W26s1's Weblog

New Q’s

w26s1 — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 18:23:46 +0000

After thinking a little and doing some research on my topic (scandals in baseball history) I have discovered that there aren’t that many scandals in the sport that I find interesting aside from the Black Sox Scandal of 1919, which was the reason I chose the topic to begin with. The only other things I was able to find information on are gambling scandals and steroid use, which I don’t feel that I can spread a lot of knowledge about. There are already hundreds of stories of this sort going around for the world to read and form opinions about. I started wondering if I should narrow my topic down to just looking at the different points of view of the 1919 Chicago White Sox and the things that happened which have affected the team’s history. I was able to find a lot of articles written by many different people – journalists, sports writers, and even players who were involved in the scandal. I think I could use these sources to discuss all of the different points of view of this particular event in history.

Feeding on Feedback

w26s1 — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 15:23:27 +0000

There are not that many occurrences of positive feedback on the grading form for my civic letter. A smiley-face indicating I typed the final draft in the correct format tells me I still remember how to format a business letter after typing up dozens of them for my internships over the past two years. I was informed that I “know the material” and that my “organization flows,” but each good comment is countered with a “but” telling me something I did wrong. That says to me, “you almost wrote something good, but you did something bad to screw it up at the last minute, so never mind.”

I know we were not supposed to vent in these posts and I am trying not to, so onward using criticism constructively. This feedback will help me remember to use in-text citations in my next paper. I need to be more aware of how many pronouns I am using, as I have lost points for that on two papers this semester. I forgot to capitalize “The South” even though somewhere in the back of my mind I knew I was supposed to. I thought it was clear what I wanted to accomplish by reading my paper: abolish the death penalty. But I guess I should have said it outright: “Governor Rell, I think the death penalty should not be an option in Connecticut.” I didn’t say what I wanted her to do, but I also thought that was clear… I wanted her to get rid of capital punishment in Connecticut. Maybe I was not as clear as I could have been so in future papers I will be sure not to imply anything, I will say exactly what I mean.

I don’t mean to sound bitter. The feedback is very helpful, but I am annoyed right now because the girl at the smoothie place made me late for work and gave me a smoothie with little things that resemble wood chips in it.

Are the Freshmen Smarter than Us?

w26s1 — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 02:36:32 +0000

It is a bit difficult to discern the themes in the conversation between Steph and her freshmen because the link she sent us to isn’t exactly a conversation. I can assume, however, that she asked her first-year students to give their reactions to the online interaction between multiple classes. It seems like most of the freshmen think it is a good idea to receive feedback from both their instructor and from other students of all types. For the most part, they are extremely willing to use the Wiki as a new method of learning – much more willing than our class. Of course, being freshmen, they are forced to be open to new ways of learning, as they experience many of these changes in the transition from high school, although some of them seem to think it is weird that other students they have never met can read their work. It appears that they value Steph’s feedback on their feedback, though some of them have expressed that they find it very different than what they are used to.

Although most of our class is adamantly opposed to use of the Wiki, the freshmen have brought up some good points. It is a valuable resource we can use to receive feedback on our writing not just from our instructor and classmates, but from students we do not know who have varying levels of experience on the subject. This way, they are able to give feedback based only on the writing, and not be swayed by what they know about the writer. Maybe we should take a leaf out of these freshmen’s book and allow ourselves to turn this resource into a positive learning experience.

Analyzing Education

w26s1 — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 17:42:26 +0000

For this assignment, we were asked to brainstorm a few questions to help us create an analysis of a list of definitions of learning

Questions

Why does this text look the way it does?

What do they mean individually?

What do they mean together?

Are there differences between each definition?

What are the differences between each definition?

Babelx3

w26s1 — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 00:25:00 +0000

After reading everybody’s reactions to Babel, it seems that most people are in agreement of the main tie between the film and the course content. Everyone agrees that the movie depicts four stories that are all interrelated in some way, but in terms of the similarities between the movie and the class is that both have to do with communication and the ways people from different cultures are able to communicate with one another despite speaking their cultural differences. I still stand by everything I wrote in my first two posts about the film.

Nobody ever commented on my first post

w26s1 — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 02:42:15 +0000

And the person who’s blog I commented on never accepted my comment. Maybe these people dropped the class? What should I do?

Language Barrier?

w26s1 — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 02:36:10 +0000

My sense of the film Babel has changed slightly with the evolution of the plot. Now that I have seen a bit more I realize that, although it is true that differing forms of communication can be a cause for miscommunication, there are also many striking similarities between these forms. The film depicts how people of all cultures all go through difficulties and hard times, and the same emotions are stirred up in all of these groups in times of hardship. These individuals are all able to communicate their emotions to other cultural groups despite language and cultural barriers.

Babel

w26s1 — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 02:50:21 +0000

The film Babel demonstrates how different types of communication practices among various cultures differ from and also resemble each other. The film portrays several groups of people who communicate using different languages, but are all able to successfully convey their emotions to each other even across their various language barriers. Furthermore, these language barriers are also causes for many incidents of miscommunication. This corresponds to the subject matter of this course in the sense that one’s intention in communication is not always what is conveyed to the audience. It is important to be able to make meaning clear, even across cultural barriers.