Ex. Credit!

I really enjoyed the College Writing II class. I feel like it has improved my writing and got me to explore a different direction of writing. Before I thought of writing as research on a topic or something boring like that. By taking this course I learned that writing is also a way of exploring and discovering who you are. I really liked exploring our identities and giving us a better look of who we are. I also liked that we got to use modern sources of media such as facebook to see what we are letting others think about us. I haven’t really thought of facebook to be that impressionable but I learned that it is.

I also had a good time listening to others and seeing their points of view on topics. I am very stubborn and don’t usually see the way others do but by listening to them and seeing different ways that people think let me be more open minded. Another part of the class that I liked is that it wasn’t your typical college writing class. I enjoyed the bloging, watching movies and clips from the Simpson’s and the Colbert Report. I feel like it takes more than a professor standing in front of a room talking to make students learn. By adding these sources of media, it helped me understand and help me to learn. I really enjoyed the class and I feel like I am walking away with a lot from the class.

Extra Credit Blog

I would say that this class was a pretty enlightening experience for me. It was definitely one of the more discussion-based classes I've taken since I've been at Kent, and I really enjoyed that aspect. In most classes, you don't get a chance to really debate topics and get inside other people's heads to see how they feel and think about things, and I think that related a lot to the "identity" theme of the course. We all look and act differently, but it's surprising to see how similarly people think, who otherwise might appear much differently from a physical point of view. I liked pretty much all of the things we watched and read. I think it's important to look at everyday things like the clothes we wear or who we socialize with, etc. and see how that portrays us. A lot of life is so routine, and if you keep trudging through without taking a look around or analyzing your surroundings and doing some critical thinking, you won't learn nearly as much about the world as you might be able to. Unknown White Male was probably the most interesting thing we watched in my opinion. I thought it was such a crazy story and I've really never heard of anything like it before, but it really made me think about how much of ourselves is created by our environment and the people in our environment. I can't even begin to imagine waking up one day and having no idea who you are. I'm still not sure if I believe it, but the idea of the film made me contemplate how I would be had I been brought up in a different place with different friends and family, and I definitely think I'd be a much different person than I am today. I did thoroughly enjoy this class, though, and I'm glad the course was designed the way it was, because I thought it was a better learning experience than most college writing classes.

Extra Credit Blog

Around Christmas time, I found a book on sale for four bucks at Borders. It was called "American Nerd: The Story of My People." With a title like that, how could I not buy it? I've been reading it off and on this semester, mostly during my hour long break before this class, and I've found it very interesting. The book is broken into three parts: "a history of the nerd," "among the nerds," and "my credentials." The first section, of course, looks at where the word came from. It also gives a brief explanation of how the United States grew to be so infatuated with sports and manliness. In the chapter "the rise of phys ed," it's interesting to me that our own state, Ohio, was the first to establish phys ed requirements in public schools, in 1892. Part two of the book, "among the nerds," provides glimpses into different groups of people that might be considered nerdy, from debate club to D&D. There is also an interesting chapter on Asperger's syndrome. The final section is the author Benjamin Nugent's "credentials," extending upon the few chapters through out the book where he discussed his own experiences with D&D and bullying. This book relates very much so to what we've discussed throughout this semester about identity. Even the title: "The Story of My People." It's about HIS people and understanding why they are the way they are and how they identify with one another.

extra credit blog

I feel that overall I had a very good experience in this class. And im not just saying that, I actually mean it. I really enjoyed showing up to this class everyday. I loved being able to listen to what every had to say about the many different topics that we discussed during class. It was nice being able to get other peoples view points on certain things and then being able to compare it with my own thoughts and ideas. I thought it was a very good idea to have discussion as a part of the class. it allows students to interact with others and show ideas. Along with the class discussion I also enjoyed the blogs. This was another way for everyone to express their own opinion on a reading. I feel that this was so effective becuase I feel that everyone no matter who they are likes being able to voice their opinions on something and having their voices heard. My favorite paper was the Facebook one. I found this one to be the most enjoyable mainly becuase it was a new way to view and look at my facebook which I never would have done before. I was able to learn alot about myself and I thought it was a very great idea for a paper. Also being able to revise the paper after we got our first grade was also a great idea. It allowed students to improve on the things that they had written, which normally a student never would have gone back and fixed it unless it was so you could boost your grade. Overall I thought the theme for this class was a great one, and it was a very enjoyable second semester for me. It made writing a lot more enjoyable to me since before this class writing was not one of my favorite things to do.

Extra credit

I really enjoyed this class. Unlike College Writing I, I had the chance to express myself in my writing. In this class I especially liked the focus of the course. Identity has always interested me and getting to discover more about myself in this class was great. In College Writing I all we did was write speech like papers in character of a moderate, patriot or loyalist. Then we would have to read them out loud to the class and debate. It was not what I expected of College writing what so ever. This year when I received the syllabus and read the main theme of the course was identity, I couldn’t have been happier. Being one who loves writing the assignments were right down my ally. I also liked the feeling that I actually learned something, compared to College writing I. Aside from the theme of this course, I also liked the blogging. It gave me a chance to say what I thought about the readings and read what others thought. It also helped me better understand the readings. I also liked the in class discussions, even though not everyone would participate all the time. Most of all what I enjoyed about this class was how it opened my mind. The topics really forced me to dig deep and really think about things. I not only learned about identity but my identity. I also really enjoyed the first movie we watched on identity. I found it extremely interesting and it was something I would have never watched myself.

Extra Credit Blog

I think that I learned a lot about my writing skills in this class. I did expect to do a lot of work but it want that hard. I thought I did a great job writing for the most part. In my college writing I class my professor critiqued us maybe a sentence here or there on a finished essay and that was it. Whenever she gave us our papers back you got a grade and a few sentences on why we she gave it to us. I was a little skeptical about my first paper because I thought it was fine but I got a full page on the things that I did wrong or could have done better, which now I am very grateful for and a lot of professors don't do that. This class has definitely made me a much better writer than what I was before. This was also my first experience ever blogging. I thought that was pretty interesting too. To have someone you don't know or probably will never meet read your opinions about things is cool. Overall I am really glad I took this class if it was with some one else I probably would've missed out on a great learning experience.