The one word that can sum up my influence on pursuing a career in business is the ENVIRONMENT. It may seem like an odd connection to the business world, but that is what has inspired me today. I never actually drew the connection until I had already decided to pursuit business.
What got me started in the direction of business was recycling, but is not in the way most would think. I have always been intrigued by using another person’s trash as your own treasure. I was constantly purchasing items on eBay before I realized that as a job I could help others sell their old goods instead of throwing them away. I proceeded to make a webpage called ebjorn.net and began selling items on eBay for people for a small commission. This way I could gain personal profit while saving people money, keeping landfills from overflowing, and slowing down the production rate of new products that would eventually end up turning to waste.
I then realized how enjoyable it was running my own business and that someday I could make a living by helping others and stabilizing the environment because being green friendly is very important to me. There are many ideas that I have stirred up from this, like starting a restaurant that is entirely green and organic. I am from Santa Cruz which is a very environmentally green friendly/hippy environment and a completely green restaurant would be easily accepted. Not only would the food be organic, but the energy used would be renewable and everything in the restaurant would be recyclable. Including the chairs and everything else I could. I have read that you can even print with soy based ink which sounds pretty cool.
I feel something like this would build a very good relationship with the community, which as you know is very important for marketing. I could become an importance to the world as well as supply others with opportunity to make money is this receding economy.
Monday, October 19, 2009
Essay #1 Final Draft
In the book Ways of Reading, Bartholomae and Petrosky talk about how students interpret readings into their own thoughts and writing. Bartholomae and Petrosky show an example of a student writer who was given the task to write his own experience of the “banking” concept, as told by Freire. He writes a well thought out paper of all the things he could relate to after reading the banking concept one time through. He uses good examples and the paper is very easy to follow, especially coming from someone who has not read the original banking concept from Freire himself. When the student was asked how he prepared and carried out the task of writing the paper he was quick to respond, “I read through the Freire essay and I worked with what I understood and ignored the rest.” (p. 13). This leads me to the basis of my discovery.
Bartholomae and Petrosky were completely fine with this process for writing the paper, as long as it was for the first draft. They then spoke of how the student writer wrote the passage as an individual example, but Bartholomae and Petrosky argue that “…Freire argues, is bigger than the intentions or actions of individuals.”(p. 14). That quote shows that while the student wrote some of his own individual examples, Freire was talking about the education system as a whole. Bartholomae and Petrosky then asked the student to re-read the passage and focus more on the sections that were complex to him. The revision was astounding to me. Even though they showed only a small portion of the revision, it showed that he had really taken Freire’s words to heart and that he was manufacturing his example more into a sample, backing up Freire’s claims rather than just an individual example.
Bartholomae and Petrosky gave praise to the student from the beginning. They stated that it was a good paper before I was able to read it and formulate my own opinion. To them, it was a good start for a first draft. It was not until after we had read the passage that we were able to get the full input from Bartholomae and Petrosky. I tried to soak it in the first time I read it before I had someone else’s opinion in my head, and before long I was dreading what would come next because it seemed like a replica of my writings. Luckily Bartholomae and Petrosky praised it afterwards, but stated that it needed a lot of revision. As it has been recommended throughout the Ways of Readings, they wanted the student to go back and re-read the text, focusing on the more difficult parts. This showed that Bartholomae and Petrosky really felt that the student had left out the importance of the argument and was just going with the basic facts. This is where I had to take Bartholomae and Petrosky’s advice into my own hands and re-read their comments on the paper to see what the real meaning was that was hidden inside their complex vocabulary which I breezed through the first time.
Bartholomae and Petrosky noticed that the writer did a good job at quoting Freire and using it in his paper for the parts he understood. They claim that doing this can give the appearance of understanding the paper but takes away the writer’s need to do any real in-depth look at Freire’s text. According to them, it becomes “unnecessary.” (p.14). This is a looked down upon because it prevents the writer from moving out of his comfort zone.
While reading this excerpt I found that I really agreed with it for the most part because it hit so close to home. As I said earlier, while reading this short essay I felt like I was reading a paper of my own. This lead me to be skeptical of what would come next when Bartholomae and Petrosky critiqued it because I felt as though I put great effort into my papers and nobody wants to believe that they do things the wrong way. However, I am still glad I read it because Bartholomae and Petrosky opened my eyes to an entirely new way of writing, a way that nobody had ever shown me before.
The first thing I learned, even though I’m not happy about it, is that when comprehending a difficult reading I must re-read it a second time to get the full understanding of the paper. Bartholomae and Petrosky found a quote by I.A. Richards which drew my attention… “Read as though it made sense and perhaps it will.” (p.10) I tried this out for a little bit after that and it actually helped a little but not enough to only read it only once. However, what it did help me with was getting the flow of the paper a little bit so that when I re-read it and focused on the tougher parts it helped bind the reading together for me.
Another one of Bartholomae and Petrosky’s points was that the writer just went with the undemanding parts of the reading and what he understood, and dumped the rest. This sounded like me exactly, even so much that before I started writing the paper I was just going to go with the parts I understood, until I brainstormed my paper and realized what I was going to write about. I realized that I could not just write a paper on the parts I understood the first time if those main points contradicted that approach in the first place. I now have realized how important it is that I pay close attention to the book when I realize that I am getting lost, rather than just spacing out until I get to the next part. I must re-read those sections slowly, pausing between each sentence and re-word it in my own head to make sure that I understand it, just as if I were taking notes in class and not just mindlessly copying things down that I didn’t understand. By taking what I have learned from Bartholomae and Petrosky I have now enacted my own rule, combining some of the advice they gave me. The first time I go through a passage I will re-read the sections I don’t understand slowly until I understand them. Then, once I am through the passage I will be commentating on, I will re-read it in its entirety so that I can get the whole flow of the paper together, helping me glue the pieces together without any rough edges. This will not only solve the problem of going with the easiest parts, but it will increase the knowledge and information that I put into my papers as well as store into my brain for overall increased intelligence.
Now, after all this re-reading and focusing we are finally finished with our…gulp…first draft. This next quote is where I could really relate to past experience. “It may not be as finished as it might need to be later in the semester, but it is writing where something is happening, where thought is taken seriously.” I have never really had a teacher tell me to take my first draft and then re-word it completely, but I really like how this student essay turned out. It showed so much relation to the context, even though I had never read the original context. It explained that no draft is a bad draft, just as long as it’s not the final draft. Sometimes you just have to start somewhere to get the mind working and then you can work with what you have, revising and rewording your original ideas.
I learned a great deal from reading the beginning of the book, Ways of Reading. I am glad that I was issued the assignment to write about my finding because if I had not written this paper I would have never analyzed the advice that was given by Bartholomae and Petrosky so closely. While researching my main points I was forced to use their own advice to critique and analyze their own writings. It showed me that I not only had to understand what they were talking about, but turn it around and use it myself to complete the assignment. It really challenged my brain to put the advice to work, which in turn caused me to better understand the findings. I hope that I can use these new techniques in the future to better my writing and hopefully you can as well.
Bartholomae and Petrosky were completely fine with this process for writing the paper, as long as it was for the first draft. They then spoke of how the student writer wrote the passage as an individual example, but Bartholomae and Petrosky argue that “…Freire argues, is bigger than the intentions or actions of individuals.”(p. 14). That quote shows that while the student wrote some of his own individual examples, Freire was talking about the education system as a whole. Bartholomae and Petrosky then asked the student to re-read the passage and focus more on the sections that were complex to him. The revision was astounding to me. Even though they showed only a small portion of the revision, it showed that he had really taken Freire’s words to heart and that he was manufacturing his example more into a sample, backing up Freire’s claims rather than just an individual example.
Bartholomae and Petrosky gave praise to the student from the beginning. They stated that it was a good paper before I was able to read it and formulate my own opinion. To them, it was a good start for a first draft. It was not until after we had read the passage that we were able to get the full input from Bartholomae and Petrosky. I tried to soak it in the first time I read it before I had someone else’s opinion in my head, and before long I was dreading what would come next because it seemed like a replica of my writings. Luckily Bartholomae and Petrosky praised it afterwards, but stated that it needed a lot of revision. As it has been recommended throughout the Ways of Readings, they wanted the student to go back and re-read the text, focusing on the more difficult parts. This showed that Bartholomae and Petrosky really felt that the student had left out the importance of the argument and was just going with the basic facts. This is where I had to take Bartholomae and Petrosky’s advice into my own hands and re-read their comments on the paper to see what the real meaning was that was hidden inside their complex vocabulary which I breezed through the first time.
Bartholomae and Petrosky noticed that the writer did a good job at quoting Freire and using it in his paper for the parts he understood. They claim that doing this can give the appearance of understanding the paper but takes away the writer’s need to do any real in-depth look at Freire’s text. According to them, it becomes “unnecessary.” (p.14). This is a looked down upon because it prevents the writer from moving out of his comfort zone.
While reading this excerpt I found that I really agreed with it for the most part because it hit so close to home. As I said earlier, while reading this short essay I felt like I was reading a paper of my own. This lead me to be skeptical of what would come next when Bartholomae and Petrosky critiqued it because I felt as though I put great effort into my papers and nobody wants to believe that they do things the wrong way. However, I am still glad I read it because Bartholomae and Petrosky opened my eyes to an entirely new way of writing, a way that nobody had ever shown me before.
The first thing I learned, even though I’m not happy about it, is that when comprehending a difficult reading I must re-read it a second time to get the full understanding of the paper. Bartholomae and Petrosky found a quote by I.A. Richards which drew my attention… “Read as though it made sense and perhaps it will.” (p.10) I tried this out for a little bit after that and it actually helped a little but not enough to only read it only once. However, what it did help me with was getting the flow of the paper a little bit so that when I re-read it and focused on the tougher parts it helped bind the reading together for me.
Another one of Bartholomae and Petrosky’s points was that the writer just went with the undemanding parts of the reading and what he understood, and dumped the rest. This sounded like me exactly, even so much that before I started writing the paper I was just going to go with the parts I understood, until I brainstormed my paper and realized what I was going to write about. I realized that I could not just write a paper on the parts I understood the first time if those main points contradicted that approach in the first place. I now have realized how important it is that I pay close attention to the book when I realize that I am getting lost, rather than just spacing out until I get to the next part. I must re-read those sections slowly, pausing between each sentence and re-word it in my own head to make sure that I understand it, just as if I were taking notes in class and not just mindlessly copying things down that I didn’t understand. By taking what I have learned from Bartholomae and Petrosky I have now enacted my own rule, combining some of the advice they gave me. The first time I go through a passage I will re-read the sections I don’t understand slowly until I understand them. Then, once I am through the passage I will be commentating on, I will re-read it in its entirety so that I can get the whole flow of the paper together, helping me glue the pieces together without any rough edges. This will not only solve the problem of going with the easiest parts, but it will increase the knowledge and information that I put into my papers as well as store into my brain for overall increased intelligence.
Now, after all this re-reading and focusing we are finally finished with our…gulp…first draft. This next quote is where I could really relate to past experience. “It may not be as finished as it might need to be later in the semester, but it is writing where something is happening, where thought is taken seriously.” I have never really had a teacher tell me to take my first draft and then re-word it completely, but I really like how this student essay turned out. It showed so much relation to the context, even though I had never read the original context. It explained that no draft is a bad draft, just as long as it’s not the final draft. Sometimes you just have to start somewhere to get the mind working and then you can work with what you have, revising and rewording your original ideas.
I learned a great deal from reading the beginning of the book, Ways of Reading. I am glad that I was issued the assignment to write about my finding because if I had not written this paper I would have never analyzed the advice that was given by Bartholomae and Petrosky so closely. While researching my main points I was forced to use their own advice to critique and analyze their own writings. It showed me that I not only had to understand what they were talking about, but turn it around and use it myself to complete the assignment. It really challenged my brain to put the advice to work, which in turn caused me to better understand the findings. I hope that I can use these new techniques in the future to better my writing and hopefully you can as well.
Difficulty Paper #2
I found the article Against School, by John Taylor Gatto, to be a very interesting yet opinionated read. It is obviously apparent that John Gatto is very against the public school system and if he could have it his way, homeschooling would be just as acceptable. He made some very valid points, but there is one large advantage of going through the public school system that John Gatto seemed to have forgotten about or chose to leave unaddressed. This will be addressed later on in my review of the reading.
I would like to begin with Gatto’s use of Inglis’ six basic functions to discredit the public school system. The fourth function is quoted as follows:
“The differentiating function. Once their social role has been "diagnosed," children are to be sorted by role and trained only so far as their destination in the social machine merits - and not one step further. So much for making kids their personal best.”
This to me is a harsh spin of the truth, and I hope that as people read this paper to themselves they step back and challenge the writings in their head to make their own decision instead of conforming to the harsh opinions of Inglis and John Gatto.I feel that this statement is entirely un-true. When I was in school I always had the option of which class I could take, according to my skill level. Even though I qualified for all of the upper classes, I always had a choice from the beginning to perform at my highest potential. You may think, wait a minute, that’s what Gatto said because you were put in certain classes to set limitations on your potential. But really it was you who put yourself in classes and those who could not handle the higher classes went to the lower ones because they were to hard for them. They were failing the tests and obviously not ready for that next level. Also, if you were not ready for the tougher classes at a young age, it never set your path for the rest of your school career. You could always try again the next year, and if you really wanted to push your potential you would study over the summer to prepare yourself for the leap the next year, so it was never pre-decided by someone else, but it was each individual who ultimately controlled their fate.
Now for one of the main advantages to going to a public school that has gone entirely un addressed. Now that I am nearing the end of college and beginning to flirt with the adult world, I have realized that there is one thing that can either take you very far or shadow your intelligence and skills, no matter how educated you are. That one trait is social skills. No offense to any student that have been homeschooled because this does not apply to all homeschooled students, it is just an observation I have made from all of my encounters with homeschooled students. Even though some claim that highschool is very harsh on some students because of the social networking that takes place, it truly prepares us for the real world. High School may be harsh for some, but the real world isn’t full of candy and dandilions. High school is a major growing stage for all people. It teaches each individual to handle bullies, criticism, negative,
Monday, October 12, 2009
Paragraphs
As a student, I recognized myself in Sommers' description of inexperienced writers. In fact, for a moment I thought that I had some how ended up in the sample of inexperienced writers that she used for examples. Throughout high school, even through AP English, I was never taught how to completely revise a paper as Sommer points out. I always did the basics. I wrote my paper, trying to perfect it the first time through so that when I revised it all i really had to do was read it alloud to myself and correct spelling and punctuation, all while leaving out the word "I". Since I was not planning on being an English major I always thought the best way to go about it wast to use maximum efficiency. This way the corrections would be easy and I could do them the morning before the paper was due if I really wanted to. However, what Sommer has taught me is that you can not only improve the quality of your paper by jotting down the first thing that comes to mind and then later revising it completely, but it also is more efficient. I realized that by jotting down things initially you save all the time of writers block and stalling and just trying to think of what to write. Then i can go through it again, with the blue print already mapped out, and greatly improve the quality, in about the same amount of time.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Draft Difficult Paper #1
I found that the article on New Literacy by Clive Thompson was very interesting for many reasons. Thompson writes about a research study done by Andrea Lundsford, who collected 14,672 different writing samples from Stanford College students from various in class assignments all the way to internet blogs. She then continues on analyzing the findings and concluding that since we write so much more than people in the past we are amidst a writing revolution and that all the current forms of writing via texts, blogs, Facebook, etc. are actually revolutionizing our writing rather than damaging it. I definitely agreed with her for the most part, although I did question some of her facts.
The first thing that I questioned was that she collected approximately 1500 samples from Stanford college students. Stanford is known as one of the most prestigious schools already, so I do not feel that they are a good representation of the young population as a whole. They are all admitted on exceptional academics as it is so they already have an unfair advantage in writing over the Average Joe. If I were to use the Greek example, that would be like going back to the Greek scholars and sampling there writing and then stating that the entire Greek generation is much more literate than the average population used to be. I am not claiming that the research is void because I still agree with it, but not because of the Stanford student. I would be more accepting to it if she took a sample from many different colleges of every level.
The paper was also not very clear on the writing samples. How did she attain these and from which classes or web pages were they? They could be great samples, but the reader is still in the dark on the validity of the findings.
Even though there were a few parts that made me question the research, I still agreed with the logic of it. If I take personal experience into the evidence I have realized that for the most part my reading has gotten much better. When I write things on Facebook or texts they are not for a teacher to grade. A teacher can give me a bad grade and that’s my punishment. But when I post a public writing online for all my peers to read I am much more self conscious of the content because I know that I will not be getting graded, but somewhat judged by many people that I actually care about how they view me after the “class” is over. This causes me to constantly look up words I’m not sure if I spelled right, because when you write a text message you can’t just spell check it. This repetition causes me to learn the spellings and then get them right the first time.
I also feel that the percentage of young adults and under do use some form of media or texting to communicate. Facebook has become so much a part of everyday life that if you don’t have one you are actually missing out on information and even events that people post online. People don’t send invitations in the mail anymore; everything is done on Facebook so the pressure to have one is so great that I rarely meet a person who does not have a Facebook. I even got a wedding invitation on Facebook two days ago if that puts it into perspective.
Although there are so many advantages to it I have found that it causes some minor bad habits as well. Because of the mass writing craze, a lot of shorthand has developed because you can get the same point across while saving time or the space on your palate. In an essay I was writing last week I caught myself writing gonna instead of going to because I was so used to it. I caught it right away but it still showed me that we are creatures of habit so we still need to be careful and go back and check our work, even if we feel that we have wooed our peers with a masterful photo comment or wall post.
The first thing that I questioned was that she collected approximately 1500 samples from Stanford college students. Stanford is known as one of the most prestigious schools already, so I do not feel that they are a good representation of the young population as a whole. They are all admitted on exceptional academics as it is so they already have an unfair advantage in writing over the Average Joe. If I were to use the Greek example, that would be like going back to the Greek scholars and sampling there writing and then stating that the entire Greek generation is much more literate than the average population used to be. I am not claiming that the research is void because I still agree with it, but not because of the Stanford student. I would be more accepting to it if she took a sample from many different colleges of every level.
The paper was also not very clear on the writing samples. How did she attain these and from which classes or web pages were they? They could be great samples, but the reader is still in the dark on the validity of the findings.
Even though there were a few parts that made me question the research, I still agreed with the logic of it. If I take personal experience into the evidence I have realized that for the most part my reading has gotten much better. When I write things on Facebook or texts they are not for a teacher to grade. A teacher can give me a bad grade and that’s my punishment. But when I post a public writing online for all my peers to read I am much more self conscious of the content because I know that I will not be getting graded, but somewhat judged by many people that I actually care about how they view me after the “class” is over. This causes me to constantly look up words I’m not sure if I spelled right, because when you write a text message you can’t just spell check it. This repetition causes me to learn the spellings and then get them right the first time.
I also feel that the percentage of young adults and under do use some form of media or texting to communicate. Facebook has become so much a part of everyday life that if you don’t have one you are actually missing out on information and even events that people post online. People don’t send invitations in the mail anymore; everything is done on Facebook so the pressure to have one is so great that I rarely meet a person who does not have a Facebook. I even got a wedding invitation on Facebook two days ago if that puts it into perspective.
Although there are so many advantages to it I have found that it causes some minor bad habits as well. Because of the mass writing craze, a lot of shorthand has developed because you can get the same point across while saving time or the space on your palate. In an essay I was writing last week I caught myself writing gonna instead of going to because I was so used to it. I caught it right away but it still showed me that we are creatures of habit so we still need to be careful and go back and check our work, even if we feel that we have wooed our peers with a masterful photo comment or wall post.
Second Draft Essay #1
In the book Ways of Reading, Bartholomae and Petrosky talk about how student interpret readings into their own thoughts and writing. Bartholomae and Petrosky show an example of a student writer who was given the task to write his own experience of the “banking” concept, as told by Freire. He writes a well thought out paper of all the things he could relate to after reading the banking concept one time through. He uses good examples and the paper is very easy to follow, especially coming from someone who has not read the original banking concept from Freire himself. When the student was asked how he prepared and carried out the task of writing the paper he was quick to respond, “I read through the Freire essay and I worked with what I understood and ignored the rest.” (p. 13)
Bartholomae and Petrosky were completely fine with this process for writing the paper, as long as it was for the first draft. They then spoke of how the student writer wrote the passage as an individual example, but Bartholomae and Petrosky argue that “…Freire argues, is bigger than the intentions or actions of individuals.” It shows that while the student wrote some of his own individual examples, Freire was talking about the education system as a whole. Bartholomae and Petrosky then asked the student to re-read the passage and focus more on the parts that were difficult to him.
The revision was astounding to me. Even though they showed only a small portion of the revision, it showed that he had really taken Freire’s words to heart and that he was making his example more into a sample backing up Freire’s claims, rather than just an individual example.
Bartholomae and Petrosky gave praise to the student from the beginning, stating that it was a good paper before I was able to read it and formulate my own opinion. To them, it was a good start for a first draft. It was not until after we had read the passage that we were able to get the full input from Bartholomae and Petrosky. I tried to soak it in the first time I read it before I had someone else’s opinion in my head, and before long I was dreading what would come next because it seemed like a replica of my writings. Luckily Bartholomae and Petrosky praised it afterwards, but stated that it needed a lot of revision. As it has been recommended throughout the Ways of Readings, they wanted the student to go back and re read the text, focusing on the more difficult parts. This showed that Bartholomae and Petrosky really felt that the student had left out the importance of the argument and was just going with the basic facts. This is where I had to take Bartholomae and Petrosky’s advice into my own hands and re read their comments on the paper to see what the real meaning was that was hidden inside their complex vocabulary which I breezed through the first time.
Bartholomae and Petrosky noticed that the writer did a good job at quoting Freire and using it in his paper for the parts he understood. They claim that doing this can give the appearance of understanding the paper but takes away the writer’s need to do any real in depth look at Freire’s text. According to them, it becomes “unnecessary.” (p.14). This is a bad thing because it prevents the writer from moving out of his comfort zone.
While reading this excerpt I found that I really agreed with it for the most part because it hit so close to home. As I said earlier, while reading this short essay I felt like I was reading a paper of my own. This lead me to be skeptical of what would come next when Bartholomae and Petrosky critiqued it because I felt as though I put great effort into my papers and nobody wants to believe that they do things the wrong way. I am glad I read it though because Bartholomae and Petrosky opened my eyes to an entirely new way of writing, a way that nobody has ever showed me before.
The first thing I learned, even though I’m not happy about it, is that when comprehending a difficult reading I must re-read it a second time to get the full understanding of the paper. Bartholomae and Petrosky found a quote by I.A. Richards which I really liked… “Read as though it made sense and perhaps it will.” (p.10) I tried this out for a little bit after that and it actually helped a little but not enough to only read it once. However, what it did help me with was getting the flow of the paper a little bit so that when I re read it and focused on the tougher parts it helped bind the reading together for me.
Another one of Bartholomae and Petrosky’s points was that the writer just went with the easiest parts of the reading and what he understood and dumped the rest. This sounded like me exactly, even so much that before I started writing the paper I was just going to go with the parts I understood, until I brainstormed my paper and realized what I was going to write about. I realized that I could not just write a paper on the parts I understood the first time if those main points contradicted that approach in the first place. I now have realized how important it is to make sure that I pay close attention to the book when I realize that I am getting lost rather than just spacing out until I get to the next part. I must re read those sections slowly, pausing between each sentence and re word it in my own head to make sure that I understand it, just as if I were taking notes in class and not just mindlessly copying things down that I didn’t understood. By taking what I have learned from Bartholomae and Petrosky I have now enacted my own rule, combining some of the advice they gave me. The first time I go through a passage I will re read the sections I don’t understand slowly until I understand them. Then, once I am through the passage I will be commentating on, I will re read it in its entirety so that I can get the whole flow of the paper together, helping me glue the pieces together without and rough edges. This will not only solve the problem of not going with the easiest parts, but it will increase the knowledge and information that I put into my papers as well as store into my brain for overall increased intelligence.
Now, after all this re reading and focusing we are finally finished with our…gulp…first draft. This next quote is where I could really relate to past experience. “It may not be as finished as it might need to be later in the semester, but it is writing where something is happening, where thought is taken seriously.” I have never really had a teacher to take my first draft and then re word it completely, but I really like how this student essay turned out. It should so much relation to the context, even though I never even read the original context. It showed me that no draft is a bad draft, just as long as it’s not the final draft. Sometimes you just have to start somewhere to get the mind working and then you can work with what you have, revising and rewording your original ideas.
I learned a great deal from reading the beginning of the book, Ways of Reading. I am glad that I was issued the assignment to write about my finding because if I had not written this paper I would have never analyzed the advice that was given by Bartholomae and Petrosky so closely. While researching my main points I was forced to use their own advice to critique and analyze their own writings. It showed me that I not only had to understand what they were talking about, but turn it around and use it myself to complete the assignment. It really challenged my brain to put the advice to work, which in turn caused me to better understand the findings. I hope that I can use these new techniques in the future to better my writing and hopefully you can as well.
Bartholomae and Petrosky were completely fine with this process for writing the paper, as long as it was for the first draft. They then spoke of how the student writer wrote the passage as an individual example, but Bartholomae and Petrosky argue that “…Freire argues, is bigger than the intentions or actions of individuals.” It shows that while the student wrote some of his own individual examples, Freire was talking about the education system as a whole. Bartholomae and Petrosky then asked the student to re-read the passage and focus more on the parts that were difficult to him.
The revision was astounding to me. Even though they showed only a small portion of the revision, it showed that he had really taken Freire’s words to heart and that he was making his example more into a sample backing up Freire’s claims, rather than just an individual example.
Bartholomae and Petrosky gave praise to the student from the beginning, stating that it was a good paper before I was able to read it and formulate my own opinion. To them, it was a good start for a first draft. It was not until after we had read the passage that we were able to get the full input from Bartholomae and Petrosky. I tried to soak it in the first time I read it before I had someone else’s opinion in my head, and before long I was dreading what would come next because it seemed like a replica of my writings. Luckily Bartholomae and Petrosky praised it afterwards, but stated that it needed a lot of revision. As it has been recommended throughout the Ways of Readings, they wanted the student to go back and re read the text, focusing on the more difficult parts. This showed that Bartholomae and Petrosky really felt that the student had left out the importance of the argument and was just going with the basic facts. This is where I had to take Bartholomae and Petrosky’s advice into my own hands and re read their comments on the paper to see what the real meaning was that was hidden inside their complex vocabulary which I breezed through the first time.
Bartholomae and Petrosky noticed that the writer did a good job at quoting Freire and using it in his paper for the parts he understood. They claim that doing this can give the appearance of understanding the paper but takes away the writer’s need to do any real in depth look at Freire’s text. According to them, it becomes “unnecessary.” (p.14). This is a bad thing because it prevents the writer from moving out of his comfort zone.
While reading this excerpt I found that I really agreed with it for the most part because it hit so close to home. As I said earlier, while reading this short essay I felt like I was reading a paper of my own. This lead me to be skeptical of what would come next when Bartholomae and Petrosky critiqued it because I felt as though I put great effort into my papers and nobody wants to believe that they do things the wrong way. I am glad I read it though because Bartholomae and Petrosky opened my eyes to an entirely new way of writing, a way that nobody has ever showed me before.
The first thing I learned, even though I’m not happy about it, is that when comprehending a difficult reading I must re-read it a second time to get the full understanding of the paper. Bartholomae and Petrosky found a quote by I.A. Richards which I really liked… “Read as though it made sense and perhaps it will.” (p.10) I tried this out for a little bit after that and it actually helped a little but not enough to only read it once. However, what it did help me with was getting the flow of the paper a little bit so that when I re read it and focused on the tougher parts it helped bind the reading together for me.
Another one of Bartholomae and Petrosky’s points was that the writer just went with the easiest parts of the reading and what he understood and dumped the rest. This sounded like me exactly, even so much that before I started writing the paper I was just going to go with the parts I understood, until I brainstormed my paper and realized what I was going to write about. I realized that I could not just write a paper on the parts I understood the first time if those main points contradicted that approach in the first place. I now have realized how important it is to make sure that I pay close attention to the book when I realize that I am getting lost rather than just spacing out until I get to the next part. I must re read those sections slowly, pausing between each sentence and re word it in my own head to make sure that I understand it, just as if I were taking notes in class and not just mindlessly copying things down that I didn’t understood. By taking what I have learned from Bartholomae and Petrosky I have now enacted my own rule, combining some of the advice they gave me. The first time I go through a passage I will re read the sections I don’t understand slowly until I understand them. Then, once I am through the passage I will be commentating on, I will re read it in its entirety so that I can get the whole flow of the paper together, helping me glue the pieces together without and rough edges. This will not only solve the problem of not going with the easiest parts, but it will increase the knowledge and information that I put into my papers as well as store into my brain for overall increased intelligence.
Now, after all this re reading and focusing we are finally finished with our…gulp…first draft. This next quote is where I could really relate to past experience. “It may not be as finished as it might need to be later in the semester, but it is writing where something is happening, where thought is taken seriously.” I have never really had a teacher to take my first draft and then re word it completely, but I really like how this student essay turned out. It should so much relation to the context, even though I never even read the original context. It showed me that no draft is a bad draft, just as long as it’s not the final draft. Sometimes you just have to start somewhere to get the mind working and then you can work with what you have, revising and rewording your original ideas.
I learned a great deal from reading the beginning of the book, Ways of Reading. I am glad that I was issued the assignment to write about my finding because if I had not written this paper I would have never analyzed the advice that was given by Bartholomae and Petrosky so closely. While researching my main points I was forced to use their own advice to critique and analyze their own writings. It showed me that I not only had to understand what they were talking about, but turn it around and use it myself to complete the assignment. It really challenged my brain to put the advice to work, which in turn caused me to better understand the findings. I hope that I can use these new techniques in the future to better my writing and hopefully you can as well.
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