Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Wednesday, February 29: Leap Day!

A day that comes around only once a year should clearly be celebrate by talking about research proposals and genre juxtaposition pieces... or with a picture of a calendar physically leaping in the month of March:

http://www.cartoonaday.com/leap-day-leap-year-2012/

Unfortunately, no calendars leapt in our classroom today. But we did get to talk about your proposals and pieces for Unit 2.

Monday, February 27, 2012

Monday, February 27

We began our group work in class today regarding the assignments due on Friday:

- half way learning blog (on each person's blog)
- genre juxtaposition piece (rough draft; a hard copy or an electronic version; one/group)
- research proposal (electronic version; one per group)

Friday, February 24, 2012

2/27 Group Work: Comment on this Blog

Hi everyone! Comment on this post telling me whose blog your notes/thoughts for this group work session are posted on.

Thanks!

The Research Proposal: How do You Create One?

When your group turns in a propsal along with your genre juxtaposition piece on Friday, what exactly should the proposal look like? Well, it should contain these parts. How your group wishes to format these parts is up to you. But, the simpler, the better when it comes to research proposals. Be clear and concise, but remember to give enough detail so that readers of this proposal can understand what you are planning to do and where potential pitfalls may lie.

Group members names
Tentative Title

1. Statement of the "Problem"
  • This is a description of the context of your study
  • Explain to me what genre juxtaposition you are working with
  • Tell me how this piece "normally" works or is set up within particular rules or constraints: The "problem" that exists surrounding this piece

Friday, February 24

We discussed on particular, larger genre construct a little more indepth today in class: Language, or more specifically, standard English and the "rules" that go along with it. In this discussion, we talked about such concepts as:
  • prescriptive grammar: setting those "rules" (likely the only kind you've ever learned in school)
  • descriptive grammar: the goal with this is to simply describe how people actually talk or write; this is also, then, open to various dialects of the English language
  • code switching: utilizing two different language in spoken word ("switching" back and forth between thet wo)
  • code meshing: utilizing two disctinct English dialects within a written genre

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Unit 2 Group and Looking Ahead...

                                      Groups for Unit II
Here are your groups for this "writing research" project:

Wednesday, February 22

Today, we continued to move forward with our discussion on Unit 2. We first went over some great components in some learning blog entries--keep in mind that all of these are online, so you have access to all of this information. We also did an exercise with one of the written genres that you all brought in (see the activity posting marked as "Wednesday, February 22").

For Friday: Read Jackson's article in the Grassroots writing journal and answer the questions on the post below regarding Standard English.

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Standard English Questions

On your own blogs, answer these following questions (as honestly as possible even though this is a public sphere). These answers will help contribute to our discussions on language use this Friday.

 
Evaluating the Standard

1.     When a person speaks or writes in Standard English, what exactly does that mean?

Monday, February 20, 2012

Wednesday, February 22 Activity: "Breaking a Constraint" in a Sample Genre

For this in-class assignment, get into your Monday groups and choose one person's sample genre that each should have brought it. With this genre, first, come up with some "common" characteristics utilizing those five categories that we worked with on Monday:
  1. Language
  2. Content
  3. Other Design Elements
  4. Location
  5. Audience

Monday, February 20

Homework Change: Read the Jackson's article for this Friday now, not Wednesday.

Today, we moved on with our discussion regarding Unit 2, considering both the characteristics/constraints of particular, perhaps more unique written genres as well as what changes could be made to them to see how people would react to them.

Here are some of the constraints that we came up with in class:

Side Walk Chalk Messages

Friday, February 17, 2012

Friday, February 17

Today, we turned in all of our stuff for unit 1! I hope that it was a good feeling to get rid of all of it. I plan to have everything graded by next Friday. So, you'll have your midterm grades by then, as well.

I also introduced unit 2. We began with some links to two news stories and how changing one particular genre construct (such as the location of them for example: What if you switched Brian Williams' story with that of Jon Stewart's?) can make huge differences as far as the reactions garnered from readers/viewers/etc. The unit is explained in more detail in the previous post.

Due for Monday: Comment on one other person's blog and bring in example of a written genre. We'll work with this example in class that day.

Have a great weekend! : )

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Unit 2 Overview/Important Dates


Unit 2: Breaking the “Rules”
As we have learned from unit 1, genres, when placed in contexts, oftentimes appear to have some pretty specific criteria and characteristics. But what if one was to manipulate the characteristics of these written genres? I’m not talking about an all-out overhaul, but a slight change to one or two of those characteristics. I’m talking about something called genre juxtaposition, the placing of one or more characteristics of one genre into the format/constructs of another genre. We could also call this breaking one of those “rules” or “constraints” that we’ve talked about. Consider these examples:
·         A friend hands you an academic essay to look over, but it is written in a nonstandard dialect of English or even the text message “dialect.”
·         You go to the first day of class, and the teacher hands out the syllabus. Except that this syllabus is a restaurant menu. Weird.
·         Those white boards on the doors of nearly every dorm room with all kinds of messages written on them? Someone has decided to place theirs on the doors to Stevenson Hall instead.

The Last Class Before the Unit 1 Project is Due...

Today in class we began to move forward with our discussion of writing/rhetoric/discourse as it is placed in its context (a very important concept as we begin to move forward into our Unit 2 discussion). The two previous posts help to clarify some of that discussion.

Keep in mind that your unit 1 projects are due this Friday. Happy writing! : )

Monday, February 13, 2012

Cultural Historical Activity Theory, An Introduction

Here's a few facts:
Aka: CHAT

A rhetorical theory (rhetoric= the art of speaking or writing effectively)

How people act and communicate in the world specifically through the production of texts

The Trajectories of Literate Activity

Here are the questions to consider for the first part of class on Wednesday, February 15:
How did the text begin and how did it move out into the world?

What other genres (generally) or specific examples of genres did you use to inform/understand your production?

Peer Review Day #2

Today was our peer review day for our rough drafts. As I "hovered" this morning, I heard some really good things being said, some really cool things being discussed, etc, etc. Awesome. We're almost to the end of our first unit, so I hope that things are coming together for everyone. If anyone has any questions regarding these final days, please let me know!! Final "stuff" is due this coming Friday!

Friday, February 10, 2012

Friday, February 10: Work Day!

Today was a work day for unit/project #1. Hopefully you all took advantage of the time you had in class to work in this project today.


Wednesday, February 8, 2012

(Re)considering our First Learning Blogs

So... today's topic: Trying to figure out this genre of the learning blog.

 I first went over the point breakdown for Unit 1, which is as follows:
  • Total: 110 points
  • Rubric #1: 10 points
  • Learning Blog #1: 25 points
  • Rubric/Analysis #2: 15 points
  • Learning Blog #2: 25 points
  • Article: 25 points
  • Participation: 10 points

Monday, February 6, 2012

Monday, February 6

Today, we went over a wide range of topics that could be relevant for your news article:
  • Audience/information placement: Consider not only "who" or audience is but "how" they read a particular piece. This where, in news for example, the inverted pyramid comes in. This, essentially, upside down triangle means that some of the most relevant information is on the top as people generally do not read news articles in their entireties.

Friday, February 3, 2012

Interviewing Basics

Some Interview Tips

1.    Think ahead: What information do you think you’ll want in your article?

2.  Ask more questions than you think you’ll need. You’ll never know if/when the extra information will come in handy.

Peer Review Day #1!

Happy Friday!

I was excited in our class today. I was hearing good things, and I hope that you all got some good feedback from your classmates in regards to your rubric, analysis, etc. You'll now want to work on your final rubric/criteria as well as your learning blog for this Monday (these will be two separate entries).

I hope to give you more time in class next week to work on everything. Have a great weekend!

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

Wednesday, February 1: Construction of Peer Review Outline Number 1

Here's what you will want to bring to class on Friday:
  • Your rubrics/criteria ( a few copies)
  • The articles you analyzed
  • Your analysis notes
Today in class, we discussed what makes/doesn't make a good peer review/feedback session. Some of our notes so graciously taken by Emily and Sam include: