Peer review Writing to Analyze

Our video wasn't shown yesterday in class so i cant for sure say how everyone would have like it. I can speculate that everyone would have thought it to be a pretty comical film. We need to still get the permission forms from the extra actors. If anything I think we could have used another skit for picking up trash.

Analyze Status

We still have to edit the video, the camera has not been able to link up to any computer. We may have to reshoot the video from a webcam and edit it that way.

Letter

Dear Jill,

I try to complete my assignments when I learn of their existence. Roughly I get about 80 percent or so of the overall assignments. Just the other day i went in and reorganized my wiki, and put all my rough drafts and final drafts of papers in one folder. Since our last meeting I would say I don't have any polished texts and I have to polish all of my proverbial silver. Fun weekend coming up. Microsoft Word has become my greatest ally in the fight against grammatical errors. An i or an apostrophe is always not captialized or non-existant in my writings. I have AIM and myspace to blame for that one. Other than my grammer, my revisions aren't much different than my first drafts. I usually do a good job of addressing my audience and my purpose, but as we talked about I still need to expand ideas and complete my thoughts. Roughly I spend about an hour or so writing these drafts every draft, so roughly I would spend about 3 to 4 hours writing for this class alone. Not to mention my learning stratgies class which I have become so demoralized to write papers for that "teacher" that I hardly bother with answering her written responses. Besides the point, This weekend will be spent writing. About 6 hours or so.

Participation I don't believe I have much trouble in. I dont respond to every single question asked, but I feel like when I do respond it helps the progress of the presentation. Or sometimes to just give comic relief. I feel like I have gone beyond the bare minimum standards, but not over zealous in those attempts.

My articles however are a different story. I will admit I haven't brought my A game to the writing table. I've been up late writing almost every one so the rushing to finish has definitely affected its potiential. As we discussed, if I just take the time to write out what my mind automatically sees when im writing my story will come together very nicely.

-Originally made by
Steven-

Writing to analyze Blog

We still have to start and finish our video. We need to get a camera and probally one shot the entire video today after class. I have half completed ideas and camera angles that would be used in the movie, but more than likely the video will take all day/night.

Chapter 13 PRP

This chapter was mainly about creating a structurally sound essay, and by developing ideas within paragraphs. The section on switching to a new paragraph I found most helpful, because over the years of writing finding where to stop and start ideas has always bee a challenge for me. To have those tips on concluding my ideas into seperate paragraphs will be most valuable to me. The connective words section is bennificial, but as I was reading it seemed that too much of these types of words will just make fragmented and run-on sentences.
My main weakness in writing is explination and detail. In my stories I will touch on idas, but I don't usually go into depth in explaining everything. This leaves the story vauge and not very descriptive. While rereading the peice, I will read the lines and my mind automatically fills in the gaps my story leaves. To define this, I write in more of a note taking format rather than a story telling one. I need the most work on this part of writing.

Writing to analyze

I am doing envriomental conservation for my analysis. I dont know much about the subject, but my group has narrowed that subject to just pollution. Many people complain about pollution yet do nothing about it. Im talking of trash of course, and the occasional homeless. Picking these things off the streets will give an overall uplifting spirit that people can benifit from.

We are sticking mainly to the internet for resorces because its fast and easy. Mainly we would be searching for statistics and data on percent of daily, and annually waste produced by just our country alone. Rumor has it we are the world most wasteful society, is this a title we as americans wish to keep?

Writing to Explore Final

The Ronald McDonald House's (RMHC) mission is to find or create programs that directly improves the health and well-being of children. In this mission they hold several core values that help the RMHC complete this mission.

• Focusing on the critical needs of children.
• Celebrating the diversity of the programs offered and the staff, volunteers and donors who help out.
• Staying true to a 35 year heritage of being responsible stewardship.
• Operating with accountability and transparency.

The House focuses on children espically, because in their vision if a childs life is changed or made better, the family well being is positivly effected. Because they focus on the children they strive to keep families together for treatment and rehabilitation. RMHC Houses have playrooms and private rooms for the children to stay in for as long as they are treated. The fees for the rooms ranges from $5 - $25 per room per night because of the many private donanations given around the world. No one is ever turned away from treatment. If a family is unable to pay, their fees are waived and care is given for free.

RMHC has donation boxes in every McDonalds along with the private and corporate donations they recieve. Everything from food and toy donations, to soda can tabs are accepted as donations. McDonalds has been the largest corporate donator for over 35 years and the in store donation boxes held in McDonalds are the largest donations to the RMHC. Even though McDonalds is the largest donator, the RMHC can not run solely on McDonalds contributions.

The RMHC asks the community to give and to help out in anyway that they can afford, whether that be money, time, or items any contribution is greatly appriciated

Lang, Knowledge, Power

Language is used to convey ideas on a familiar medium for other people to recieve and comprehend. If ideas can be conveyed correctlly and inspirationally then those words gain more power for influence than by beating the listener to agree. The sword will force people to believe in something they have no heart for, but the inspiration from words, alters thinking patterns and aspires people to change and conform on their own accord. To do this a speaker must be very knowlegdgable and very articulate to pass on this knowledge to the listener. Their knowledge and language becomes anothers strength and power.

Experience Final Draft

Dear Eric Bishop,

Im writing to you to thank you for the zen-like example you had. Through ought the time you were my coach your leadership had pushed me to excel beyond that of my fellows. For your constantly improving my faults, and for teaching me to be a smarter player rather than a more skilled one. Your devotion to the team is something i will always carry with me everywhere I go in life, and it is a lesson that I too will try to impass to others.

Even when I've never met you your name was mentioned by all the Little League coaches and by current and former players. You were the titan in midst of the ants in these tales. I was anxious when fall had started because after the entire summer and winter I still had not seen your face, but the dominating presence over the other coaches and the players was something I had expected, but had not experienced and it overwhelmed me. I remember the end of the winter conditioning and the coaches told the players to sit in a circle and introduce themselves when called upon. Quiet I sat awaiting roll call and to gauge your reaction to me. I will never forget the first words we had spoken to each other.
"Steven......what are you a junior?" -he questioned
"No coach, only a freshman." -I calmly replied
"Huh, well no shit." -he said
Overjoyed, I couldn't help but smile. Had I impressed the great coach Bishop? Turns out I didn't impress him as much as I thought. Later I came to realize that I learned that to impress you actions would speak much louder than words.

It took all of freshman year to understand how you structured practices out on the baseball field, but once the flow was there the drills became somewhat second nature to me. Everything from ground hits around the infield to running situations for outfield hits. You taught me the plays, and the outcomes of almost every senario that baseball had to offer, something I had never begun to think about. To think ahead several plays and determine the best course of action in a second, those kind of skills do not leave a person, and even in life outside the diamond I exlempifed your tutelage and succeeded without much effort. Like playing a constant game of chess, always calculating and never resting.

By the time my sophomore year hit I was part of the team. I spent all freshman year sitting the bench over the other star catcher and I think I played a whole 6 innings the whole season. I was a little upset, but everyday in practice i had enjoyed learning new techniques and becoming that much closer to a spot. My second year I had to give up catching to play first base. I enjoyed first base more than I did catching, but learning the "inside scoop" all freshman year really helped. The beginning of the season though I had done something stupid and broke my hand. Again I sat the bench with no hope of playing all season. Most people would complain and be completly distrought at this, but strangely I just found enjoyment being on the field. I have partly you to blame for that, but mostly myself. You inspired me to stay on the team even though I couldn't contribute much to the team. That kind of dedication has always been with me.

You were the only person I hated to leave behind in baseball when I left. You were the light in the dark for me. Dealing with the thick-headedness and stubborness of the other players really began to drone on me. I had found a better life in running and I do not regret leaveing, but I sometimes wonder what else I could have learned from you if I had stayed. I feel there is nothing I can do to repay you for your lessons, but I suppose as being a teacher it is what you would have wanted. I can never thank you enough.

Chapter 5

While reading i thought to myself, most of these "writings" are reactivly thought out inside the mind rather than on paper. In secion 2 writing to explore life, the examples given I believe are those that people will just think about. Most of those I have met, adults included do not consistantly make a pros and cons list for everything in their lives. The act of writing and physically seeing your thoughts as your writing them proves time and time again to be more comprehensive than just quietly thinking them, again the time factor and practicality comes into play. People are just too busy. I did however enjoy reading of Dr. Tao and his prime number article and he is the truest example of years of writing classes, and commitment will eventually do to a career.

Genre and Design

1.
I would define this article as one that is revealing, but no more than need be. Blogs are ment to tell the story of what that person experienced. The interview, calling their friends, drinking a few beers its all part of what everyday normal people attend to and as such people can relate easily to the peice.

2.
I believe it became common when viewers began to leave huge ammounts of comments about how good the peice was and how good of a blogger they are. Because of the raised self esteem I think the bloggers began to reccomend other articles like their own so the readers are constantly intrested. The blogger gets more views, and the readers are happy -win win.

3.
I was intrested when the writer began to talk about how they called their family and friends. Its hard not to relate to someone who shows such excitement about landing a job.

4.
I wouldn't read more of this reader because it is their life, and I have my own. Im not the type of person to be gossipy and into everyones business even if they willingly offer it.

5.
I wouldn't include things such as crazy out of control parties/drug useage if there was any. Really leave out anything that is potentially incriminating by officals. Half naked pictures for the ladies may land them the job, but on a whole seperate set of circumstances that im sure the girl didn't want.

Chapter 3

This chapter i thought was a more in depth overview of the ending of chapter 2. Chapter 3 spoke mainly of making notes and rewriting important details. While these methods are useful, they are not practical. Every article cannot be disected so throughly and be expected to be done in a timely manner. I understand that the trick to it is to be able to disect the article as you read it and these steps prepare for that, but the reality is that most people already do this naturally and to build on skill that are already present in peoples reading patterns would only require more reading, not more work for the readings.

Chapter 2

This chaper spoke mainly of pinpointing main ideas and of quick comprehension. Skimming is a good method if your in a hurry, I even skimmed over this chaper to write this blog. Its a good method, but most of the non-important details are left to sketch. Annotation I don't much care for, but for book reports and critical questioning, annotationg helps me find the inner meanings in the stories. Its very time consuming, and quite frankly I usually dont have much time to write my papers.

Draft 2 Experience

To Whom it may Concern,

This is not a story about one person in particular. Rather its about an experience as a
whole as I lived it. I thank those who were involved in shaping my thinking and personality.
Without these persons I wouldn't have become who I am today, and I thank you all for your
enlightenment.

To begin we go back, back to a more dramatic and traverse period for everyone, the end of
middle school and the beginning of high school. Where everyone was searching for a place to be,
and a crowd to call their own, and I was no different. I remember going out and buying all new
clothes, mostly black because I thought "hey, the goth kids dont take shit from anybody." Turns
out they did. They took the blunt of most of the cruel and unusual jokes circulating around
campus. No one dared make fun of me to my face, but I was not deaf, I could hear the laughter
echoing through the halls directed at me and my ilk. I didn't care, I was who I was, and I wasn't
ashamed. I had joined baseball in the fall only to meet the next clique the school had to offer, the
Jocks. I never truely fit in with the baseball kids and because they were the people who had
laughed and made fun of me the entire year I didn't much like them either. Mainly because of
their horrible superego, but also for their lack of work ethic. I nearly killed myself the entire
year getting into shape for the season, and what hurt the most is that they, without doing much
work and constantly complaining about doing the workouts, played more games than I did. The
coaches always had meetings to always tell us how much we complain and how much we need to
work harder. I say we because even though the team consisted of seperate individuals playing baseball, I was still apart of it. The next year was a repeat of the year before. A year older, and not too much brighter. It wasn't until the summer in between sophomore and junior year that things finally began to change.

A friend of mine had convinced me to come out to the cross-country summer conditioning to
see if I would like it. I was very skeptical about it. Running long distance was not my forte, but I
was fast in the sprints. The first day I was astonished to find at how easy the runners had
accepted me and how easy going they were. I immeditally fit in. What diffred from baseball is
that this WAS a team. Cross-country was one well oiled machine consisting of friends as close as
brothers. I fell in love with running because of the sheer excitement from being with the team. I
ended up running track in the fall instead of playing baseball, and I have never looked back.
After track I contuined to run cross-country through my senior year, and because the same
kids played Ultimate Frisbee, I played with them. I had finally found the group of people where i
could be happy. Being on that team had changed me in such a profound way I can hardly
describe the drastic switch. Since freshman year I have learned much, but most imporantly I
learned how not to behave. I learned not to judge people for who they are, but for what they do.

Because of this I have learned to have a higher outlook in the good in people, Even those who the
rest of society have cast aside. High school in its whole was very educational, but my education
did not come from the classroom, but from studying those around me.

Personal Experience

High school was very a very humbleing experience for me. Going in as a freshman, I didn't know what crowd i should belong to. Throught middle school, high school cliques and "gangs" was all anyone could ever hear about. When the day finally came for me to decided where to stand, i remember buying all new clothes, mostly black, and decided "hey, the goth/scene kids dont take shit from nobody." Turns out, they do. They take the blunt of most cruel jokes and hard times imaginable. After a while I stopped wearing all black, but the kids who first accepted me still were called my friends. I joined baseball my freshman year, only to be mistaken for a Jr. A lot more was expected out of me i felt than was expected and shown from the other players. Thus enters, the Jocks. Egotistical, and extremely selfish, the jocks on baseball only accepted me for the only reason that i was actually on the team, and I grew to hate them for it.
Sophomore year wasn't that much diffrent from freshman year, save i was a year older and not too much brighter. I broke my hand at the beginning of season and didn't play but 3 games the whole year, though i did show up everyday to afterschool pratice and weightlifting. It impressed my coach yes, but overall i couldn't see any real reason not to show up, I was just going to go home and do nothing anyways.
When summer hit i contuined to go to baseball weightlifting, but one of my friends had convinced me to join Cross-Country for the summer and see if I would like it. Turned out that i absoultly loved it! The kids running were the smartest in the school and thusly enjoyed higher class jokes and a more submerrsive humor. They helped each other and there were no individuals on the team, we were one well oiled machine. This contuined throughought senior year and i have never looked back from quitting baseball over running.
The biggest lesson i learned in high school was not to judge people on who they are, but rather what they do to themselves and others. I still loathe the baseball kids for who they are, but i must thank them for showing me a possibility that i could've been exactlly like them. Just as snobbish and stuck-up.

Taking Root

1: In what ways was writing depicted in this film?
Writing will do many things to inspire, but writing is just simply the abstract formulation of an idea. Sometimes, action is called upon and the sword must be mightier than the pen. The sword in this instence is not a battle persay, but a physical action. Maathai's action was to constantly protest and activly replant entire forrests. The writings given were bias ranging from dipicting Maathai as a saint, to a she-devil not to be trusted.

2: What kind of power did the writing have?
Influence. Nothing more, nothing less. The people reading the words can take them in whatever way they see fit, but the author can usually persuade those who read their words into thinking as the author thinks. Friends would not even greet Maathai in the streets because of the bad reputation she had been given, when in reality she was one of the only ones trying her best to make the world a better place.

3: What does it mean to take action?
I define action as the physical event people partake in to change the physical world they live in. Now that definition is a little textbook, but when seriously considered it covers all facets that action can be applied to. From moving a cup of water from the table to your mouth, that action transfers the water to your stomache, and thus to your nutrition. Action in the sence of the movie has been one persons life long struggle to better their and many others world by physically planting trees, and protesting the overwhelmingly oppressive government. Through Maathai's actions, she inspired others to do similar acts, and finally take thier own lives in their hands to shape how they see fit, hopefully for the best.

Personal Response Paragraph

Chapter 1:
Rhetoric: "The art of using language effectively." -C. Brooks; R. P. Warren
I begin with this quote because I felt it sums up the entirety of the section in a single sentence. Language is the medium in which humans converse and exchange ideas. To call language anything else would be rather round-a-bout. Since the cradle, our parents, family members, and friends have shaped how we formulate sounds and our selection of words or phrases i.e. "y'all". Typically a southern phrase, the conjunction of you all is part of a southerns culture and heritage.
Writing however, has no place for this word. Writing gives pause to the instantaneous thoughts that are spoken casually in conversation. I do not speak as I write, one because its rather formal and its structure may intimidate others, and two, if someone were to hear me speaking this way.....they may never speak to me again. Yet, the language in writing forces people to comprehend the very essence of the writers inner thinkings. This comprehension in some small way alters the readers thinking patterns. They become filled with the authors thoughts as they read on and they can lose themselves in the authors dialect.
The section of Rhetorical Knowledge contains a bold heading of rhetorical situation. That paragraph I believe has the most impact of chosing to speak profoundly, or to speak casually in all facets of communication, including writing. Of when and where to speak with authority, or when to speak intructionally. As the paragraph reads, "To write for others successfully, then, you need to determine how to adapt your writing to meet their expectations and needs."

Chapter 4:
Fiction books have captivated the imaginations of many, from youthful to elderly. Most fiction however has greater purpose behind the tall tales than their colorful imagery. The author choses his or her audience, declares a valid purpose, and then immortalizes their thoughts into texts.
Immortality......such a profound word. We all seek it, but it is only given to few. The people of today want nothing more than what people have always wanted, to be heard. Bloggers, authors, comedians, activists, all seek some sence of purpose in their writings and messeges.
The book even gives examples of such people, like Mr. Russell Baker. A brief autobiography about the road to becoming an author. He shares his lifes story for his readers to comprehend his struggle on becoming a successful author. One to give insight on lifes endeavors, and two to forever give his life to the continuum of time.