Outside Reading 2011-2012 Reflection

As freshman year comes to a close, in a lot of classes we have been reflecting on everything that we have done in the school year.  This past year, I have not been completely satisfied with my outside reading as I have been in years past.  One thing that I have definitely learned this year is that I have a hard time sitting down and focusing on a book, often enough that I don’t get bored and eventually finish it.  This did not happen as often as I wanted it to, which really made reading something that I didn’t look forward to. This was very unusual for me, because I have always loved reading, and for some reason I just didn’t all of the sudden. Looking back, I have realized that I didn’t really get into reading this year because I didn’t take the time to find a good book that I would be interested.  More times than not, I would just pull something off of the shelf and read it because I knew that I should be reading. Towards the end of the year, I started to take more time to pick out a good book, and actually ended up finishing most of them. It really surprised me that I wasn’t enjoying reading because of something so simple.  This has now made me more aware of what I read, and how to realize earlier on if I am interested or not.

            This summer and next year especially in my reading, I plan on being careful about what I pick to read for outside reading, and knowing that I am interested in it early on.  I am one who always wants to be productive with my free time, and I want to feel especially productive when it comes to outside reading.  Though I am not very happy with how I went about my outside reading this year, I think that with what I have learned from it, I can be very successful in the next school year. 

Common Errors List

1. Comma Splices - The attempt to join two independent clauses, but without a coordinator.
Ex. I got up late this morning, I didn't have time for breakfast.
How to fix - I got up late this morning. I didn't have time for breakfast.

2. Direct Quotations - End periods and commas go inside of the quotation marks, but periods and commas go after the parenthetical documentation.
Ex. "No!", Jimmy protested (64).

3. Repetition - Repeating a name or a pronoun multiple times in one paragraph
Ex. She likes "The One" the best because it was dedicated to their fans, and she is one.  She also likes "Everybody", because she was a fan when they were first starting out, and she is still a fan now.

4. Affect vs. Effect -
Affect: a verb
Effect: a noun
Ex. Her actions affect the way that her friends are viewed.  An effect of this might be the loss of friendship.

5.Unnecessary Commas - placing a comma where it is not needed/appropriate
Wrong: I like that shirt, but, it doesn't come in my size.
Right: I like that shirt, but it doesn't come in my size.


Commonly Misspelled Words:

Attached
Unnecessary
Accidentally
Guarantee
Supersede

Reflecting on This Year's Writing: Writing WrAP Up

         Before this past year, I had never been fully confident in my writing.  I always felt as if I was an insufficient writer, trying hard but not succeeding. In the past 8 months, I can honestly say that I have improved greatly as a writer, and in ways that I didn’t even know I could.  I am proud of the work that I placed my name on in English I, and I know that without the feedback and criticism I received from not only my peers, but also Dr. deGravelles, I would not feel as strongly as I do today.

         

         The very first piece of writing that we turned in on Turnitin.com was our literacy narrative.  When given the assignment, I knew exactly what I would talk about and how it changed who I am today as a writer. Overall I was fairly satisfied with the work that I did here, because I had only a few errors (mainly incorrect punctuation with quotations, and comma splices).  Getting the feedback from Dr. deGravelles set me up in a position where I was not only sufficient in my writing, but I was also confident. 

         

          After we wrote our literacy narratives, we moved on to writing profiles.  I had chosen to profile my good friend, and write about how she managed her life as a recent freshman. My rough draft for this paper had been about what she did in a day, and my teacher pointed out to me that I should choose to focus on one or two things about her characteristically, and why that makes her who she is.  Unfortunately for me, I didn’t fully grasp the concept and my literacy narrative turned out to be a mess. Overall, I did okay, but I did not reach all of the requirements that were set for us.  Each of my scores on the rubric was brought down an entire letter grade because of this.  I had also thought that my voice throughout the piece was substantial, but I ended up receiving a “D” in that category. Looking back, I should have known that a good paper follows every guideline on the rubric, and I honestly don’t know why I didn’t follow it in the first place.  Receiving a 28/35 on this piece, I was put into a mindset that in order to receive good scores and succeed, I would have to work very hard.

         

           Out of all the papers that we wrote this year, the hardest one to write for me was definitely the literary analysis.  When we were given the assignment, I should have known to pick a short story that I could effectively write a literary analysis on.  Instead, I chose what I wanted and read from a collection of humorous holiday-themed short stories.  After choosing a story and starting the writing process, I quickly found that finding a thesis in my story was tricky, but I pushed on through and made do with what I had.  I wrote my literary analysis, unsatisfied of what I had put my name on and turned it, but I luckily received great feedback from Dr. deGravelles.  My voice in this work was awkward, and my understanding of rhetorical situations was clearly not what I had thought it was. She had also acknowledged the challenge that I had with writing my literary analysis, which made me more comfortable with letting her know how I felt about my writing.  My feedback and conclusions from my literary analysis made me 100% sure that I was going to try my absolute hardest for the next paper that we were going to be assigned to write.                            

In Social Studies, shortly after Christmas break, we started to do research on a global issue.  We were told that our research would tie in with a project in English class, and we needed to make sure that we had all of the requirements in order to move on from the research stage to the writing stage.  Unfortunately, my social studies class was not prepared for the requirements in our English class, which in turn made research not fun.  I had to do a lot of research on my own time, despite the seemingly endless amount of time that we were given in Social Studies. However, I realized early on in this project that though it not may be easy, I needed to improve overall in my writing, which I concluded by assessing the writing that I had completed earlier on.  I chose to write about overpopulation, and how it affects the world environmentally and economically. I completed a lot of research, which made writing the paper itself quite enjoyable.  I like to write, but writing this paper was different.  I was very proud of my writing every step of the way, and the feedback that I received through peer editing was a wonderful confidence booster.  I received comments such as “near perfect draft”, and “this is an awesome paper”.  That along with my comments from Dr. deGravelles boosted my confidence to an entire new level.  Not only were my peers and my teacher proud of my writing, but I was too. I think that this paper helped me to realize that in order for others to be proud of your work, you yourself have to be proud of it too. Writing this paper was sort of an epiphany for myself as a writer, as I was finally completely proud of my paper, and it showed.

         

             A while ago, we completed the WrAP test, as we do every year.  We were given the rubric, and told to fully review it, as we should always try our hardest to receive the highest grade we possibly could as writers.  Normally, I write three pages of whatever I come up with relating to our prompt, but this time I only wrote a page and a half of well-developed ideas of downloading music and what I thought about it.  For some reason, I was completely satisfied with my page and a half, and was even more satisfied when I had received my scores of mostly 5.0’s and only one 4.0.  With a total score of 29.0, I had written less than I had on any WrAP test I had ever taken, and made the highest score out of all of them.  I was amazed as I reviewed my writing, only reaffirming the fact that in order to succeed in writing, you have to be proud of your work too.

        

            With all of the feedback that I have received this year, I realized that I struggle in a few general areas, being my ideas and voice throughout writing, and also dealing with rhetorical situations.  Though towards the end of the year, these struggles started to go away a little bit, they are still present in my writing, and it is something that I look forward to improving on over the course of the next few years.  With the help that I have received this year, and the help that I will receive in the years to come, improving in these areas is definitely a possibility for me.

Looking back on this year, I am more than happy with my improvement as a writer.  As I was completing these assignments, I had not thought much about what it was helping with in the long run, I only thought about how they were not fun and they seemed like a burden. After this year of English, I am so excited to move on to what will come next year.  I never thought that I would be the writer that I am today, even if I have only improved just a little bit. Next year, I hope that I can improve even more as a writer, especially in the areas that I struggled with this year, such as rhetorical situations and especially voice and overall ideas. However, I am thankful for all of the work and struggles that I pushed through this year, as it has not only made me eager for what is to come in the next three years of high school English, but I am finally fully confident with myself as a writer, and I am so excited to see myself improve even more.

        

Reading Times

Wednesday: 15 minutes
Friday: 90 minutes
Sunday: 60 minutes

"Daylight" by Matt and Kim

One of my favorite songs is "Daylight" by Matt and Kim.  It is one of the duo's most popular songs, and it is very catchy, but it also has a unique meaning.  In the song, Matt sings about what he does during the day time, and in each stanza he mentions something new and interesting that he is doing durning the day, clearly living his life to the fullest and facing everything with a positive attitude.  The tone of "Daylight" is the carefree and optimistic attitude that you might expect to see for someone who's relationship with the daylight is one that is inspiring, because you can tell that the narrator believes that daylight is a gift and it should be used to its absolute fullest.

The techniques that are used in "Daylight" are:
- Repetition of the word "daylight"
- Repetition at the end of each stanza except for the chorus
- Dense imagery in the 4th stanza
-Rhyme pattern in each stanza - last words rhyme in the first two lines of each non-choral stanza
- Contrast between day and night

The repetition of the word "daylight" plays its part throughout the entire song, as it plays the biggest role in the story.  In the non-choral stanzas, the narrator tells a "mini" story about what he does during the daylight.  The 2nd and 3rd lines of these stanzas are the main points about daylight, and there are four of these main points mentioned throughout the song:

1st stanza -
We cut the legs off of our pants
Threw our shoes into the ocean
Sit back and wave through the daylight
Sit back and wave through the daylight

2nd stanza -
Slip and slide on subway grates
These shoes are poor man's ice skates
Fall through like change in the daylight
Fall through like change in the daylight

4th stanza -
These sidewalks liquid then stone
Building walls and an old pay phone
It rings like all through the daylight
It rings like all through the daylight

7th stanza -
Open hydrant rolled down windows
This car might make a good old boat
And float down grand street in daylight
And float down grand street in daylight


In the 4th stanza, there is a bit of imagery going on. The lyric is, "These sidewalks liquid then stone, building walls and an old pay phone".  This creates a visual image for the reader of what the narrator sees while he's walking down the street, which is wet sidewalk turning into dry sidewalk, and his observations of his surroundings, being the walls beside him and the old pay phone.

In this song, it was hard to notice but there is contrast between the day and night.  In the 8th stanza, the last two lines are "step back and here comes the night time", repeated.  This technique was used so that the reader got a sense of what he did during the day, and now that his day was over the night time was coming.

Lastly, I found deeper meaning in the chorus, which is the main part of "Daylight", as it is repeated 3 times throughout the song.

And in the daylight we can hitchhike to Maine
I hope that someday I'll see without these frames
And in the daylight I don't pick up my phone
Because in the daylight anywhere feels like home

The chorus analysis that I came up with was that the narrator is living his life during the day time, because anything in the daylight is comfortable for him.  Basically, in the chorus the narrator states that he can do anything in the daylight.  From hitchhiking to Maine to one day seeing on his own without glasses, he can do anything because in the daylight "anywhere feels like home".

_Bossypants_

So, over this break I decided that I would start to read a little bit more than usual.  My mom thought that I would enjoy Tina Fey's biography, Bossypants.  It is about her life from the time that she was a teenager to her life now as an extraordinary actress. With herself as the narrator, she talks about things that happened in her life, and comedically tells the story with remarks on what she thinks about those things as she looks back on it now.  I am really interested in Bossypants, because Tina Fey is one of my favorite actresses and was one of my all time favorite SNL regulars.  I look forward to the rest of the book, I hope that I can finish it soon so that I can share it with all of you!

I also read the poems that we were assigned to annotate over the break, and in total I read for about an hour from the poetry book.  I noticed that while some of the poems were easier to understand than others, the ones that were short and sweet had much more meaning than the longer ones.  I don't know if that's reverse psychology or what, but it was definitely something that I noticed! I look forward to continuing our poetry course, it is something that I feel connected and interested in, probably one of my favorite things all year!

Reading times:
Thursday: 65 minutes - Bossypants
Saturday: 45 minutes - Bossypants
Sunday: 60 minutes - Poetry

"My Papa's Waltz" by Theodore Roethke

"My Papa's Waltz" by Theodore Roethke is about a child who's father, after working all day, comes home and drinks whiskey, and then dances the waltz.  This poem follows the ABAB CDCD rhyming pattern, with alternating lines ending with words that rhyme and/or have repeated sounds. With the simile, "But I hung on like death;", creates an image for the reader that the child was holding onto his/her father tightly while dancing, despite his drunkenness. With other techniques such as repeated sounds (often found in the rhymes), and somewhat dense imagery, the reader can get a generally clear picture of the two dancing around in the kitchen, with the pots sliding off of the shelves and the mother's look of disapproval.

The narrator of "My Papa's Waltz" was most likely a small boy, as in line 2 it says "Could make a small boy dizzy;".  If this line hadn't been included in the poem, the narrator would have been most likely perceived as a girl. Because this was included, the tone of the poem changes, and as a reader I can picture a father and his son having a good time dancing around in the kitchen. With imagery in the third stanza, talking about his father's hand, the reader can start to get an understanding of what the father was doing all day: working. This is also conveyed in the fourth stanza, when it talks about his palm being "caked hard by  dirt" (line 2).  This also creates an image for the reader of not only what the father's hands actually look like, but what the father and the boy look like while they dance, as they probably had not seen each other all day and were having a good time.  The last two lines of the last stanza, "Then waltzed me off to bed Still clinging to your shirt", finish off the poem with a clearly happy tone that the father and the son danced until they could no longer dance, and the little boy had enjoyed the time with his father, as he was still clinging to his shirt.