FINALSSSSSS!!!!!

FINALS ARE NEXT WEEK!!!!! I am stressing out like crazy because I am so pressured to do good. I am a bit relieved that I only have organic chemistry and physics but still? I am worried so much more in physics than orgo because physics is not my strongest subject. I just feel like I am not where I wanna be even though I am happy with my grades. I'm still trying to figure out why that is. I'm pretty much just going to spend all weekend and all of next week studying to be in the best shape possible. Even if I try to relax just for a little bit, I won't be able to because im mentally going to be stressing over everything I have left to do. Not gonna lie, I am a little less stressed because this past week I was given so much things to complete by Friday. Now since that is out of way I am relieved. Hopefully, this weekend and next week goes by smoothly.

Update on final paper

When the assignment was first given, I struggled with finding a good topic because I wanted a topic that is very factual. I changed my topic like four times before I decided to write about how society impacts body image. I have majority of my paper written but I struggled more than usual with this assignment than the rest of the other assignments. I think it was the fact that I had to combine everything we discussed in one paper. It's just hard to write a paper when I barely have the time since finals are around the corner. Hopefully, tomorrow in class I get feedback on my paper so I can make the final edits before I turn it in Friday.

Success!

      

 Over the past several weeks, this College Writing II course has taught me so many lessons that I did not learn in my College Writing I class. I had a better understanding with this course much better than CWI class. As a writer, I never fully understand the whole rhetoric concept till this class. I would like to believe that I have a much better understanding now! I've written a lot of papers throughout my college career, but the papers that were required in this class required a more different approach. Dr. Kyburz really made it very important to write about "real people in real time" which made me write much better. In my college writing I class we discussed rhetoric but I couldn't understand the meaning of rhetoric for the life of me but I am glad that now I have a good understanding of it!

     Throughout this semester, we have focused on multiple projects that improved my writing skills. Out of all the projects, I would say that I really enjoyed the documentary project and the multimodal project. That was the first time I've ever had to watch a documentary and write about it. The documentary project has taught me to gather big details and summarize them in a complex thought. It also taught me to organize my thoughts in a chronological order and not use opinions in the paper. The documentary project helped me improve my summary skills and I got to watch an interesting documentary also! So not only did I write I paper, but I also learned some interesting history.

        The next project that I really enjoyed was the multimodal project because we had to use different modes. When this project was first introduced, I freaked out because I hate creating videos to get my point across but I managed to do a good job! The outcomes from this project that I have learned was the ability to come up with and question and give reasons/consequences about that problem without answering the question. At first, I struggled with this idea because the one page limit had me freaking out which I tend to do when a assignment is first introduced but I always manage to understand what I am doing when I stop procrastinating.

       I feel like I have improved with using ethos, pathos, and logos. Before this class, my understanding with those appeals were not the best. I incorporated the use of those appeals in my selfie summary and analysis project which strengthened my understanding. My final draft for that project was much written than my first draft.

     The use of technology in this course has helped me see that writing can be expressed using different things. For example, I remember Dr. Kyburz talking about the blogs that we had to write weekly and I disliked that idea right away because I didn't like writing blogs but I was wrong. The weekly blogs helped me gather my thoughts, rant a bit about life, and helped me brainstorm ideas for my projects.

    One thing I've struggled with in this class was the drafting part because I find it hard to gather my thoughts in one place. I changed by topic for this final paper at least 4 times before I came up with a good topic that relates to me. The reason that I struggled was due to the fact that when I starting gathering information, I felt like I didn't have sufficient and useful information to write a good paper.

Overall, I feel accomplished as of where I stand in this class. I am happy with every assignment I turned in and I know I tried my absolute best!

Reflection on Selfie Summary

Reflection:

Overall, this assignment was not that bad because we've already written a summary in this class and the only new thing we had to do was incorporate a few quotes in our summary. That part was not difficult because I've done it before but that was a while back. The only part I struggled with was the length of the overall paper because it was quite challenging to reach 3-5 pages. In my opinion, this article was pretty short so it was hard to reach that page length. Even though I used about four quotes which I felt like I analyzed pretty well did not do much to my page length. I have been brainstorming ideas for the final paper but I can't think of any good ideas. I want to write about something that interests me. Over break, I am going to try to think of ideas to write about. Hopefully I end the semester off with a great final paper!

Just a bit of a rant

It is almost Thanksgiving Break!! Honestly, I am so looking forward to this break to the point where I'm going to enjoy every single break. I am glad to say that I don't have to worry about a lot of homework assignments over break which is a first :). I am going to spend time over break with my family and obviously catch up on my tv shows! The sad part is after the break ends comes the harsh reality. We will have two weeks ONLY before finals which is very stressful thinking about it. As of now, I only have two finals I have to worry about: Organic and Spectroscopy. I am glad that in calculus we don't have a formal final, which is great! I know that I will be very stressed out as we reach finals week but hopefully I will take it day by day. The nice part is that the last day of finals by brother who I haven't seen in a few months will be spending winter break with us. 

I am almost caught up with my blogs! I have around two more blog entries and I should be good to go. As of right now, I am so looking forward to Thanksgiving Break. I feel like its a break that is very much needed for everyone. My break is going to consist of catching up on my tv shows and sleeping. Since the end of the semester is around the corner, majority of my classes have been stressful. I'm constantly trying to get ahead and finish my assignments ahead of time but it doesn't work every time. This week has gone by smoothly so far because I finished majority of my assignments a week before the due date which is great! I love not being stressed out for once this whole semester.

Multimodal Imovie

Update on Class

This class has helped me improve on a lot of my skills. When I signed up for this class, I thought I would just write essays, but I was wrong. I love how different activities and techniques were used so far in this class. I really enjoyed the multimodal project even though at first I found it to be quite challenging because I had to be creative which is something I thought I lacked. I've never had a class that incorporated the media. I remember on the first day of class when Dr. Kyburz mentioned that we would be creating our own blogs, I kind of freaked out because I don't like everyone to see what I write. But after a few weeks, I realized that it is not as bad as I thought it would be. I actually enjoy the blogs. Overall, I think I learned a lot of things in this class and improved my writing :)

Microtheme & Multimodal Reflection

Overall, I really enjoyed this project. It made me have to use skills that I never had to use before. The multimodal project really stood out to me because it made me realize that you can use pretty much anything to get your point across. I feel like I did a pretty good job on my multimodal project. I choose a variety of atmospheric images that starts off with a clear sky which then progresses a dark sky with lightning. This expresses how I feel about lying. Also,  the microtheme was a very interesting project once you get the idea. I kind of struggled with the ending paragraph where we were required to close it up without solving the problem. I've done projects using iMovie but it was nothing like this! One thing I would say I forgot to do was add a works cited page at the end of my short film since the images weren't mine. I found my images on google images by searched different atmospheric scenes. I feel like this project helped me be more creative. When I first tried to find images and music for my film, I was very lost because I couldn't think of a creative theme. But when Dr. Kyburz mentioned using atmospheric images to set the mood that really interested me. I feel like it really got my point across. I used short simple words to also get my point across. I feel like those words looked great with the video. One thing I can perhaps change would be to either use different transitions to make it flow a little better and try seeing if I should put the text on top of the images rather than have an empty slide. I hope I get to do more projects that involve making videos. I will try to figure out how to post my film because I can't seem to be able to post it from iMovie.

Update on Microtheme and Multimodal Project

I have a few final touches with my microtheme and I will finally be done! This project was very interesting because I've never had to write about something that really makes me mad. I choose lying because throughout my whole life, I been lied to in many cases. I mean everyone lies including me. Its something that we just do. I would say the mulitmodal project has been a bit more challenging to me because I am not a very creative person and can't express my thoughts/feelings in a imovie. Its hard. I decided to either do a atmospheric imovie or an imovie with art. These images would set the mood. The mood I'm going for is anger. The thing about lying that angers me is when people close to you lie to you all the time to gain something from you. But overall, I really like this project. I really like the in class time dedicated to work on our individual projects. It gives me time to really think about what I want to do. I also find going over someones rough draft really helpful because it gives me ideas with things I still need to improve on.

Not gonna lie but I've been kind of behind with my blogs because I always forget to write one every Friday.Today was a positive day for me, I took an orgo and calc exam which I felt confident about unlike last time. Every week has its own surprises. I am constantly piled with loads of homework all the time and feel as if my whole life revolves around it now. I try to complete my assignments a few days before the due date because that way I won't feel as stressed out.Normally it helps but this year I feel like no matter how hard I try to get ahead its just not enough. Hopefully I will take advantage of this weekend to catch up with a few things and also relax. It doesn't help that my mom is having her baby this weekend. I feel like I'm going to be so caught up with my baby sister that I won't wanna do anything :/ 

This microtheme assignment seems simple but it requires a lot of thought. When we were told it has to be one page, I couldn't believe it because it just seems so little. I hate having page limits because I always find myself going over but I've been getting better. I'm kind of struggling with the mulimodal project because its hard to come up with something interesting with my question. The one thing that really bugs me is when people lie. So trying to put together a short movie or a powerpoint is kind of tough. Hopefully I can come up with something interesting over the weekend. Overall, I like this project because its something different than my previous writing class. 

Update on Film Summary

Thing left to finish with my film summary: 

• make sure my summary flows 
• make sure the summary is in chronological order (skim through the documentary again and follow up by skimming through summary and see if it matches. 
• Use MLA format to correctly cite the documentary
• make sure the summary is 3-5 pages long
• I have to make sure I don't use too much detail and keep it straight to the point
• have another person peer edit my summary before turning it in
• Make sure the summary focuses more on the important scenes and less on unimportant scenes. 
• Revise each paragraph to make them perfect
• Answer the reflection questions and put together the final draft along with the rough drafts. 

I feel like I have a lot to work to do on with my film summary. I have been working on it periodically and in little chunks instead of sitting down and finishing up my film summary. Never have I ever been procrastinated over a writing assignment like this. Usually I'm always on top of my game but I don't know why this time its different. I think its because I'm putting all my focus on my other classes and leaving my summary for the end. Hopefully by the end of Wednesday I will have put together all my drafts along with the final paper. I've realized that since a week or so has went by since I watched this film that I am kind of forgetting the main details. I will have to go back to skim through the documentary to catch up on those details. 

This was my first time writing a summary on a documentary. I've never watched a documentary that has to do with history. Overall, I really liked this project because I learned new information and had to watch a film then gather what I watched and type it out. 

I am almost done with revising my film summary and so far its been going well! I'm not going to lie I have been pushing it off till last minute because I keep telling myself how hard is it to write a summary? I've realized that it takes a lot of time and effort to write the summary because I have to make sure I don't analyze the movie. This Monday I have my first organic chemistry exam and I am so scared/nervous for it. I don't really know how to study for it and the only thing I keep telling myself is that I want an A. I know I shouldn't worry about the grade because I know that when I do...I don't do the best of my ability on the exam but I panic and all. Hopefully I will prepare myself really well and see what happens. Honestly, I cant believe midterms are just around the corner for my organic chem and physics class. Physics class will literally be the death of me. I feel like my brain just doesn't comprehend anything dealing with forces and vectors and what not but I am always trying to keep a positive mind and try my best! The one thing that is preventing me from trying my best is my confidence. I literally have no confidence in anything that I do in my life which kind of affects the way I study and all. Hopefully my goal is to try and build my confidence.

Blog Entry #3

The documentary in class real got me thinking if sometimes I do things subconsciously to comfort me and the answer is yes. Sometimes the outcome is either good or bad but I know that majority of people rely on something to take their mind off things whenever they are feeling a bit down. For example, I wouldn't consider this  action that I do a big one but I subconsciously find myself playing music depending on my mood. If I'm sad...I listen to more settling songs compared to the music I usually always listen to. I would say that kinda relates to what I took in from the film. I mean I know that his experience was very much then mine but still. Overall, the documentary was very touching with how it was portrayed to the audience. 

For my documentary choice, I chose Keep the River on Your Right: A Modern Cannibal Tale. Right when my eyes landed on that title, I got an uneasy feeling in the pit of my stomach because I'm not the type of person that would ever decide to watch something out of the ordinary. Now you may be asking why I still shrugged off that feeling and picked that documentary? I guess its all because I'm curious..this documentary will be something different and every now and then I like to watch different things even if I'm kinda uncomfortable with it. Life is all about learning new experiences and stepping out of your comfort zone. I have never watched anything dealing with cannibalism because I get disgusted but honestly why not give it a try! I am really looking forward to this documentary project because I enjoy simple enjoyable things like these! 

Social Media
I believe that social media can be used to express your opinions using rhetoric. Nowadays, social media plays a huge role in society either in a positive or negative way. Rhetoric is a type of language used to persuade others. Rhetoric is used a lot on social media because it helps the writer build their ethos. Many companies share their ads through social media to gain more support. This is done by using pathos. This is very effective because it can influence people to support them. Even though, I wasn't in class, my friend told me you guys talked about parking permits and how angry it made everyone. I personally agree because how outrageous is it to pay for an parking permit when I don't even get a good spot. Everyday I have to park far away from the building I'm always in because all the parking lots are full! It angers me because I pay for a expensive parking pass  and still have to walk...sometimes I'm late because of it. I've realized that not a lot of people even pay for their pass and that is so not cool because why should some people pay and others get away with it? I think Lewis has to do something about this. Hope everyone has a great weekend :)

"This is Water" Reflection:

This video made me view things differently. I loved how the speaker said the truth and everyone can relate that video to their everyday lives. Sometimes, without realizing, I find myself getting really impatient at a drive thru or at the grocery store. Like the video mentioned, our brains go directly to the "default setting" which brings out the worst in people. I am that type of person that releases my anger or frustration in anyone that gets in my way. I am ashamed of that but its the harsh reality. This video has opened my eyes and taught me to not be so fast at judging others because we aren't the only ones having an awful day. Everyone has their own problems but we are oblivious to them and tend to just think our problems are the most important. The main message of this video was to think of others and not just yourself. I am working on becoming a better person that views things in life and appreciates more things.