My experience with reading “I Just Wanna Be Average” in one sitting was very peaceful. I sat down in a blocked off desk on the upper level of the library, and read for an hour and 15 minutes. Reading this long of a passage gave me Déjà vu, to when I used to read for long periods of time. I makes me miss when I was younger and had so much time I could use on personal things like reading. It was difficult to read it all at one time because it is hour of doing anything can get exhausting. The reading material was interesting, and told a great story of a boy who grew up from nothing, only to find his true passion of reading and writing. It was a good and worthwhile to read, that’s why I could read it in one sitting.

Rose tells us what is like to make the choice not to follow his fellow classmates in being average. While his friend Ken Harvey chose to be dumb, Rose pushed himself with the help of his English teacher Jack MacFarland. Because of MacFarland, Rose’s mind was not allowed to wander, he was forced to do school work. This made him become an active student, “We wrote three or four essays a month. We read a book every two to three weeks… He gave us a quiz on reading every other day”. By being made to do school work and consistently do work in class, Rose began to enjoy being in the classroom for once. MacFarland brought back Rose’s excitement for reading that he used to have when telling stories and reading his books about the stars. By drawing out his old passion he once had, it allowed him to open his mind not only in the classroom but to what he reads.

MacFarland gave him the right curriculum to help his students prosper, “He tapped my old interest in reading and creating stories. He gave me a way to feel special by using my mind”. This important teaching style gave Rose to option to turn down the option of being average. Throughout the story, Rose turned his mind off in the classroom, this started when he encountered his first troubling subjects in school. Because of his difficulty to understand what was being taught he gave up. Before a teacher came along like MacFarland, Rose was used to an average teacher lecturing about things he doesn’t understand. By using the power of books Rose was allowed back into the state he was when he was younger. Because the books he read allowed him to leave where he was and what has happened to him throughout his life, and be someone else. When reading, he became closer to getting out of his struggling situation that his family has to face living in the city of angels.