Touching Spirit Bear By Ben Mikaelsen

Touching Spirit Bear, written by Ben Mikaelsen, informs the reader about circle justice and contestant, Cole Mathews. Cole has always been irresponsible his whole life, thinks he is the best and everyone is afraid of him, and has always taken unnecessary actions. After beating up a classmate, Cole's life would change. Cole enters the circle justice program and is forced to go to an island in Alaska. Wanting to swim away, Cole burns his prebuilt shelter and swims against the tides, but is pushed back. Cole all of a sudden sees a spirit bear and wants to fight it, stabbing it, grabbing fur, and punching it. Then gets mauled by it and blacks out. Cole finally realizes what nature has to offer and starts his transformation. At the beginning of Cole's transformation,

Cole starts to care about the world around him and the world he is a part of. After Cole is rescued he says he saw spirit bear and people don't believe him, trying to be better, Cole made a decision that he would for now on never lie and let go of the only evidence of spirit bear he had into the water, its fur. After Cole's rescue, he needs people to forgive him. Circle Justice is not willing to bring Cole back to the island, but Edwin and Garvey are willing to give Cole a second chance. So Cole sells his belongings and goes back to the island, building his shelter and collecting firewood. While Cole is on the island, Edwin teaches Cole a few ways to relive his anger. First, Edwin takes Cole to the cold pond to clear his mind, then makes Cole carry a rock referred to as the ancestor rock and roll it down a hill. Edwin tells Cole to think of the ancestor rock as his anger, rolling down a mountain and being let go. Learning from his mistakes, Cole starts to observe the atmosphere around him and sees animals. By observing a creature, you can learn a lot about them, creatures provide teachings for us every