CLASS NOTES
January 10, 2017
Blog:
Whether you are preparing a speech or writing an essay, you must think about the type of audience receiving the information. This is important because it controls the genre in which you will write in. For example, when an author is writing a children’s book he or she will use words that the children can understand and pictures that appeal to them. Knowing your audience also helps you stay focused in your writing. For example, if you are preparing a speech for adults on the harmful affects of drugs and alcohol, then you are going to have serious tone and persuasive attitude.
Class Discussion:
Genre – categories of ways of communicating a message (composition) – can include
Audience – knowing who you are writing to shapes how you write your genre or what genre you choose to write in
Rhetorical Situation – context from which the text/genre arose
Time
Purpose
Audience
Conflict
Exigency
January 18, 2017
Blog:
A chapter from Anne Lamott's book, Bird by Bird, called "Shitty First Drafts", was inspirational and extremely relatable. I thought it was inspirational because of the fact that herself and many other professional writers had struggled to begin first drafts. She explains that no one can just sit down and just start writing. There is a process that all writers go through: bad first draft, decent second draft, and respectable final draft. I was able to relate to Lamott because I always have a hard time starting my papers. However, now that I have some advice from Lamott it may be a little less stressful to start my first draft.
In-Class Prompt “where you feel like you are most heard (who)”:
I feel like I am most heard when I am around family and friends. I feel comfortable talking to them because they know who I am and they understand me because they have known me for a long time. I don’t usually feel heard around people I don’t know or people that don’t know me because they can’t relate to my situations like my family and friends can.
Ideas on first paper:
Being involved in the sports community at my high school. Specific sports team?
250-word discovery draft of first paper:
Throughout high school I was involved in the sports community. I participated in football, basketball, weightlifting, and wrestling. By playing these sports I was interacting with genres such as team meetings, recruitment, practice, and team funding. In team meetings we discussed what we needed to work on as team, what we could improve on individually, and something good that we did. The wrestling team was short on players so we had to inform the student community and persuade some individuals to join the team. At football practice, the lineman would have to protect the quarterback so the quarterback could trust (ethos) the linemen that he would have enough time to throw the ball. And in basketball, the point guard would have to trust his teammate to come down the court at the right to so he could get the pass off. In all these sports the whole team had to participate in raising money for the team. For football and wrestling, we went to several busy places and ask people if they would like to support a local high school team buy purchasing a discount card. For basketball we had a shoot-a-thon where we asked friends and family to pledge us a certain dollar amount for the amount of free throws we make. The fundraising for weightlifting was very similar to that of wrestling; instead of shooting free throws, we did push ups.
January 18, 2017
Conference Reflection: During my conference reflection, I worked with Matt to make sure I was on the right tract with my essay. I didn’t make to many grammatical errors, but I did struggle relating my topic to genres. To fix this issue I went back the certain points in my three body paragraphs and got rid of irrelevant information and added more details that related to genres. I also wrote the essay in a report-like form. To fix this problem I went back and changed all the “you’s” to “I’s” and put it in a more personal point of view. I fixed phrases or ideas that I repeated in the essay by either removing them or rephrasing them. Lastly, I wrote my conclusion by summarizes what I wrote about in the essay. Instead, I need to write some personal thoughts about the process and how it affected me.
January 30, 2017
Plagiarism:
Plagiarism is just as bad as stealing. It is taking someone else’s own work and using it as your own. You will not gain anything from plagiarizing because you won’t be learning the material. When students plagiarized they fail to improve their abilities and they fail to understand through experience. And the punishments for a cheating are definitely not worth the risk. The consequences can include: an “F” in the course, disciplinary probation, suspension, and even expulsion. An act of plagiarism also goes down on your record, so when you are applying for jobs employers will see that you cannot be trusted. Dishonesty is certainly not a trait that employers want in their employees.
In-Class:
Genre Presentations Epic Rap Battles: Shakespeare vs. Cat in the Hat Started in 2010 Two feuding historical figures settling differences Speaker uses to Audience teens to twenties Tone – anger and pride Rap to convey message Begin with 3 friends trying to start improv
Propaganda:
Examples of Plagiarism:
Ex. 1 is plagiarism because it is exactly the same
Ex. 2 is plagiarism because it uses the same phrases
Ex. 3 is plagiarism because it uses the same phrases
February 6, 2017
Maine Lobster Festival is every July towards the end of the month and is located on the west side of Penobscot Bay. The festival attracts many people each year because of the fun and exciting activities. Some of the activities that will be presented at the festival are concerts, cooking tournaments, parades, and of course eating lobster. When I was five years old my uncle got married in Maine. Although I do not remember much from the wedding I do remember seeing and eating a lot of lobster. I never knew why that was the only thing I remember, but now I think I understand.
ROUGH AND FINAL DRAFT DUE WEDNESDAY – email and upload to wix
MEET AT LIBRARY
Research Paper – 3,000 words
February 13, 2017
The best way to write a good paper is to write something you are passionate about. If you cannot relate yourself to your topic then it is going to take more time and be more difficult to write. However, if you are passionate about the topic you are writing then you can add more meat to your essay by sharing your own thoughts and ideas. As well as adding your own thoughts and ideas, you will also be interested in finding out more about your topic. Writing a paper that you are passionate about will give you more of a purpose to write which in the end will result in a great research paper.
February 20, 2017
After reading chapter 14, “Finding and Managing Print and Online Sources”, I learned the difference between popular and scholarly sources and how they can help me research my topic, which is on the MCAT (Medical College Admission Test). These “popular sources” are informal works that are relatively short and not peer-reviewed. Therefore, when I first started my research on the MCAT I used popular sources to get a general view of all the important information that I wanted to focus on. Then, when I figured out the main points I began to use scholarly sources because they are peer-reviewed and written by experts, therefore, being making my research more accurate.
Jayne Morel – Well first off I thought the whole fly-in-community was a really cool idea because I have never heard of anything like it. And I thought it was interesting how she is going to use more of a popular resource than a scholarly. I also didn’t know you could use a video recording, picture, or artwork as sources which is something that I might be able to use in my paper as well.
Renee Wyatt – I agree that the keywords are very important in conducting research. And using these filter engines is very important because it will narrow down the searches to make things a lot easier to find. Especially if you have a really broad topic you need to be using the “OR’s” and “AND’s” in the search engines
Amanda Neppl – I agree to the statement “the lengthiest sources can misinform a reader” because many times I would get lost or confused. And the same can be true with sources that are too short because they can contain more general information than specifics.
February 21, 2017
Chapter 7, “Integrating & Documenting Sources”, discussed quoting, paraphrasing, summarizing, and avoiding plagiarism. If you want to use the author’s own words to emphasize a point, you can take a segment from the text and put quotations around it. But, you still have to give the author credit by including his or her name. However, in paraphrasing you do not quote or write word for word from the text. You reiterate the main points of the text in our own words while including similar details that were used by the author. Then if you do not want to be guilty for plagiarism you must include an in-text citation and a works cited. When we summarize we do not use details from the text, like we would when paraphrasing. To summarize, you would break down the text into your own words and it should be much shorter than the original text. Then you would include the authors name to give him or her credit for the original work.
Interview Questions & Answers:
1. Did you use a guide or tutor to study for the MCAT?
I used the Stanley Kaplan prep course
2. What do you remember for the prep course? What did it include?
Included practice tests
3. Can you explain the setup of the MCAT? Was it multiple-choice (bubble sheet)? Any essays? Anything you can remember about the layout or structure.
I only recall multiple-choice questions
4. How did you find out your scores?
I received scores by mail
5. How many times did you take the exam?
I believe I took I once
6. Do you think the MCAT should have a strong influence on admission to medical school?
I think it should have moderate influence.
7. Why do you think it should have a moderate influence?
It levels the playing field with respect to grades from one college to another but it only reflects your performance over several hours as opposed to years of work
8. What medical schools did you send your MCAT scores to?
UM, UF, FSU, Medical College of Pennsylvania and Universidad Central del Caribe
9. Why did you choose the Medical School of Pennsylvania?
Good reputation and location
10. Is there anything interesting about MCAT that you would like to add?
Must have been pretty stressful and miserable because I've blocked out most of my memories about it
February 27, 2017
Chapter twenty-one, “MLA Style: In-Text Citations”, talked about how to include in-text citations into your papers. The purpose of in-text citations is to show the readers where they can find your source from your works cited page. There are many ways to make in-text citations. The most popular include the authors name in the text with the page number in parentheses or both author’s name and page number in parentheses. If you used multiple works written by the same author then you have to include the title of the work either in text or in parentheses. I realized that many works would not always give you an author so it is important to know how to cite a work without one. To do this you simple just use the title of the work in your in-text citation.
Genre presentation
About history
Who
What
Conventions
Purpose
March 22, 2017
At my conference with Mat, I worked with him to make sure I was on the right tract with my essay. I didn’t make to many grammatical errors, but I did struggle with one of my points. To fix this issue I went back the certain points in my three body paragraphs and got rid of irrelevant information and added more details that related to genres. I also wrote the essay in a report-like form. To fix this problem I went back and changed all the “you’s” to “I’s” and put it in a more personal point of view. I fixed phrases or ideas that I repeated in the essay by either removing them or rephrasing them. Lastly, I wrote my conclusion by summarizes what I wrote about in the essay. Instead, I need to write some personal thoughts about the process and how it affected me.
March 26, 2017
Revising is important for a well-written paper because it helps polish your paper by fixing grammatical errors, unclear ideas, and other problems that weren’t originally noticed by the writer. There are two main ways to go about revising an essay. The first is “Revising Based on Your Own Observations” which means to reread and revise your own work based on errors that you notice yourself. I usually do this after every paragraph and about three to four times after I completed my essay. By going back and reading my work I catch simple grammatical and punctual mistakes. The second type of revising is “Revising Based on Peer Review” which means to have someone other than yourself read your essay and comment on any mistakes. This way of revising is probably the most beneficial because the one revising the essay will most likely see the essay in a different view than the writer does which results in new ideas and advice.
March 27, 2017
I didn’t know that I already knew what viral marketing was until I read the definition. I knew that consumers can be influenced by companies to share information about the company’s product but I didn’t know the actual term for this action. A perfect example of viral marketing is the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. ALS is a disease that affects the nervous system in a way that weakens a person’s muscles and negatively effects physical abilities. The ALS association did not create the ALS ice bucket challenge. Pete Frates, who was diagnosed with ALS, created the ALS ice bucket challenge about two years ago. He posted a video of a bucket of ice being dumped over his head, which then lead to his friend to do the same. And before you knew it everyone was posting videos. Each video began with the person stating their name and three other people they want to nominate for the challenge and then the pouring of ice over their head. Eventually famous actors and professional athletes were creating videos and donating money. 115 million dollars were donated in an eight-week period.
Speaker - Cooperative Forest Fire Prevention
Occasion – comes from Smokey Bear and always now
Audience – children and adults
Purpose – to inform people about the wildfires and persuade them to prevent
Subject – prevent wildfires
April 3, 2017
Chapter 10, “Assembling A Multigenre Project”, is basically a detailed explanation of how to create a multigenre project for project three. It even includes a step-by-step procedure to create a multigenre project. The example of the bond between people and dogs made it much clearer of how I should go about project three. I went head and decided what my three genres were going to be. The first one is a thank you email to a retired neurologist that I had interviewed for project two. This email is a narrative because I am showing my appreciation for her time while telling a story of how the information she gave me was beneficial for my research paper and for my personal knowledge. My second genre is a twitter page for all pre-med students at FSU. This is informative because the page is constantly posting information on classes, professors, jobs/internships, and important due dates. My third genre is a persuasive poster that encourages per-med students to follow the twitter page. The poster is full of bright colors to attract students, and it includes the name of the twitter account and a list of ways the twitter page will be helpful. It will be posted to in the King Life Science Building where many pre-med students walk in and out for science classes and labs.
April 5, 2017
Mountains/planet
Rocky/rough
Birds eye view
High/low areas
White
G represents Google
Pin
Green
White
Yellow
Blue
Grey
Street
Grass
Lake/ocean/body of water
Pin is blown up
Opportunity
April 12, 2017
Poster – poster to promote twitter page
Twitter page – where all pre med students can be updated with important news
Thank you email – I will send a thank you email to the retired neurologist that I interviewed
Class Log:
For Hannah’s mini-genre presentation she made an instagram to inform people of the dangers of tourism. The instagram page includes pictures of animals, nature, and a “Brita” water bottle. The “Brita” is a filtered water bottle. Her second genre is an email sent to the city of Saint John, recommending using filtered water bottles to save Saint Johns most wasted resource – water. Her third genre was making an advertisement for a filtered water bottle and posted it on the FSU Class of 2020 Facebook page.
For Olivia’s mini-genre presentation, she made a pamphlet, poster, and Facebook page. The pamphlet explains the three sectors that the Peace Corps mainly focus on. The three sectors include: Health, Education, and Environment. The poster is a map of everywhere the Peace Corps has been. The map is labeled with dots in different colors, and the phrase “How the Peace Corps Continues to Change the World” is written in big font on the map. The Facebook page’s purpose is to inform others on the countries the Peace Corps travels to and the sectors they focus on in that specific area.
For Steffen’s mini-genre presentation, he made a Facebook group, posters, and an “Evite”. The Facebook group is a group for FSU chemical engineering majors to communicate. He created four posters to advertise the Facebook group and put one of them in the Dirac Library. He also made an “Evite” which is an electronic invitation to join the group. He mentioned the “Evite” could be posted on instagram and twitter as well.