Reading Journal Dasbender

bcbaski1

 

 

Title of Article + Proper MLA Citation for Works Cited page DasBender, Gita. “Critical Thinking in College Writing: From the Personal to the Academic.” Selected Readings for FirstYear Composition, pressbooks.online.ucf.edu/comp1sample/chapter/critical-thinking-in-college-writing-from-the-personal-to-the-academic/.
Summarize the article — include your reaction, thoughts, anything to help you remember its claims. 100 to 150 words In this article, Gita Dasbender discusses critical thinking and how to better understand it. In the beginning, she talks about how when we hear the term critical thinking, many become intimidated because this skill requires attentive reading, and complex thinking. Being intimidated has always been the case for me because reading large essays or writings can be difficult. Dasbender talks about ways to help with this issue of intimidation though. She says ways to help become engaged in the reading is to ask or list question throughout to show that one is actively reading. She also talks about the importance of remembering keynotes and phrases for organization. Organization will help with the essay which should show that one analyzed and responded the the writing accordingly.
Define new terms and concepts by quoting or paraphrasing the original author.

 

  “Impersonal writing, writing that is detached, distant, and lacking in personal meaning or relevance” (Dasbender).

 

Discrepencies- lack of compatibility
How does this reading connect to other articles from class and/or your own research?

 

  This reading connects to my own college life because it gave me advice on many readings I have done or have to do in the future. It taught me how to look deeper into what is written and actively think and ask questions rather than just skimming over what is written down and trying to scramble everything together to make sense.
Based on the reading, craft one question to act as a springboard for class discussion.  What is the most important aspect of critical thinking in your opinion?

“Multimodal Final Reflection–So Far”

bcbaski1

My progress on project four is going well in my opinion. I love this type of writing so my thoughts seem to flow pretty freely. I also love being honest about struggles I have had because writing it down really reminds me of how far I have come in my writing and makes me want to do better. I also love looking back at all of the times that I had thought I wouldn’t make it through this year because it reminds me also that I am capable of more than I think. I have my pictures picked out, and I already have a draft that I am correcting and adjusting every day.

I am extremely more comfortable with this type of personal writing. I feel like this because I know me. I already have all the information in my head because it happened to me so now I just need to write it down. Academic essays are great for improving my writing skills overall, but they stress me out. I always feel like I could have found more information about the topic or that I am not being as in depth. With personal writing, it is easy for me to go in depth because I feel more passionate about the subject since it is about my growth and struggles.

I can honestly say at this moment that I am not facing any struggles right now. If I had to say something though, I guess I always get nervous that I am not being as specific as possible, but I am pretty sure I am. Hopefully, I will not fail haha. 🙂

“Reflective Writing Video Response”

bcbaski1

In this video, I learned that reflective writing should have a minimum amount of description. Now that I think about this, it makes sense because the description is just a tool to set up my reflective response. I also learned that reflecting can help me learn more about myself and my past experiences so that I can do better in the future with the knowledge that I have now. Both good and bad experiences will help me become a better writer in the future.

For becoming a better writer and student, reflection is so important. It allows me to look back at what I have learned throughout my time as a student and fix what I may not have been great at in the past. It can help me not only become a better thinker but also a better writer. For example, I can remember how stressed that I felt once for procrastinating on a paper, and I hated that feeling. Looking back and remembering that feeling made me realize that I am not good at doing things last minute. I learned from that experience, and it helped me become a better student and do my work on time. Another example is that my teacher gives me corrections and comments on all of my papers. Looking at these mistakes is never fun, but it allows me to learn about what I need to do and not do again. This allows me to become a better writer.

Reflection is important outside the classroom because it applies everywhere in life. Everyone makes mistakes. I have made plenty, but I can honestly say I do not regret anything because it has helped me learn how to be better in all aspects of my life. This is a form of reflection because I can look back at my past mistakes and remember how bad I felt at the time. Looking back on this feeling makes me want to be better and not repeat those mistakes again. I learned from them, and now I can move on. I can also look back on what I have done right in my life. I have also made so many good decisions, and remembering these accomplishing moments makes me want to continue on that path so that I can keep improving. Accomplishing something always feels good, and it is addicting. Reflecting on my good moments always makes me want to repeat them.

Project #3 Unit Reflection

bcbaski1

I feel that my writing/research skills did improve from this project. I noticed that unlike my very first paper, I was able to quickly conduct a solid thesis and knew exactly how I wanted my paper to be structured. I also love arguments so maybe that is why this paper flowed easier to me than any of my past papers. I usually have bad writer’s block and get stuck on one paragraph for a long time, but in this paper I knew what I needed to write.

I did notice some areas of weakness though in this project. I notice this in each of my papers and it is that i feel like i’m always struggling to reach the word count and have to start finding new information to include. I think that is just because in my high school we never had to meet a certain word count. I also always question my works cited page and am never 100% sure if it is correct because of all the MLA rules always changing.

The most stressful part of this essay was having to rewrite the entire thing and remember and try to find my original sources from the original paper. My computer glitched and completely broke down. I took it to get fixed, but they said it was unfixable. I had to order a new computer and at this point knew I would not reach the due date. I was able to get an extension from my amazing teacher. It took longer to rewrite than I though because I lost all of my sources so the paper was slightly different, but I did end up finishing it in the end. I dealt with this stress by just getting it done. It didn’t help with the stress of the presidential election always on in the background, but I just persevered and wrote as fast as possible. I would say I was successful since I finished the paper in the end.

If I could do anything differently on this paper, I would have asked someone like one of my teachers to read it so I could have a professional opinion. But I was on crunched time with my computer breaking so hopefully i will do this on my next and final paper. For my writing process, I can honestly say I would not have done it differently. I am pretty strict and repetitive when it comes to my writing process. So that answers the next part which is yes I would keep every aspect of my writing process because I felt that it worked best for me.

Reflective Post

bcbaski1

I’ve learned that crafting arguments takes a lot of research and you actually need to educate yourself on the topic that you chose. I also enjoy looking at both sides of an argument to give myself a better perspective on how I choose to word it. Conducting academic research involves much reading. You must find the truth and not just the opinions. I always look at the statistics to prove my stance. I chose the controversial topic of why marijuana should be legal and have learned the many positive effects it can have on illnesses like cancer. It also is the most commonly used illegal drug in the US with over 22 million users each month. The only problem I have in writing this paper would be finding the correct information in a sea full of opinionated articles.

Response to “For Argument’s Sake”

bcbaski1

In this enlightening video, Daniel H. Cohen’s main claim is that war in argument misses out on the real benefits of engaging in active disagreement. He is claiming that there should be new types of arguments that are positive. He supports this claim by explaining that the “loser” in the argument is really the one who gains knowledge so why is he portrayed as the loser. He also explains that war in argument prevents compromise, collaboration, negotiation, and deliberation which all should be things we seek in a good arguments, but war in argument doesn’t allow for this. He says that the only outcome in this type of environment is great triumph or shameful defeat, and this is polarizing. Nothing good can come out of this type of argument, and he rightfully wants to change that.

There were many new ideas that I heard in this Ted Talk. I always believed that the winner in the argument was the one who got the opponent to believe his or her point, but now I see that the opponent or adversary is really the “winner”. They are the winner because they now have gained knowledge and new insight into something they previously did not know. Knowledge is power. I also learned that there are different types of arguments. I never really thought about arguments as performance as a type of discourse, but now that makes a lot of sense for there to be different types of arguments depending on the situation.

I do not have any counterarguments for Cohen, but I do have one question. How would you successfully have an argument without offending someone’s personal beliefs? Because it seems like in many arguments or debates, it is  very difficult to have civil discourse with a person who is not willing to even try to believe or listen to anything you are saying. It is especially difficult to argue if they have certain religious or strict beliefs that they have grown up believing.

Ideas from this video certainly have made me think about how to word my argument in my paper so that it does not come off as a “I’m right and you’re wrong” situation. I want it to be a paper that gives new information and knowledge to the person reading who may or may not agree with the topic.

“Project #2 Unit Reflection.”

bcbaski1

I felt like my writing skills did improve in project 2. Before college, I had a very hard time at writing something without getting stuck half way through. With the analysis paper, I watched my film so many times and payed such closed attention that I never got stuck in my writing. An0ther improvement was revising my paper throughout the writing process. I used to feel that I could not change my paper until I was finished, but now I feel confident in my decision to change something such as the thesis half way through my paper. I felt very prepared for this paper so everything ran smoothly; I never felt super stressed out which I have in my past papers.

This project did highlight a few areas of weakness in my writing. I noticed that when I feel super confident about a paper, and I’m writing freely, that I make careless mistakes. When I read through my rough draft, I noticed that I had many spelling errors that I missed when I was typing. I also saw punctuation errors as well that I should have fixed. Basically, I became so focused on the deeper meaning of my paper, that I completely looked over the easy components like grammar and spelling.

The most stressful part of dealing with this project was having to dig so deep into my film and constantly feeling like I was missing something. I rewatched the film too many times stressing myself out even more because I felt like I could always add something new to the paper. I successfully dealt with this stress by taking notes and making an outline on what I KNEW needed to be in the paper. I wrote the rough draft and then told myself when I was done that I could decide whether to add more. The paper ended up sounding fine to me, and I’m glad I did not add unnecessary parts of the film to my writing.

For my epilogue post, I want to remember to always check over my paper for mistakes even though I may feel confident. This is my worst habit, and I need to always remember to do it because there are so many times where I could have gotten a better grade if I would have checked for careless mistakes. I decided to check over Project 2s paper, and I am so thankful I did because I had way too many careless errors that I did not notice the first time through typing. This is an important thing I learned about my work in this unit that I want to be sure to remember.

“Op-Doc Analysis–So Far”

bcbaski1

A few important things that I have learned about analysis in this unit are that it is more in depth than I believed. I have learned that when analyzing, one does not just describe the obvious details on the surface, but he or she must explain the director’s choices, why he chose them, what they mean, and put everything together. I have learned to ask myself about rhetorical appeals and focus on how those can completely change a film. I have also learned to not have a opinion but to look at the topic objectively.

I have learned that crying is actually good for one’s health and can actually boost one’s immune system. Japanese culture has been known for seeing not crying as a virtue and the op-doc that I chose talks about changing that. Crying is seen as a weakness in adults, but this op-doc shows a teacher who is trying to change that by getting people of all ages to cry in his tears lessons.

The only area that I would say that I am struggling in is probably critical thinking. Sometimes I ask myself the obvious questions instead of the deeper more important ones