Advancement in Writing

Ever since the start of the school year I think that my writing has began to change. I also think it has been for the better. In high school I rushed through papers not caring so much as to just get them done. Now I realize I take the time to read everything through and correct the errors I made by just zooming through those papers. Also the revision of my paper and of others has changed a bit. Now, I take the time to go through my paper and others and break each part of the paper down. Overall, I think my writing and critiquing has advanced and is at the level where it should be right now.

writing critique

On the Scoring rubric i would end up giving "Whole World" a 6. There were very little flaws if any and i thought the style of this paper was in order. It is written in a very powerful, precise language to get her point across about her trip to brazil and the need they have down there. I would have never really thought to travel down to brazil and this paper kind of gets me curious about going there. Last year i met a foreign exchange student from brazil named renaldo, who was a pretty chill individual. I thought the overall structure and all the information she talks about was laid out perfectly. If i had to say there was an error i would say the only minor flaw was that she gets a little repetitive on the vaccines paragraph. This could have been reduced to a few sentences. The pictures are a good visual to where they show what is happening. Overall this was a very good paper with minor flaws that is why i would grade it a 6 on the scoring rubric.

one on one

This week we only had one class day, monday, to get the general information on our fourth project. The rest of the time we had an individual meeting to go over our past projects, our grade, ideas for project 4, and and questions we have concerning the class. Overall my meeting went fine. I think that i am going to base most of project 4 on what i have already done for our timed writing. Overall it was a good week.

Fire Friday

Friday in class we were suppose to do our mid semester timed writing assignment to see how were coming along thus far. Unfortunately about half way into our time we encountered one of the famous la fallotte fire alarms. The alarm ended with leaving us very little time to finish and complete a top notch paper. I know I was not able to finish mine having about one paragraph and a couple more sentences of my conclusion still to finish up. Overall, I thought I was doing a pretty decent job on the paper with the time we had, and can hopefully finish it into a good paper.

Guest Speaker

On wednesday we had a guest speaker in our english class about his trip to Africa. I was very surprised that in such a war torn country that they were able to execute what they had planned to do. Another thing that was interesting to me was the lack of fresh water and electricity. The fact that the main city had only 4 hours of electricity a day made me think how life would be like if we had that in the U.S. The pictures he had were also intriguing in that with war going on everyone was very happy. The things that he did to help out the countries schooling was a great deed and I'm sure they were very thankful for him and his group.

art museum visit

I finally saw all of the ball state art museum yesterday to gain information for project 2. I was surprised with all the collections and how big the museum actually is. The part i liked most, well theres really two. The first would be the giant Buddha, it is gigantic and i guess if you leave coins by his feet it is suppose to give you good luck. The second would be the coin collection that they have in one of the far rooms on the second level. They i have over 200 dated way back into history. Another interesting thing is the african and south american exhibits, the masks from a long time a go are fascinating that people were able to make them. Overall i gained enough information to begin my paper and to hopefully do a good job with it.

Beah Presentation

The Ishmael Beah presentation I thought was quite interesting. I was very surprised to find his joking manner when talking about the events that unfolded in his life. Being my first ever actual Author presentation I was intrigued by him quoting lines from the book and explaining them and there true meaning. Another interesting thing was him saying how the translation of words like ball to and air vessle. I found it cool to the fact that he went through so much and had such a vibrant personality. Overall i thought he did a good job at his presentation and that i will probably read his new book when ever it is due to come out.

boy Soldier

Growing up into a war must do things to the mind are unthinkable. I would think if i was in his situation i would probably run and try to get out of the country as soon as possible. Being in that state of mind im pretty sure that it would be the only option.
With Beah coming this week if given the opportunity, i would like t0o ask him what his after thoughts on his whole life. I think hearing his story actually told by him would be interesting to hear. His story is just so interesting on how this all actually happens to children in war torn countries.
I hope that he gives us time for a q & a, just to hear how things like this happen.

A long way gone

A long way gone could possibly be one of the best books I have read so far.  The story though is messed up in the fact of what Beah went through to survive.  In my own opinion i doubt i would be able to survive in that situation and if possible i'd try to get out of the country as soon as possible.  I probably couldn't handle being so close to finally finding my family just to miss them by a few minutes and find them killed by rebel forces.  

The way he goes into so much detail on things that are happening really makes this book great.  I don't know how he is able to handle with the stress from seeing everything and still able to live an average day to day life.  If given the opportunity i think it would be a great experience to hear his tale in person and to ask him some questions regarding the book. I am glad that Ball State chose this book over others that would not be as interesting to read and thus keeping my attention to actually read this book through.

My English Goals

This year for english i have two main goals in mind.  The first is to work on better development of term papers and essays.  Most of my english and class papers in high school were average at best.  I usually put off papers to the last minute and that may be the cause for underdeveloped papers.  I know that in college things are different and being just average will not cut it.  

My second goal is to work on reading comprehension.  I want to be able to understand everything that I read this year and to interpret it into my own words.  I would like to start this by fully understanding A Long Way Gone.   By fully comprehending everything i read it will help to improve papers if we were to write them in class and will overall help me in most things that we'll do in class.

I believe that this year i can accomplish both these goals through hard work and taking the time to develop and understand everything I do in class this year.  It's going to be a fun year  and hopefully everything goes smooth.