher fresh out of college. She gets the idea to teach them about the Holocaust after a racist drawing of one student gets passed around the class. After that it picks up, and soon her students are wr...more
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عشق ، راه برخورد با یک دوست نیست
نمی خواهم این طور باشی.
نمی خواهم ببینم چشم هایت
در یک روز بارانی
در کیف گود کم حافظه ها
در فراموشی گم می شود.
عشق،راه برخورد با یک دوست نیست
نمی خواهم ببینم تن ات
مثل مرمری زخمی
به معماری آن ها که از پرنده های فلج
پل ...more
نمی خواهم این طور باشی.
نمی خواهم ببینم چشم هایت
در یک روز بارانی
در کیف گود کم حافظه ها
در فراموشی گم می شود.
عشق،راه برخورد با یک دوست نیست
نمی خواهم ببینم تن ات
مثل مرمری زخمی
به معماری آن ها که از پرنده های فلج
پل ...more
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I picked up this book from my local store when I saw the movie was releasing back in January 2007. I like to read the book before seeing the movie, so I still haven't watched Hillary Swank on the big screen with this one. It was moving and sad to read the journal entries of these students in LA and the horrors they lived through on a daily basis. We all think high school was an awful experience... try high school in LA when your raped at 15, pregnant and your uncle is a drug dealer! I like life ...more
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Read in February, 2009
This book is inspirational to both teachers and students. It is written by high schoolers who were considered "losers" by the school administration of Wilson High, a racially integrated school in Long Beach, California. No one expected them to graduate. They are teens write about their problems and how being in Erin Gruwell's class made a huge difference in their lives. It is a compilation of their journal entries. At the beginning of their freshman year, none of them expected to gradu...more
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Read in May, 2007
The only reason I picked up this book was because it happened to be lying around the house and I needed something to read. I'd heard of the movie with Hillary Swank and intended (and still do) to stay away from it as I believed it was another "Gangsta's Paradise" cliche: white teacher, colored students, they all dance and learn. When I picked up the book, I thought it would provide a few anecdotes of interest and then would return to its pile on the floor and disappear under weightier ...more
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Freedom Writers Diary a novel and movie based on real life events of one-hundred and fifty students and a woman by the name of Erin Gruwell, has opened up the eyes of many people and welcomed them into their lives. The novel includes diary entries from students that attend Wilson High School, in Long Beach, California. As a first year teacher at Wilson High School Ms.Gruwell was experiencing and seeing things she had never seen before. One day as Ms.Gruwell taught in the very diverse school she...more
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In the movie the teacher gave each of students a notebook and they were allowed to write anything in it, and it was more like a diary to them. So in this book it shows what they wrote in there notebooks about their lives. Most of them talked about how their everyday lives are when they're in the streets just walking. No where is safe for them and they're always getting chased if they see people that is not their race they start running because those people will beat them up or even worse ...more
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Read in January, 2009
Despite having this book recommended to me, and being incredibly eager to get started reading it, it took me a fair while to get into it. The beginning didn't read very realistically at all. I understand that the beginning of the story had to be told somehow, but I find it hard to believe that these kids that supposedly hated reading and writing were even willing to write diary entries at the start, especially ones that in depth with what was going on.
Once I got past that, it was an ...more
Once I got past that, it was an ...more
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Read in January, 2009
When Erin Gruwell first entered the high school classroom for the at-risk students, she wasn't sure how she would come across. Her students weren't sure how long she'd last. Little did they know that their lives were about to change forever.
Erin, a first-year English teacher at a high school in Long Beach, California, knew that her students suffered from a lot of issues due to their environment: gangs, fights, abusive parents, drugs, and so forth. But when they passed around a rac...more
Erin, a first-year English teacher at a high school in Long Beach, California, knew that her students suffered from a lot of issues due to their environment: gangs, fights, abusive parents, drugs, and so forth. But when they passed around a rac...more
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Read in July, 2007
I read this book after I stumbled upon the teacher's memoir (Teach With Your Heart). Erin Gruwell is the real life teacher who inspired the movie the Freedom Writers, and this book is filled with diary entries from her high school students. I found their entries insightful, inspiring, eye-opening, and somewhat disturbing--these are kids living in the projects, experiencing all sorts of nastiness that I was thankfully spared. Their writing and their story is impressive.
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01/11/09
Kathleen
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Read in May, 2007
The Freedom Writers Diary, by The Freedom Writers and Erin Gruwell. Downloaded from audible.com.
A-plus
This is one of these inspiring teacher books that makes me glad there are some teachers out there in public school who try to go beyond the teach-to-the-test mentality of our current Department of Education administration. It was made into a movie, so more people have probably seen the movie than have read the original book. It is about Erin Gruwell, a White upper middle-class wo...more
A-plus
This is one of these inspiring teacher books that makes me glad there are some teachers out there in public school who try to go beyond the teach-to-the-test mentality of our current Department of Education administration. It was made into a movie, so more people have probably seen the movie than have read the original book. It is about Erin Gruwell, a White upper middle-class wo...more
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Read in September, 2007
I found this book to be a little manipulative. I understand that Ms. Gruwell was a spark for growth in the lives of these students, but I was a little annoyed. She taught these 150 kids for 4 years...why? Why didn't she try to reach as many students as possible? Couldn't she have sparked change in 4 different groups of 150 students? However, I greatly appreciated reading the students' impressions of the books they read. I am taking a few recommendations from them.
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Read in March, 2009
In big urban school there are always bad students. And in Long Beach it is no exception. In the book “The Freedom Writers Diary” many kids from Long Beach that have very bad reputation in school for different reasons have a class with Miss. Gruwell, a new teacher, which has no idea what’s waiting for her.
I really liked this book because it is very touching mostly because of what the student’s life is like at school, home, and in the streets of Long Beach, California. I ...more
I really liked this book because it is very touching mostly because of what the student’s life is like at school, home, and in the streets of Long Beach, California. I ...more
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Read in April, 2008
A tad disappointing. The entries seemed to be more about putting together the book then the remarkable ones that made such an impact on people who had read them. Would like to have seen the ones that were so insightful and touching about the lives they led and less the "rah rah we're impowered and making this book". I think hoopla from the movie may have ruined that for me.
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quotes from this book
"There were more courses than O.J. has alibis."
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