goals

At the beginning of this semester I thought I was somewhat prepared in writing but when the essay came to date I realize I need it more practice in writing. My main goal was to improve as a writer by learning different styles of writing and how to approach my audience. I’m proud because in this semester I learned those skills and one thing that I didn’t address in my goals at first and I had trouble with in my essays was writing my thesis statement.    

Throughout the semester I felt frustrated because I wasn’t getting the grades I wanted and that was mainly because I didn’t have a statement of purpose and that made my whole paper to fail. I didn’t know how to organize my paper and also didn’t know how to connect my ideas to my thesis. I started to focus more on these things after my second paper and I had a big improvement and that was seen in my scores. So, I feel that in the last paper I did a great job and I had a thesis statement and a good organization.

Even though I more prepared to write college level papers I need a lot of practice in order to keep up the good work. Therefore, I will try to write papers even when I don’t have a class and try to give it to people around me to give me advice toward my papers. Also, I will also take English 102 so I can master my skills and be prepared for my college career. 

Revisions #14

            For my portfolio I’m going to revise the argument analysis. My strongest in this essay was that I successfully talked about how the author failed to make his argument and how the tone used was not trustworthy. The weaknesses were my organization and not having a clear thesis statement to tell the purpose of the essay. I will make sure that I address both strengths and weaknesses in order to have a well-written essay.

            In order to make good revision I will focus in organization of my paper and make sure that I have a stated thesis stamen and also having it in the right place. The organization and thesis statement have to go together because organization is how the paper flows and it has to be connected with the statement of purpose. This will help in order to have a good essay and also they are the most important things to make an effective essay, since the thesis is what tells the reader what the essay is going to be about and also the organization is not to lose the reader so they both have to be well connected.

            Also I’m going to make sure that every claim is connected to my main idea and not losing focus.  Other thing I’m going to be careful about is that I have to be careful of not mixing my claims so that my organization is clear and in the right order to make sense to the audience. I have to make sure that my thoughts are clear and that they are understandable for all the audience. 

Reflection #13

When I analyzed the article: don’t presume to know a pigs mind for the first time I thought that all the authors evidence was compelling. After, reading the article several times I realized that the author had weak points in his essay. He fails in his essay by not addressing the problem which is animal cruelty and rights. Ther3efore, I learned that even when you know is hard to address the other side, you have to talk about it in one way or another but you have to give solutions to the reader that why they are reading it.

Another thing that I learned in analyzing text is that you have to know who your audience is to create a common ground and have an idea how to approach them.  Otherwise people will not agree with you and you will lose readers right away. In my third essay I saw that Hurst fails to address the right audience because he is not solving the problem and people will get upset with the author because he wasn’t giving solutions. So, I learned that I have to give some sort of solution to the problem

The other thing you have to see when writing an argument is that you need a trustworthy tone and introduce that tone to your audience so everything you say the audience will believe it if you have the right tone.  In order to do this you will need to identify the rhetorical situation and of course use the right words to make the audience believe what you are saying.

Thnking about evidence #12

           The most compelling evidence in my argument is that all youngsters that are 18 or older should vote and be more enrolled in politics because those decisions affect their lives in one way or another. This evidence is real strong because if youngsters are enrolled in choosing a president, they can ask the candidates to help them more with their education or personal difficulties. By reading these ideas youngsters may realize that is for their own to participate in candidate elections to fight for their own ideals. Since this is one of my strongest points I will think about this claim when creating my thesis to refer back to it throughout the essay.

            My weakest point by making this argument that youngsters of 18 of age or older should vote in order to get what they want from government. The counterargument from them is that teens or young people are not relevant to government and they may say that their vote doesn’t make a difference toward the election. My explanation to this argument would be that youngsters need to be more enrolled in politics in order to have more opportunities and also to be addressed by the candidates. I will talk about why is so important for them to vote, even though their single vote will not count for much the community of teens as a whole does count and will make a difference because they are going to be the future of the country. They will make the change and therefore they should be enrolled in politics since they are 18 and being able to vote.

Error Patterns #11

            I pattern of error that I have notice throughout my writing is that I tend to be repetitive in my ideas and I keep talking about the same thing through all the body paragraphs, which makes my writing boring. In order to improve and get rid of this problem I believe that the best thing to do is to be most focused when writing so I can prevent repetition. I know for sure that if I keep doing it I won’t be able to keep readers entertained because they are going to notice that I’m just talking about the same thing over and over.

            The other error that I commit often while writing is that I tend to get off of topic and then that makes the paper confusing and hard for the reader to understand the point I’m trying to convey. Therefore, in my future papers I’m going to focus in the style paper I’m supposed to do and not change the topic. For example for our first essay for class we were supposed write a Personal narrative and I got out of focus and started talking about other people and not me which you are not suppose to do because it’s a paper talking about your personal experience.

            The last thing I want to mention is the error that I commit in all my papers is that I don’t look for the right words to make it a high level and well written paper. I know that in order to fix this problem you have to do it with learning and enriching your vocabulary. Since, I have only studied English for 4 years, my vocabulary is not good that’s why I’m not able to do a good job in changing the words to make a college level paper. 

Peer Review #10

           In this class I learned that in peer review you obtain more ideas in how to write your papers and also how to organize your ideas. In our peer review we get into small groups in which we all read our paper and our peers would give us feedback. This peer review is effective because we are able to get opinion from other people. I believe that it can be improved by talking more about it with the class as a whole. That way we will have an idea in how to make our papers better.

            My weakness in peer review is that I get shy when reading my own paper and also I feel uncomfortable when I’m in front of others and they are reading my paper. My strength in peer review is that I’m able to give real good ideas to my peers that they can add to their papers to make more complete. I believe that peer review is the best thing to do when writing papers because at that early step you are able to see your weak points and have the chance to change that before the final paper. For me is better to do it in big groups because we are able to get more ideas.

            I think that we should keep the peer reviews as we have been doing in class because it helps everyone to write our papers. Peer review should be done for every paper because nobody writes perfect papers and everyone needs feedback from others in orders to make good papers.

Choice in Topics #9

           Of the three assignments that we have seen so far, in my opinion the hardest one was the Advertisement Analysis. The Advertisement analysis I found it hard because sometimes its tricks you in what the real meaning of the ad is. The easiest to write about was the literacy narrative because you write about personal experiences and the ideas come automatically.

            Anyways, it doesn’t matter how hard or easy they were all of them helped me to write better and that’s why I’m in this class. In this class am learning how to write in different styles and keep the writing on topic. I feel like I’m learning and also learning a lot by reading my peer’s papers. This class is also helping me to enrich my vocabulary and to understand things that I didn’t know. For example I have learned what does logos, pathos and ethos stand for.

            So, for the rest of this semester I am going to try to learn as much as I can in writing other styles. I know that this is going to be possible by putting all the effort possible from me and also by working together with the class and listening to their opinions and of course by listening to Ms.Spencer. This is the best class that I have taken so far in college because everybody gets along with each other and always willing to help. We have a class in which everybody give ideas about the topics we are analyzing that can be very helpful in order to write good papers.

Arguments (Don’t Presume to Know a Pig’s Mind)

During the Grammys Awards an ad for Chipotle Mexican Grill made its debut, in which a family of farmers raises their cows and pigs naturally and the animal seem to live happy.  Then, industries appear in the ad and they move the animals to indoors into large building, where the animals have no freedom and are all bunched up. After, the ad shows the farmer thinking about his animals and the things that industries do to the animals by giving them antibiotics and pumped the animals up. The pigs and cows are being oppressed and after they are big and fat they are processed into cubes of meat.

            The production methods are not supposed to cause pain to animals and we know that not only because they live outdoors, they are happy. However, this ad had a big impact, starting with McDonalds that started a campaign in which they ask suppliers to stop making suffer the animals used for meat. They said that they should look for other ways in which animal don’t suffer as much, as they do in gestation crates.

            The result of this change will be to push off the market all the small farmers raising hogs, because they are not going to be able to make changes in how the raise their animals. This meaning that the price of bacon will increase and the only suppliers will be rich industries.

            “Farmers are business people and respond to market signals” (B.Hurst). These are contradictory because while the worldwide hunger is high they keep arguing about how food is produced. Farmers will have to decide if they are going to keep producing meat the easy way or they are going to care about the nostalgia produced by how they treat animals....

             I chose this argument because is arguable and you are able to get a position. In this article especially you are able to against or for the use of medication to make animal bigger in shorter time periods. Also I decided to write about this because there is much info to write about this topic. You are able to talk about the protection of animals, Hunger worldwide, Use of medication in animals etc...

REFLECTION!!!! :)

            I thought that this semester of writing was going to be much easier because I was more into writing but so far, I have found it real hard. I believe that writing is just not my strongest subject because I don’t feel comfortable writing these papers that we have to do for class. Since, my first blog I can say that I obtained more knowledge about styles of writing, but still I can’t use them for some reason. The major may be that I’m an ESL student and I may need more class to improve my writing.

            I find it helpful that the teacher gives us advice about how to write our papers and also she knows how to explain the class. Also, the peer reviewing has helped to see my errors that I commit when writing and that way I can improve my writing for future papers.

            It would be really helpful if the teachers read our first drafts and give us advice in how to make it better, before we have to turn in the final draft. So, we can make better papers and see what she is expecting from us.

            My writing hasn’t changed much since the semester started for some reason I keep making a lot of mistakes in my papers and I’m upset of it because I just can’t write. The problem may be that I can’t write my ideas down in paper. I think of ideas in Spanish and it’s really hard to change them in English in the right way.

            I don’t think is one of my subjects because I feel that I have a big deficiency with it.

Comparing and Contrasting

The difference between the literacy narrative and the Ad analysis is that in the ad you are criticizing the information and the meaning they trying to convey. In the other side in your Literacy narrative you talk about personal experiences and you didn’t have to give opinion about a specific writing or ad. What they have in common is that both of the writing types have to address the rhetorical situation. They both need to talk to a specific audience, with a purpose and decide the tone and also the genre of their paper or analysis.

 The rhetorical situation may be different from the literacy narrative to the Ad analysis. In the analysis the tone is different because you are giving a point of you and is not going to be the same when you talk about something personal. Also, the purpose is going to differ from one another. In The literacy narrative will have the purpose to give a personal experience to your audience. Different from the literacy narrative in the ad analysis your purpose is to find the meaning of the ad and also how the ad is trying to convey something by using colors and details in order to convince their audience. The audience is for me the same for the analyzing and for the literacy narrative because people around us are the ones that will read it. For the genre it may change a little bit from one another because the literacy narrative is like a personal story and the analysis is like criticizing the ad and giving also your opinion about it.

Analyzing Ads

Purpose: the main purpose of this is ad is to convey that you don’t have to think if its right or wrong, you just have to do it and Nike uses this quotation in all his products in order to make people act and not to think about it.

Audience: Since we see a teen peeing in a wall and not caring that he is in a public space, also Nike uses a kid not wearing shoes and looking like a poor kid to convey that it don’t matter what’s going on in your life you just have to do it. They use the poor kid also to say that everybody is able to do whatever they decide to.

Genre: Nike uses the concept “Just Do It” for many of his ads and they make it visible for the audience also with the Nike logo next to it. They all have the idea that you don’t have to think about doing something, you just do it.

Tone: The kid urinating the wall without caring about his surrounding creates a cheerful tone because even though the kid looks like he is from the lower class he doesn’t care and he just did it.

Making Revisions

When I wrote my literacy narrative for the first draft I only tried to put my ideas down without looking to grammar. The major change that I did to my paper was to fix all the grammar errors and I really didn’t change the structure because I believe I have strong points that will help to my literacy narrative. My big problem is that I make too many sentence errors and I have to keep an eye on that because it can make my paper of low quality. I’m still looking in my paper and reading it over and over to see what I can change and I’m not sure yet but I might add other ideas into the body paragraphs.

 However, I think I have a good first draft I just need to make sure my audience will like it and also that they understand the point of it. I found many errors and points that were irrelevant thanks to peer review but I also found errors in my essays by re-reading my paper over and over. Although I believe that I have a good paper and especially a good introduction I just need to work a little bit more in my body paragraphs. My body paragraphs I think are kinda repetitive so I need to come up with new ideas to add to my paper that can work with my intro and the rest of the paper.

GOOD PAPERS!!!

There are many aspects that need to be taken into account when writing papers.  A good paper will need a good structure in which many details have to be included. What I mean is that a good paper like for an example a literacy narrative will be a narrative and not a story. The narrative have to be in a format that the reader can follow and it has to make sense and have to be connected everything the writer says with the main topic.

Also a good paper need a detail explanation about what he is talking about and also he needs to be specific. What I mean by specific is that the writer needs to tell the reader how he feels about the topic. Then the writer needs to let the reader about the place, or things that around about what he is talking about so that the reader can have an idea of what the writer is trying to say.

Another thing in well written papers  is to have good structured sentences. That way the reader will not confuse the meaning of the paper. In a good paper is helpful when the writer goes to the point and states his idea and avoids just talking much and saying nothing specific. Therefore is better to keep it simple but giving the exact meaning.

Potential Topics

To write a good literacy narrative one the potential topics that I think about and I think I can be descriptive is talking about the difficulty I had learning English when coming to the U.S. In this essay I can talk about how I manage my problems with English and how I did to learn some English. My English is far to be perfect but every time write speak or read in English I try to enrich my knowledge about English. I believe that this will be a good idea to write my narrative. The reason I say this is because I’m not the only Hispanic that suffered or suffers trying to learn English

            Another potential topic that I can use in my narrative is to talk about teens like me that come from other countries and the forced transition from one language to another. Also, to explain why they decide to come and the problems they had, so they decided to move to United State a country in which you need to learn the language to be successful.

The last topic in which I believe I can write a good literacy narrative is to talk why is so important to write and to know what the right way to do so is. English is one of the most famous international languages. Therefore, we have to know how it works, so that we can use it in our life. English will help us to succeed in every career. I can talk about things that can help improve one’s writing.

The first time when I was asked why I was taking English 101 my immediate answer was "it’s a requirement". Now I realize that is not the only reason especially because English is not my first language. I have lived in the United States for only 5 year, so I need to keep improving my English. English 101 is the best way to improve my writing, reading, and speaking skills. For me English was the hardest barrier in my life when my family decided to come to the U.S. but now that I’m here am not giving up, that is why this class will be so helpful for my English but also to make a career.

            English is also the world’s most spoken language. Therefore, English is the language that everybody wants to learn to succeed in life. That is why I believe is fair that school’s require students to take this class, because without English you will not understand the system in the U.S. I mean that in order to be successful we have to understand people around us in order to make better living conditions for our own. In my own experience English is a hard language to master because it has many details in which people like me gets confused, trying to convert words from their language directly into English. My best advice for everybody is to take extra English courses so life can be easier in the future. English is the one of the pillars to be successful because any career in life has to do with the language.