The last blog post here is a reflection of where I was at the beginning and where I am now as a writer. I’m gonna reflect on my author identity, my theory of writing, my growth, and how I will use what I know now in the future. To start off, I watched this video about reflective writing and looked at Genres in Academic Writing: Reflective Writing and drew a lot of comparisons to my personal growth process. Whenever I reflect on something, whether it be a conversation i just had or an activity I just did, I always think about what I learned and how it could be applicable in the future. I usually do this mentally and automatically, but when Sabatinos got you under the gun and you have to write about it, I actually think I retained and comprehended my experiences better. Also, thinking on the paper lets me understand my thoughts better spatially. I think that this alone has lent itself heavily to my author’s identity. Looking at where I have gone wrong and working towards the meta-level understanding of an issue is something that I enjoy ruminating on. In terms of what has actually changed about my author identity, I think that the horizon only got bigger. I think that at the beginning of the semester, I was trapped into one style of writing, and never before have I tried to write with emotion, so there was a lot of learning to be had early on. Now, I have a clearer understanding of where I am as a writer and what the next step for me is. My theory of writing has also changed over the course of the semester. While I don’t particularly enjoy writing more now than before, I value it much more now. I used to only ever write one draft for every paper I wrote. Now i get the whole shitty first drafts and whatever. I understand the value of failing in writing now more than I ever have. It kind of reminds me of Zeno’s Paradox which is only being able to move half of the way to your goal at a time, but this means that you can never reach it, only get ever so much closer. And while it might seem like a losing race, you win knowledge by making it to the halfway point each time. My growth as a writer has also seen a lot of improvement. Having the leniency of choice on these assignments has helped me out of my comfort zone. In the past there was a lot of learning conventions and what I am allowed to say and what I am not allowed to say. I can confidently say that I have learned more about writing this semester than I did in my last 2 years of high school. And lastly, where am I going with what I know in the future. While I see value in having a personal journal, I am mostly likely not going to do that or anything similar. What I will do, however, is every time I walk into a room I’ll bring my ancestor’s knowledge, my previous knowledge, and now our discourse communities knowledge with me and apply it to anything that is thrown at me.
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This blog post will go over what my notes mean and how I used them as well as what I can do to strengthen my research project. First I’ll go over my notes and then at the end I’ll talk about my plans for the research project and where I went wrong and how I’ll fix them.
The first thing that I want to reflect on is the MLA paper that I started writing. I thought I was going to write an MLA paper for this project because it seemed the easiest and least time consuming. However, when I started writing it, the ideas I had were flawed and beyond repair. I went through a lot of writing and rewriting and ended up with something that I really didn’t like. I thought about how I could improve my MLA paper, but I kept returning to this idea that I had much before. I wanted to try to write a persuasive piece in the style of The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling. I really liked the idea of short stories, which were too long so I made them allegories, to convey a message. I researched a lot of folklore and snagged ideas from here and there and mixed them in with my own to create my research project. I didn’t do all of the work on the MLA paper for nothing though. I reused some of the ideas from the notes I had and built stories from them. The second story I wrote (The Son) was heavily influenced by the need to learn about emotion when they experience it. Your brain remembers emotion very well, even if it isn't with clarity. Through my research, I learned of the importance of teaching your son about emotion early. Many of the ideas I had with the MLA paper carried over into the stories. When I started writing the allegories, I wrote them down as I saw them happening in my head. I knew I wanted one to be about parents and one to be about friends because that is where you learn the most from growing as a boy. I also added one about a mentor because I learned of their importance as well. I basically just splashed down all of the ideas I had without really caring about setting. I just wanted to make sure that the message i was trying to convey was at the heart of the allegory. As I started writing the actual allegories, the messages sort of evolved on their own to fit into the allegory and my research better. I was pretty unhappy with how my research project came out for one main reason. I did not have a lot of time to revise it which really screwed it over, and it came off as very confusing, admittedly even to me. If I had the chance to step back and reexamine my project I think it would have turned out much much better. I plan on adding explanations for everything and also plan on including some quotes and other such things that reinforce my position. The focus of this blog post will be to interpret the three texts: Our Discourse Community Values, What is Literacy by James Paul Gee, and We Are Many by Pablo Neruda. It will also answer the question of how these three texts speak to the identity of our English class discourse community.
James Paul Gee discusses discourse communities through the lens of a scholar. I think that what he says has a lot of application to our discourse community because it is a primarily academic one. Gee says that discourse communities are inherently ideological. I think this fits with our discourse community because ours is based in learning. Values that everyone in our discourse community holds are in the Discourse Community Values and also include being in the class and learning together. Secondly he states that discourse communities are resistant to internal criticism. While this seems to be an unnecessary claim, I personally think it is important. I think this claim sets the boundaries of our discourse community. Once you are against the base values of discourse community then you are not part of it anymore. James Paul Gee also says that the discourse-defined position of yourself is also influenced by other discourses. The way I understand this claim is that discourse communities that you are currently part of and have been a part of in the past all have an influence on your position in this discourse community. We somewhat discussed this in class when we talked about My Name is Margaret. We discussed how you bring all of your past experiences with you wherever you go. I think that is an important realization to make about ourselves as well as the discourse communities we belong to. This claim that Gee makes is important for being considerate to everyone in the discourse community. It is important to understand that our discourse community could be in direct conflict with other discourse communities that members of ours are a part of. I think this is more apparent with hate groups however. The last part of his statement about discourse communities says that they are closely “related to the distribution of social power”. I think that this aspect of discourse communities has little effect on ours. In his poem, Pablo Neruda talks about his many selves and how they manifest themselves when he is talking to different people. In his poem he says whenever he is set up to look smart he says something stupid and ruins it. He is trying to say that he brings what he knows from everywhere he has been into the conversation he is having currently, whether it be a positive or negative thing for the group. He also talks about how when he writes, he gets so lost in his writing that he kind of maps out who he is as a person. I think that is why he is saying he will speak of geography in the end. This ties to our discourse community because of how we bring our lives into the classroom and exit with what we have written and understood about ourselves. Home Page Well-Being Assessment: Flourishing Why Assessment Summary: It does its job well. How Assessment Summary: I will proofread it as necessary. About Page Well-Being Assessment: Flourishing Why Assessment Summary:It looks good but the aesthetics need some work. How Assessment Summary: I will find a better place for the embarrassing picture by 3-17. Narrative Page Well-Being Assessment: Functioning Why Assessment Summary: I need to expand on some of the blog posts and add others into the paragraph How Assessment Summary: I will expand on the blog posts by 3-17. Narrative Draft 1 Well-Being Assessment: Flourishing Why Assessment Summary: The first draft was very rough. How Assessment Summary: I will leave it alone because I can look back over it to improve later Narrative Draft 2 Well-Being Assessment: Flourishing Why Assessment Summary: I was very happy with how everyone received it because I thought it would be very hit or miss How Assessment Summary: Start working on a next draft after spring break ends Research Project Page Well-Being Assessment: Suffering Why Assessment Summary: It still has some scaffolding in there How Assessment Summary: I think I will leave some of the reminders in there so I know what to have, but I will also finish the paragraph by 3-17 Contact Page Well-Being Assessment: Flourishing Why Assessment Summary: Looks clean and done How Assessment Summary: Does not need any changes Blog Page Well-Being Assessment: Flourishing Why Assessment Summary: Besides missing this blog post it looks good How Assessment Summary: Add blogs as needed Blog 1 Well-Being Assessment: Flourishing Why Assessment Summary: Answers most of the questions and looks good How Assessment Summary: No changes will be made Blog 2 Well-Being Assessment: Flourishing Why Assessment Summary: It’s not my favorite by any means, but it shows growth How Assessment Summary: No changes will be made Blog 3 Well-Being Assessment: Flourishing Why Assessment Summary: For a first shot at narratives I think it isn’t too bad. I also think it shows growth as well How Assessment Summary: No changes will be made Blog 4 Well-Being Assessment: Functioning Why Assessment Summary: I need to add a picture How Assessment Summary: will add a picture of a detention slip by 3-17 Blog 5 Well-Being Assessment: Flourishing Why Assessment Summary: I think this one is fine and does not need any changes How Assessment Summary: No changes will be made |
“If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all: Read a lot and write a lot”
- Stephen King AuthorHello. I'm Raj. Nice to meet you. Archives
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