It seems impossible, but the first month of classes at Humboldt, fall semester, 2010 is almost over. I started this blog so that I and my composition students could 'talk' to each other every week, but the progress has gone more slowly than I had hoped. But that is the nature of writing--it is a process that seems to determine its own pace. Most of the students have, by now, started their own blogs. I enjoy reading about their hobbies, travels, home towns, adjustments to college life, and interests. And the blogs are demonstrating that they can be very good writers when writing about topics that they choose and that appeal to them as a bridge in and out of the classroom. During months two and three of the semester, I am expecting that their writing about what they read on this blog will start to become both appealing to them, as well as a forum for us to exchange ideas with a real audience.
Next semester, I plan to design and present a workshop for college teachers on using blogs in their composition classrooms with this semester as my trial and error. I am going to ask my students this semester to comment on their attitudes and opinions about blogs as an alternative to the traditional reading response journal, learning log, and writing prompts so that I will have real 'data' to share with my colleagues during the workshop.
My biggest challenge so far is getting students to check the class blog each day or week and to add a comment. It needs to become part of their routine.I am optimistic this will be the case by the end of the semester.
Hi, Tatum. Kelly and I are reading your reading response in my office as a good example of using the class bog. See you in 20 minutes for our conference.
ReplyDeleteErika Jaimes TR 11pm
ReplyDeleteReading Response #2
For my position paper, I decided to write about animals used for entertainment is bad, evil, etc. Since, I did not know specific examples I have decided to research some articles. Two of them focus on Sea World; one of the two articles also had a brief mention about a chimpanzee. Both these articles were written from reporters or people like them. The last article was about the pros and cons, which was written by a professor.
The Sea World incident was about a killer whale named Tilikum. It seems he killed his veteran trainer in a performance. They also mention his calf, Ky, who also had problems with trainers in the past. Though, Ky never killed anyone like his father.
The chimpanzee was used for commercials, and he mauled his owner’s friend. He ended up being killed at the end.
The last article focuses on the pros and cons of animals in cages. Though my focus on my paper has changed a bit, the article is still useful. They give some insight on animals used for entertainment. Not only that but they also have some insight on how being kept in Zoos is helpful.
reading response 2
ReplyDeleteas you know im doing my topic on violence relating to video games i read the article "do violent video games contribute to youth violence" it started off with an almost over whelming percent stating that 97% of 12-17 year olds in the US play violent video games. that helps the 11.7 billion dollar game industry thats has been created because of it. also in the opening statement it tells of how 10 of the top 20 games rated were violent ones. i actually would guess that to be higher in the 15-17 range so that was a low number to hear. critics against these violent games talk about how the games affect kids and what they teach them. like teaching kids its ok to resolve a conflict with violence. among these critics were dr. phil and arnold schwarzenegger which doesnt make to much sense to me considering the movies he has been in in the past (terminator 1,2 and 3). this article also talks about how violent video games could actually be considered helpful for kids to reduce violence as a substitute for rough play. it also provides an out let for agressive and angry feelings. at the closing of the article it talks about, states that have tried to regulate the sale of violent video games to minors. but i dont believe that will ever be stopped because when it comes down to it the industries are going to sell to the people who have money regardless of their age. i enjoyed reading this article because it gave to different out looks on the topic but it definitely leaned towards games not being bad.
Reading Response
ReplyDeleteThe example of the auto-ethnography that we read in class yesterday more a perfect outcome of what our assignment is suppose to illustrate. The Japanese girl had to move to california from her home and felt alienated by her mothers decision. Since her parents were japanese immigrants they had to transform to keep a job. after a while of being in california she appreciated and embraced the differences that we once hated. her sense of self had been more appreciated then ever once she stepped out of her norm when she was growing up. She began to teach people about her culture and traditions she carried in her family. in the story it mentions her visiting an orphanage which ties into her experiences in her new are of living. Personally, I can not wait to establish who I am as a person. All the socially constructed stereotypes has molded me into a beautiful black women who appreciates every little thing in life. I can not wait to share my experiences and culture with the world.
Reading Response on Garry Trudeau from Alyssa Fraijo:
ReplyDelete“My Inner Shrimp” by Garry Trudeau is an auto ethnography that I enjoyed listening too. This piece of writing was about how the writer, Garry grew up being height challenged and was constantly teased about it for a very long time. He absolutely despised being the short one amongst his friends and peers and it was something he had to hear about almost everyday. This auto ethnography was written well by the way the writer showed deep emotion in it. For example, the feelings he had towards being short and towards the people who would tease him daily because of it. This helped him display the actual thoughts and feelings to the reader, and also keeps from getting boring to read.
As I got more into the story, I felt a sort of connection with him. Being tall also has it’s downsides, I would know because I’ve been 6’0 feet since I was 17. I never necessarily got teased because of my height because frankly, everyone was too scared to make fun a bigger person than they were. It was more of an insecurity issue for me, mainly during elementary school. I was always the “tall girl” of the class, which also translates me being the tallest out of all my friends as well. I didn’t like the fact that I stood out so much from everyone else. Sometimes I would feel embarrassed for being so tall and at times, would hate my height. As high school rolled around, I matured a lot and I absolutely loved my height. People would say it’s a blessing to be this tall. I think that insecurity was an issue for Garry Trudeau also. Sometimes we don’t realize that everything happens for a reason and at the end, everything seems to be all better.
Reading Response to Auto ethnography about being Japanese.
ReplyDeleteThe auto ethnography about the Japanese girl really intrigued me. In the beginning she talked about how she was embarrassed about being Japanese. She didn't like her name or how her parents had an accent when trying to speak English. She even felt comfortable using FOB(fresh of the boat). Later on she got more and more involved in her culture and enjoyed it so much more. I can see where she's coming from because I've had the same issues as well. It was always embarassing to listen to my parents attempt to speak english(just a note, my parents came off of a plane). It was pretty bad and we needed translators haha. My name was also an issue. I shared the same name with my younger brother which made it worse. I learned to accept and now I love my name. It's unique to me because no one else really has the name Chiem(Other than my brother).
Reading Response #2 I know I am late.My position paper focuses on animal cruelty and its connection to human violence. There were a lot of resources that confirmed the link between the two, which I found to be extremely helpful. However, there are a couple of websites that really grabbed my attention. “Animal/Human Victims: Reports from police case files.” http://nocruelty.tripod.com/anicru.htm is one of the websites I found and I really liked this one because it shared true and very graphic stories of men and women who started out with animal cruelty and went on to human murder. Although no one would want to read them, I found them very useful because it pulls in my audience and it really lets them know how serious I am about the issue. Those stories grabbed my heart and I my eyes got a little watery. I really believed these stories made my paper a just a tad bit stronger because it provided a factual yet reality check side to it. Pet-Abuse.com is the other site I really enjoyed because it listed different types of animal cruelty and the two forms of cruelty. It helped me distinguish the two and if I needed to, focus on one type of animal cruelty.
ReplyDeleteRecently in class, we listened to a story about a man who was an “inner shrimp”. The man had been so traumatized when he was little about his height that even now as an adult he still considers himself a shrimp. This story was an auto-ethnography. It’s crazy how the smallest thing you thought u were over still haunts you and you never realize it until you really analyze the things you do. Sometimes we are even in denial about experiences that we thought was in the past. I guess that’s human nature. In class, Susan told us a story about “Linda”, who wore fancy clothes to camp. Linda was poor when she was younger, so she wore fancy clothes so no one could tell she was poor as a child. Being poor affected Linda to where she had to cover up the fact that she was once poor. Sometimes the past can make you stronger and helps you become the person you are today for the good, however it can also shadow you and make you mask the real you because you are afraid to be the real you. For me, I am embracing my left handedness. But being in a right hand society is extremely stressful and that is my topic for my auto-ethnography. I am not traumatized by it nor do I pretend to be something im not. However being a lefty is rough.
ReplyDeletehi susan, here's my reading responce. sorry it took so long i just figured out how to comment and follow your blog
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/animals/conservation/rhinos/
I liked this source that I used the most. It seemed to have the most credible information out of the other sources that I looked at. I thought that the people who wrote the article did a very good job at explaining the reasoning behind the poachers choosing to kill the rhinos.
I thought that this article was very informative because I didn’t know about the civil unrests that were happening in Africa. I didn’t realize that the people who poach are mostly people who are just trying to keep their families alive. This information actually really helped me explain both sides of the story much better than I could have with the other resources that I found.
Most of the other resources that I used for my paper didn’t give a lot of background information about the situation in Africa. I felt like I needed more information on the economic situation in Africa and I also needed to know the reasons (besides being sick like everyone portrays them as) why they decided to do this. I thought that this website was good at explaining both sides.
Mosque Article
ReplyDeleteThe Mosque article I read seemed to try so hard to not bee biased that it ended up sounding a bit wishy washy. The writer came off as if he or she was trying not to offend anyone so they just gave lots and lots of dry facts for the most part. however the writer did use pathos when talking about how sad people where about the deaths of the people involved in 9/11. the fact that the writer choose to write about the emotional side to the issue that involved the people hurt from 9/11 rather than the people hurt by the discrimination towards the mosque was what made me think that the writer was leaning towards being against the mosque. It could also be that the writer just sided with people who upset about the mosque for discriminatory reasons because the writer feared they might loose fans over such a controversy.
I personally think that if the writer was choosing to use emotional stories they should show both sides equally or if the writer does want to pick sides they should show their opinion a little bit better and make their facts stronger and less just emotional stories.
I agree with Obama that this is a constitutional matter and whatever he personally feels should not sway his actions towards the situation.it's a civil write that we can have our own religion weather it bothers others our not and so if freedom of speech. this country was started mainly for religious freedom, a lot of people seem to forget that when they start to hate on others for their personal believes and when they bring religion into politics.
Hi Susan! This is my tenth and final response on the class blog. And I can’t help but apologize again for having done this all backwards. I started responding on the more recent posts and have worked my way backwards to the beginning. I know, I know it is the end of the semester and I should have been keeping up for a while… and haven’t been. But today has been really interesting. Going back through all the posts and comments has been like a trip down memory lane of everything we have covered this semester. I know that we are supposed to have our own personal blogs set up and emailed to you by now. And, again I apologize, right after I do this post I will go ahead and begin to set up my own personal blog and email you the link. I appreciate you cutting me some slack and allowing me to submit all this blogging to you, sooo last minute. I think my blog is going to be about my life in California. From the Bay Area (where I grew up) to Humboldt County (where I now live, obviously): California has been a great influence on who I am and my life. I am going to focus on anything and everything ;) Strange, cool, new and interesting experiences I have, people I meet, and things I’ve learned from Humboldt and the Bay Area. I don’t know yet what to call it. Expect an email from me later tonight with the link… And by the end of tomorrow I should have at least multiple entries on my personal blog. Thanks again for your understanding and flexibility.
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