Finally, the last Peer Review Process! Not that I didn't like it, but I just couldn't wait for the semester to be done with. For this last peer review, we used Google Docs again, just because everyone agreed that this was a much easier program to use, and I agree as well.
The final essay is a reflection of the movie making process that we did as a group. On the day of peer review, we were divided into groups with people that weren't in our collaborative video project group, which I thought was beneficial. As I was reading through a couple of my other blogs about peer review, I noticed that I was upset because there were never enough people in my peer review group, and so I wasn't getting enough feedback. This time, I was finally in a group of 4, which I was very thankful for, just because I wanted as much feedback as I possibly could get.
I did receive the most feedback that I ever did all semester for this essay. The only problem was that one person in the group didn't contribute, and so I only received feedback from two other people. I had my rough draft essay posted well before Thanksgiving break, and was hoping to get some work done, before we went back to school. That didn't work out the way I planned. The people in my group didn't submit or revise any papers, until after the break, which was a bit of a set back. The only advice I have for this specific peer review, is that Thanksgiving break is a bad time to get a lot of work done.
I liked the overall process of peer review, but for future purposes, I think there should be a way for you to analyze more closely what students are revising, and so this will motivate the students to contribute to their peers in the groups.
Thursday, December 4, 2008
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
What is Style Part 2?
After reading a couple of my earlier blog entries, I realized that I had a good opinion of what style is prior to entering this class. The only problem I noticed, was that I didn't have any other clue about what Style is, other then a Style is different for each writer, their own in a sense. I felt like writing style was kind of like fashion style in a twisted kind of way. I used to believe that the way we choose what we want to wear is the same way we choose how we want to write. Clothes are a way to express ourselves, individually, and writing is as well.
Writing style is developed from many ways, other then just the way a writer feels like writing. A writing style comes from the topic of what the subject you are writing about is in. Is this a paper about movies, or is this a research paper on the history of presidency? This matters when it comes to the type of style the writer will be using. Another aspect, is who is the audience that the writer is directing the information towards. Does the audience know much about the topic being discussed, or is the audience completely in the dark, and have no idea about what the topic is. This will effect the way the writer chooses to layout the information in order for the reader to comprehend.
Strunk and White and Williams books, The Elements of Style, and What is Style, were packed with different rules and procedures of ways to improve your writing style. These books give information ranging from where the comma should be placed in a sentence, to comprehension, conversion, concision, and ways to make your paper 'flow'. These rules are all different options that allow the reader improve on their writing style. These aspects make a writers style much more concrete, and allow the reader to hear the voice of the author and see the style of the writer as well.
There are many ways that a writer can improve their writing style, which is not only based on one aspect. A writer never stops working to improve their work and is always looking for the best way to connect to their audience. This class has taught me to continue working on my writing style every time I write, and have come out of this class with a lot more resources and knowledge of how to improve my writing style.
Writing style is developed from many ways, other then just the way a writer feels like writing. A writing style comes from the topic of what the subject you are writing about is in. Is this a paper about movies, or is this a research paper on the history of presidency? This matters when it comes to the type of style the writer will be using. Another aspect, is who is the audience that the writer is directing the information towards. Does the audience know much about the topic being discussed, or is the audience completely in the dark, and have no idea about what the topic is. This will effect the way the writer chooses to layout the information in order for the reader to comprehend.
Strunk and White and Williams books, The Elements of Style, and What is Style, were packed with different rules and procedures of ways to improve your writing style. These books give information ranging from where the comma should be placed in a sentence, to comprehension, conversion, concision, and ways to make your paper 'flow'. These rules are all different options that allow the reader improve on their writing style. These aspects make a writers style much more concrete, and allow the reader to hear the voice of the author and see the style of the writer as well.
There are many ways that a writer can improve their writing style, which is not only based on one aspect. A writer never stops working to improve their work and is always looking for the best way to connect to their audience. This class has taught me to continue working on my writing style every time I write, and have come out of this class with a lot more resources and knowledge of how to improve my writing style.
Friday, November 14, 2008
You Tube / Low Bridge Videos
So far, this movie making process seems to be going in the right direction. I feel like a lot of us, the people in my group, have a lot of great ideas, but just need to organize them all together. Everyone in my group has been showing up everyday to work on our movie, so the time given in class is really helping us out. We finally got a script together, and began shooting film today. It was hard at first, just because there are so many ideas that we want to put into our 3 minute film. There are so many ideas flowing, but we haven't figured out how we are going to organize them to flow like a movie.
This process of movie making seems somewhat similar to the process of writing in a sense. There are so many ideas I come up with in my head, when I want to write a paper, but then have difficulty organizing all my thoughts into a paper that flows well. This is like the brainstorming step of writing. The next step is to get all the ideas down on paper, which I try to get as much as I can, and later edit what I don't need. This is like the process of shooting different scenes for the movie. We wanted to shoot as many takes and scenes as possible, so we can find the absolute best scene filmed. The last step for writing is proof reading and editing the paper. This step takes time, and help of others as well. Just like the editing of the movie. This step takes time, trying to figure out which scenes go best where, allowing the movie to naturally flow without looking awkward or unnatural.
As for me personally, I definitely see a lot of benefits of using YouTube for the writing classroom. I have named many similarities to writing and movie making above, but don't believe that a writing classroom should be limited to just this process. I feel like there are a lot of limitations with YouTube as well. YouTube has been used for entertainment purposes, and reasons other then writing processes. I feel like this can easily distract students, and doesn't allow them to see many good examples of what can be done on YouTube.
I wouldn't use YouTube for my classes, just because I feel like the writing process needs to be done in a classroom, as well as the use of technology. I feel like students need human contact, and input on the subject or topic of what they are writing about. Eye contact is needed from the students for a teacher to get an idea if the students are comprehending what is going on in the classroom. I like this idea of multimedia, but would prefer to teach my students the writing process in class, the old fashioned way!
This process of movie making seems somewhat similar to the process of writing in a sense. There are so many ideas I come up with in my head, when I want to write a paper, but then have difficulty organizing all my thoughts into a paper that flows well. This is like the brainstorming step of writing. The next step is to get all the ideas down on paper, which I try to get as much as I can, and later edit what I don't need. This is like the process of shooting different scenes for the movie. We wanted to shoot as many takes and scenes as possible, so we can find the absolute best scene filmed. The last step for writing is proof reading and editing the paper. This step takes time, and help of others as well. Just like the editing of the movie. This step takes time, trying to figure out which scenes go best where, allowing the movie to naturally flow without looking awkward or unnatural.
As for me personally, I definitely see a lot of benefits of using YouTube for the writing classroom. I have named many similarities to writing and movie making above, but don't believe that a writing classroom should be limited to just this process. I feel like there are a lot of limitations with YouTube as well. YouTube has been used for entertainment purposes, and reasons other then writing processes. I feel like this can easily distract students, and doesn't allow them to see many good examples of what can be done on YouTube.
I wouldn't use YouTube for my classes, just because I feel like the writing process needs to be done in a classroom, as well as the use of technology. I feel like students need human contact, and input on the subject or topic of what they are writing about. Eye contact is needed from the students for a teacher to get an idea if the students are comprehending what is going on in the classroom. I like this idea of multimedia, but would prefer to teach my students the writing process in class, the old fashioned way!
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
Peer Review Recap 3
For our third essay, Understanding Comics, we were able to use Google Docs to peer review with our classmates. This was something I was definitley excited about, because I hated using Wiki! There were issues that I had that were different than the first time I used Google Docs.
This time around, we had to count off to get into groups, we weren't able to pick who we wanted to peer review. This wasn't a big deal, but the only set back was that my group was really small, only 3 of us, compared to other peoples 4 or maybe 5 people. I wanted to get a lot of review this time around, seeing as though the last essay with Wiki, I wasn't able to get much review at all.
I still feel the same towards Google Docs, I really like using this tool to review. I think it's cool the way we are able to read the same paper, with new reviews from our peers. The only issue I had was in class submitting my paper, it wouldn't accept it for some weird reason, but never gives me a problem at home (I think its the Mac Computers). So far, I only recieved reviews from one person in my group, and am hoping for the other to respond to my annoying emails. This seems a little unfair, because I know a lot of people that are getting 3 or 4 reviews, this is the only thing I hate about this process.
After reviewing a few of my classmates blogs, I think it's safe to say that most of us prefer Google Docs. The majority of us believe it's easier, and serves the purpose of peer review much better. There were a lot of the same complaints as mine, the kind of feedback that was given was either minimal or useless. In my opinion, I would prefer editing on paper.
This time around, we had to count off to get into groups, we weren't able to pick who we wanted to peer review. This wasn't a big deal, but the only set back was that my group was really small, only 3 of us, compared to other peoples 4 or maybe 5 people. I wanted to get a lot of review this time around, seeing as though the last essay with Wiki, I wasn't able to get much review at all.
I still feel the same towards Google Docs, I really like using this tool to review. I think it's cool the way we are able to read the same paper, with new reviews from our peers. The only issue I had was in class submitting my paper, it wouldn't accept it for some weird reason, but never gives me a problem at home (I think its the Mac Computers). So far, I only recieved reviews from one person in my group, and am hoping for the other to respond to my annoying emails. This seems a little unfair, because I know a lot of people that are getting 3 or 4 reviews, this is the only thing I hate about this process.
After reviewing a few of my classmates blogs, I think it's safe to say that most of us prefer Google Docs. The majority of us believe it's easier, and serves the purpose of peer review much better. There were a lot of the same complaints as mine, the kind of feedback that was given was either minimal or useless. In my opinion, I would prefer editing on paper.
Monday, November 3, 2008
Reading and Writing about Comcis, Part 2
After reading a few of my classmates comics, I was able to see the huge range of comics posted on the web, other then the site I visited earlier. The comic that I thought was interesting was posted by Lukas Tasker, which is a comic by Daniel Goodbrey. The reason that I this comic caught my attention is a bit strange. I would assume that the comments with all of the action or bright colors would catch my attention, but this wasn't so. This comic is very simple, the words and images, and I think that's what caught my attention. I'm not used to reading a lot of comics, and so this one was simple enough for me to comprehend without getting too intimidated.
Lukas touches on the ideas of the categories mentioned in Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics, on page 71. I agree that this comic would fall into the Moment-to-Moment category, seeing as though it seems there is very little closure in this strip. It seems as though the moment caught in this comic, is over a very brief moment.
The topic I want to touch on, that Lukas hasn't mentioned about this comic is the combination of the words and images. McCloud mentions these combinations on page 153. I believe that this comic falls under the category of Word Specific. This means that the pictures in the comic illustrate to the viewer what to look at, but don't significantly add to a largely complete text. I believe that the text in this comic does more for the panel, then the picture does at all.
Lukas touches on the ideas of the categories mentioned in Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics, on page 71. I agree that this comic would fall into the Moment-to-Moment category, seeing as though it seems there is very little closure in this strip. It seems as though the moment caught in this comic, is over a very brief moment.
The topic I want to touch on, that Lukas hasn't mentioned about this comic is the combination of the words and images. McCloud mentions these combinations on page 153. I believe that this comic falls under the category of Word Specific. This means that the pictures in the comic illustrate to the viewer what to look at, but don't significantly add to a largely complete text. I believe that the text in this comic does more for the panel, then the picture does at all.
Monday, October 27, 2008
Writing about Comics Part 1
Growing up, I never was into reading comics, they always reminded me of some sort of action hero stories, like Batman or Spider man, which didn't appeal to me. Understanding Comics, by Scott McCloud, is the first comic book I ever read. The positive aspect is that it teaches the reader how to understand and interpret comics, but I don't have a lot of experience in that, so this was all new information to me. At first this book was hard to read, not because of the text or language, but because of the way you have to read the words in a comic. The lines and bubbles were hard for me to read without getting distracted and wandering off to the drawings. I caught myself completely forgetting where I was at, and what the topic was about! After a few chapters of practice, I was able to get the hang of things and found myself flowing through the reading much easier, and enjoying it as well. I thought a lot of the illustrations were helpful and noticed the words changed for me with the illustrations.
I found a comic strip off the web using the site onlinecomics.net. This site allows you to read different comics, which are categorized either by genre or style. The comic that I found interesting is called Croaker's Gorge by Steven Ogden. This is about a boy who moves from the city to the country, and meets a bunch of smart-alec talking animals living in a polluted swamp behind his house. This comic is for people of all ages. This comic reminds me of when I was younger, and my parents taking my brothers and I on vacation up north. We hated it, couldn't wait to get back to the city life, we always were so bored! The boy in Croaker's Gorge hates moving there, and the animals don't make it much easier. I think it's hilarious.
The scene that I want to talk about in relation to McCloud is funny, and I chose this because it resembles the format for the comic that we have to create in class. Take a look at it right here. There are 3 frames, which is what we have to create for our comic as well.
According to McCloud on pages 70-71, the transition used is called Subject to Subject, or #3. This type "takes us from subject-to-subject while staying within a scene or idea." (pp 71). The reader involvement is needed in order for the transition to take place, where is he walking to; his room, kitchen, or is he going outside? The next frame takes us to the scene outside, but stays within the same subject. The other idea I want to point out it is the idea of Time Frames, which is Chapter 4 in McCloud's book. On page 101, there are demonstrations of how authors play with the frames in order to show time. They can either make the frames larger, or spaces between them larger as well. I found this comic interesting because he is shown walking from one frame, to the next, as if we are taking the time to walk with him. I thought this was a cool technique used, that I didn't see in McCloud's reading.
I found a comic strip off the web using the site onlinecomics.net. This site allows you to read different comics, which are categorized either by genre or style. The comic that I found interesting is called Croaker's Gorge by Steven Ogden. This is about a boy who moves from the city to the country, and meets a bunch of smart-alec talking animals living in a polluted swamp behind his house. This comic is for people of all ages. This comic reminds me of when I was younger, and my parents taking my brothers and I on vacation up north. We hated it, couldn't wait to get back to the city life, we always were so bored! The boy in Croaker's Gorge hates moving there, and the animals don't make it much easier. I think it's hilarious.
The scene that I want to talk about in relation to McCloud is funny, and I chose this because it resembles the format for the comic that we have to create in class. Take a look at it right here. There are 3 frames, which is what we have to create for our comic as well.
According to McCloud on pages 70-71, the transition used is called Subject to Subject, or #3. This type "takes us from subject-to-subject while staying within a scene or idea." (pp 71). The reader involvement is needed in order for the transition to take place, where is he walking to; his room, kitchen, or is he going outside? The next frame takes us to the scene outside, but stays within the same subject. The other idea I want to point out it is the idea of Time Frames, which is Chapter 4 in McCloud's book. On page 101, there are demonstrations of how authors play with the frames in order to show time. They can either make the frames larger, or spaces between them larger as well. I found this comic interesting because he is shown walking from one frame, to the next, as if we are taking the time to walk with him. I thought this was a cool technique used, that I didn't see in McCloud's reading.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Picturing Texts on the Web
When I hear the word 'text' I immediately think of words. After reading chapter 1 of Picturing Texts, I was able to realize that there is more to this word then just words on paper. Images, pictures, symbols, and words are all apart of the definition of the word, text. From this chapter I was able to develop a language needed to use for describing the concepts involved with the texts. These concepts include, balance, classification, comparison and contrast, description, emphasis, metaphor, narration, pattern, point of view, proportion, and unity.
I found a web page, with an image that I found interesting in relation to the concepts of Picturing Texts. The picture is called Tangerine, a photo taken by Justin Grant. First, take a look at the picture right here.
The first concept I believe this picture relates to is balance. This picture brings an equal amount of weight on each side of the photo. The necklace is a tangerine, that is hanging over one side of the eye, but is balanced out by the chain hanging on the other side of the face. This is also balanced by the shape of the necklace as well. One side is shaped like a tangerine, with a colorful, smooth surface, while the other is a silver, chain texture. This balances out the photo.
The next concept I will talk about in relation to this photo is emphasis. The face of the woman captures our attention the emphasis is towards the tangerine over the eye. After looking at the picture I, find myself being drawn towards the tangerine. The colors and the detail of the tangerine may have an affect as to the emphasis of it in the photo. The color of the tangerine is orange in the photo, which is bright, and causes the viewers eyes to be directed towards it.
I do believe that there is some sort of a pattern in this photo. I don't necessarily think it's as intense as the Chinese symbol of Yin and Yang, but I do believe there is importance to it. The color of the eyes, with the color of the lips, skin, and necklace all seem to blend together. These patterns communicate to the viewers to direct our attention to where the photographer, or author wants them to go. The color of the tangerine is the brightest, and so the photographer has emphasized this for the viewers to direct our attention towards it.
I found a web page, with an image that I found interesting in relation to the concepts of Picturing Texts. The picture is called Tangerine, a photo taken by Justin Grant. First, take a look at the picture right here.
The first concept I believe this picture relates to is balance. This picture brings an equal amount of weight on each side of the photo. The necklace is a tangerine, that is hanging over one side of the eye, but is balanced out by the chain hanging on the other side of the face. This is also balanced by the shape of the necklace as well. One side is shaped like a tangerine, with a colorful, smooth surface, while the other is a silver, chain texture. This balances out the photo.
The next concept I will talk about in relation to this photo is emphasis. The face of the woman captures our attention the emphasis is towards the tangerine over the eye. After looking at the picture I, find myself being drawn towards the tangerine. The colors and the detail of the tangerine may have an affect as to the emphasis of it in the photo. The color of the tangerine is orange in the photo, which is bright, and causes the viewers eyes to be directed towards it.
I do believe that there is some sort of a pattern in this photo. I don't necessarily think it's as intense as the Chinese symbol of Yin and Yang, but I do believe there is importance to it. The color of the eyes, with the color of the lips, skin, and necklace all seem to blend together. These patterns communicate to the viewers to direct our attention to where the photographer, or author wants them to go. The color of the tangerine is the brightest, and so the photographer has emphasized this for the viewers to direct our attention towards it.
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