My Wobbliness!

In this English 1101 class I would say that I have had my share of wobble periods.  I have tried new attitudes, new ways, and new points for writing.  A lot have failed, although a lot have also worked!  I came into this class without a clear understanding of what I would be doing.  However, I came out with a completely new outlook.  I have learned many new styles of writing, and ways to write about life.  One very important thing that I have learned is that everything with writing is not always black or white, there can definitely be grey areas!  Wobbling in this class, or not having a solid understanding, has really made my writing what it is.  By wobbling I have learned how to pick myself up, pick my work up, dust myself off, and keep on trucking!  I have learned how to take and receive criticism, and also learn and improve from it.  All in all I would say that my wobbling in this English 1101 class was necessary for me to be able to get a better grasp of the different writing concepts, attitudes, and techniques.  I have learned a great deal in this class that I plan to use for the rest of my college years, and for a lifetime.  I will keep moving forward as a novice writer, and better myself day by day.

Ethnography Project Final Blog Post

Our ethnography project came together well, even though it did not start off as easily.  Starting my ethnography project and trying to find something to write about was not a simple task.  I had the building that I planned on talking about, but I just had no way of relating it to literacy underlife.  After our group came upon the topic of architecture everything seemed to fall into place from there. 

 

 

In this picture you can see my original connection between architecture and literacy.  I used Robinson Hall very heavily to emphasize my point.  However, my focus on Robinson Hall in specific did not last all too long.  I then began to expand my focus points while working with my group.

Revising my work however was a completely different story.  After doing my literacy narrative, revising was not as bad, simply because I now know exactly what it was.  The hardest part in revising my ethnography project would be from broadening my points from Robinson Hall specifically, to all academic buildings on campus.  I think this was a special kind of revision because it didn't focus on actual writing, but rather on changing my work to fit my groups progression, but revision nonetheless.

Working in a group seemed to flow a lot smoother for this project than just about any other project that I have worked on.  My group seemed to pretty much just understand everything that needed to be done.  We never really had any problems with not completing any assignments involved in completing our ethnography project.  I know we aren't supposed to say that everything was peachy clean, but when it comes to working in this group, honestly it was!

However, creating an untraditional piece was not easy at all.  It's so hard to kind of go against everything that we've been taught going through school.  I also think this ethnography project was necessary because it helped us to see that our writings and meanings are created by us.  We're so used to doing things by the book that we forget to add our own creativity and letting it shine through in our writing.

Overall, I think the ethnography project was important for our growth in writing.  It helped us to see that we can't always look for basic meanings that are given to us, but we have to create our own.  I think that is exactly what we needed to learn in our freshmen year of college for many of us.

This picture is my portion of our ethnography project in writing.

Literacy Narrative Final Blog Post

Wheeewwww! Where do I begin?!  Writing this literacy narrative has not been a walk in the park.  I have struggled with about everything under the sun when it comes to writing this paper.  First, I couldn't find a topic, then I struggled with making it interesting,  and I also didn't understand what to write.  However, once I discovered my topic I pretty much just plowed my paper out from there.  I wrote my entire literacy narrative in literally about 3 days, and that was the problem.  I never really stopped to think about the actual assignment, but rather just getting it done!  When I figured out what to write, my essay started off like this......

 

However, after reading and analyzing the start of my first draft I realized that it was not what I wanted to write about,  or even read for that matter.  So it was back to the starting blocks.  My final draft is still based on the same topic as my first draft, but I go about telling the story in a completely different way.

 

Revising my work on the other hand was along the same lines of picking a topic!  I didn't completely understand how to do it.  Coming into this literacy narrative I had revising and editing totally confused.  I mistook one for the other.

 

 

 

This picture shows how I tried to switch writing styles on October 4th.  I tried writing with the "Lydia Davis" style of writing.  I tried incorporating short, choppy sentences, and questions to get my point across.  As you can see, I wasn't the best at it!  Editing and peer editing was pretty easy and successful for me.  I believe I gave a lot of interesting points and suggestions.  I also received just as many helpful points and tips.  When editing my work I had a few goals that I wanted to get accomplished, these were:

• Completely understand my writing, and which direction I'm taking it.
• Try different styles of writing.
• Work on better intros and conclusions, and ways to experiment with my writing.

I would say that I accomplished these 3 goals.  The only one that I feel like I could have had a better handle on was the first one.  I feel like I could have gotten a better understanding of my writing then I have now, but that's my personal opinion.

 

Overall I would say this literacy narrative assignment was extremely helpful.  It wasn't just a normal essay that I was just trying to get over with.  It actually required some thought and input from others on how to make it my own writing and not just some boring, factual essay.  While writing this essay  I learned the true difference between revision and editing.  I also learned how to play with my writing, and not use the basic style for an essay, but switch it up and make it interesting.  My final conclusion from this literacy narrative is more of a opinionated one, but still important nonetheless.  I have learned that writing an essay does not have to be a template or pre-designed event.  Writing an essay can and should be a reflection of your feelings, emotions, and experiences!

 



Ethnography Project Update and Questions!

I want to talk more about my group's ethnography project, and also ask some question that may help us out.  So as of right now our group decided to go with making a video for our ethnography project.  We decided to have sort of a compilation of information, interviews, and discussions to give a deeper meaning to our topic, architecture.  Do you all think a video like this would be boring?  If so, what would make it better?  Our project on the other hand is coming along well.  We each have a our own sub-topic and have already started investigating them on a deeper level.  I would have to say that our topic is pretty interesting though.  By doing this project I have really begun to step back and look for deeper meanings in everything I come across on a daily basis.  I think this ethnography project is really cool, and I can't wait for you all to see our video!

Ethnography Project Updates!

My group's ethnography project on Architecture is coming along well.  We have decided to focus our attention on three main topics which are, architecture within academic buildings, general buildings, and within the classroom.  I think this is a good start for us because we all have different focus points to dig into while bringing our project back to the central topic.  I think our idea of creating sort of a compilation video to provide answers to our different questions will be a great.  The only problem that we may run into is finding out how to use the movie maker website that Lacy sent to us.  Somehow though, we will make it work, hopefully!  Wish us luck!

Annotated Bibliography

• Pizzato, Mark. Personal interview. 1 Nov. 2012.

I plan on conducting this interview some time soon.  This interview is important because it will help me understand more significance behind Robinson Hall.  I will also conduct this interview to stress the importance of architecture, and how architecture can affect a classes style of learning.  In this interview I will ask question of how teaching in this particular classroom in Robinson Hall may be different from teaching in any other classes.

• Manship, Lacy. "#freehand1101." Map. Ed. Kedric M. Wright. N.p.: n.p., n.d. N. pag. Print.

This map created by Professor Lacy was very useful in choosing which building would be better to analyze specific architectural differences, downfalls, and improvements.  When using this map I noticed that all of the buildings on this campus have their own unique shape, which made it much easier to choose which building to look closer at.  In choosing Robinson Hall I noticed that it's shape is not as unique compared to other theatre buildings.  This map was very helpful in helping me recognize this.

• Diao, Dr. Yuanan. "Professor Interview." Telephone interview.

This interview will be used as a contrast interview to my other interview.  This specific professor teaches math in a lecture style classroom, and I would like to find out if this is easier or hard to do.  In this interview I will ask specific questions about the architecture of the classroom, and if he believes it helps or hurts to effectiveness of his teaching.  The usefulness of this interview is to use as a control group to my previous interview of Professor Pizzato.

Remapping the Map!

After sitting down with my Architecture group we came up with some pretty neat things that relate both literacy and architecture.  While sitting down in Atkins library we created a list of things that ties architecture into literacy.  On our list we wrote:

• The specific ways in which the buildings are set up.
• The way the buildings are situated on campus.
• The actual insides of th buildings.
• Specifics within the buildings, like artwork or etc.

This list helped us realize how architecture can positively or negatively affect literacy in many different ways.  In the updated overlay version of my map I added different classroom layouts.  The different classroom layouts can affect literacy greatly.  A lecture style classroom versus a intimate smaller size classroom changes a person literacy history dramatically.

Robinson Hall and It's Coolness!

I chose Robinson Hall as my location to map simply because of all the amazing points the building contains, physically but mostly figuratively!  Robinson Hall truly is a mecca of creativity and literacy underlife.  People always associate literacy with just strictly reading and writing but I believe Robinson Hall completely shatters those standards.  By housing the dance, theater, art, and music departments, I believe Robinson Hall truly is the most important building on campus that deals with different forms of literacy underlife.  When walking into the building for the first time one would not get the impression of it being a building of the arts.  It actually seems like some boring science building.  But after wandering around on the different floors, I slowly began to pick up the artistic vibe.  I began to notice special paintings, and sculptures throughout the building.  Surprisingly a majority of these photos went unnamed.  This automatically made me picture literary underlife.  By not naming the piece of art, I was unable to identify where it came from, and who designed and made it!  That seems pretty shady to me, which honestly brought me all the way back to the word "underlife."  I believe Robinson Hall and all of it's obvious artistic vibes, but also it's non-obvious artistic vibes is what makes it an important place to discover literary underlife.

Discovering the Discovered

The place I chose to map on my journey was Robinson Hall.  I chose this location partially because I have a class there and it seemed logical, and partially because there really is a lot going on in the building.  Robinson Hall is home to our universities' theater.  This is really unique because I think about myself having a class amongst greatness, and where it is created.  Robinson Hall is also home to multiple music, dance, art, and theater classes.  In this location I noticed that it was a very plain building (to be a building of the arts).  Generally art buildings are exciting, and full of color, but this building is the complete opposite.  White walls, white floors, white lights, white everything!  But surprisingly I notice that this building has a lot of "underlife."  This building has a lot of amazing things running through it's veins, just like the theater class I take in it.  This led me to understand that just because the building is pretty bland the things it creates within are things that go unmatched.  The map I drew just describes the multiple "walks of life" that are within this building, Robinson Hall!

Two Ways of Writing

I want to talk more about the in-class assignment we did on putting our literacy narrative plot on paper.  I think it was interesting how we first had to put our original plot into picture formation down on paper, and this is what I drew.

 

 

If you notice in my drawing I start with just basic background info, then transition into my thoughts on the situation.  Then I go into a important flashback, then an explanation of the flashback which leads into a reslolution.  I thought this was an extremely boring and generic way to tell my story.  I thought of this as like a boring children's book way of explaining and telling my story.  So when we were asked to write an alternate version I came up with this......

 

 

 

In my second version  I placed my flashback as the opening of my literacy narrative.  I think it was pretty different and cool to do it like this because it has a completely different flow now.  I then go into specific examples, then a little writing experience and history.  Then I tell my actual story which is then followed by another flashback which finishes off with what happened in the end.  I think this way of writing is a lot more interesting.  It's not the basic and predictable writing that I had before which makes it more appealing.

 

 

Atkins Library, 10am, okay!

 

This entire journey was extremely interesting and different!  It was kind of fun to meet with my writing group outside of class and actually do something that involved us working together.  I really enjoyed looking for our text to write beside.  It was kind of hard to find something that was relevant to all of our literacy narratives all at the same time.  After about 20 minutes of searching and asking the other writing groups about how they selected their mentor text we found something pretty relatable.  We discovered the newspaper section in the Atkins library, and it was awesome!  We finally found an article about a bicycle culture that was pretty interesting!  This article was called "Two-wheel town: Belmont build bicycle culture" written by Joe DePriest.  After sitting briefly and writing to the text our writing group shortly discussed what we all wrote.  This was great because it allowed us to see how similar and different all of our texts and interpretations were!

The Haunting of the "Two Question"

I want to talk more about "Two Questions" because I found the passage very interesting in many ways.  One way in which I found it interesting is that the actual passage is much deeper than it comes across.  When first reading the passage I truly just thought it was about a girl dealing with criticism over her work, hence the two questions she kept asking herself.  Is this good? Does this suck?  Don't we all ask ourselves those questions though whenever we're creating something!  Then I began to think deeper about the complete message.  I began reading the subtext and analyzing every single picture on the page.  I then start to realize that it was about more than just criticism.  It was about her self confidence.  They entire passage was about her losing her confidence and trying to gain it back.  She was doing this by going back to doing the simple things that made her happy.  Understanding the passage in this light put an entirely new picture in my head, which I enjoyed!

 

 

Recording Myself!

I want to talk a little more about me recording myself writing!  That was extremely awkward!  I put my webcam on record and actually forgot that I did so.  15 minutes later I remembered that I did.  The video was so weird because I was all over that place.  I ate, I drank, I watched tv., and I wrote.  When I reflected on myself writing a lot of funny words came up:

Watching
Noticed
Looking around
Bored
Watching tv
Stopping
Drank
Ate
Distracting

All these words are kind of weird to have considering I was working on a project for my history class!  I think I actually learned how crazy my writing process is, and how even though I never completely focus on what I'm doing, I always seem to come out successful.  I also learned that I work best when I'm doing something else.  This is probably backwards but when I'm focus on one thing at a time, I usually get even more distracted! Lol

WDYDWYD?!

WDYDWYD?!

This website was super interesting because it was pretty much like a free expression website, where people could come and freely express how they felt!  All the pictures are pretty interesting because they are all full of color and definition.  When I was looking at WDYDWYD I thought it was similar to Tumblr where people can come a post pictures that appeal to them.



This picture is from Tumblr and is very similar to pictures that I have seen on WDYDWYD!

When Writing into the Day about the website I noticed that I called the pictures "random pictures" which is interesting because when looking at the website again and understanding the title most of the pictures have a purpose to them!  I also said in my day book that if I was making a WDYDWYD post my picture would say "because I'm me!"

The End of Publishing?!

I really liked the Youtube video we watching in class on August 28th called "The Future of Publishing."  I think it is interesting in seeing the different viewpoints of how people view publishing in today's world. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Weq_sHxghcg

Me personally, I think we are nearing the end of books being published physically and leaning more towards books being published online.  With the way that technology is advancing I don't see a problem with publishings become more online then printed out. 


These Kindles are a prime example of how physical books are slowly becoming less and less common.




Read my Writing into the Day and tell me what you think!

 

Things too short to be saved!

I still think that the quote about things being “too short to be saved, but too important to be thrown away still hits me in a way that describes a lot of things I come in contact with throughout my life.  There are often times in which I have had things that I thought that I really didn’t need any more but I would still save them.  This could partly be to my need to hoard things but it could also be related to how I view things as important or unimportant.  There are a lot of things that I have to save just for the heck of it. Many times I don’t even know where it came from, who did it, why whoever did it did it, or even what it is but I still save them.  I usually think that whatever it is that I’m saving will eventually have another purpose, or I can use it for something else.  Writing into the Day really lets me get the little quirky things or things that I have never truly thought about in depth out of my mind and onto the page!  Even sometimes when I’m writing into the Day I run out of things to say but I keep writing and waiting for my thoughts to jumpstart and catch back up.