Patterns of Error

1) I need to be more concise: In my writing, I tend to be more wordy than is necessity to complete a writing assignment, in particular,  I tend to repeat some of my ideas throughout my writing, which causes my papers to be longer than needed. By wordy, I mean that I typically use more words and sentences to explain my ideas than is needed and this has an effect on the readers by that they get confuse on what I trying to saying in my paper. Also I tend to repeat myself a lot in my papers, which also confuses the readers and doesn't allow my paper to flow. I know this is very difficult for me to pay attention to and to fix because I do this a lot in my papers, but when I do revisions on my papers, I need to pay closer attention to what I am saying in my papers so as to make sure I am not repeating myself and I am not using more words to explain my ideas than is needed.

2) I need to organize my ideas better: As stated before, my papers sometimes aren't organize as well as I want them to be. This is because I either repeat my ideas several times in my paper or that I didn't put key important ideas in the beginning of my paper and the non-important ideas at the end. By repeating, I mean that I repeat ideas I have stated before in other body paragraphs in paragraphs that don't relate to them, which confuses the readers by that there are multiple ideas in one paragraph. Also, sometimes I don't organize my paper the best way. I state the less important ideas first and the more important last or I don't put the most important idea right in the middle of my paper and the readers wouldn't understand what I am trying to say. To fix this, I need to make sure that the most important ideas are place right in the middle of my paper and my ideas goes from most important to less important. Also I need to pay attention to what I am writing in my paragraphs so that I am not repeating myself.

3) I need to work on basic writing skills: By this, I mean sentence structures, noun-adjective match, fragment or run-on sentence and others. By my final draft, these problems are mostly fixed, but still there are some that I don't see that make it to my final draft. I typically don't have fragments in my paper, but I do sometimes have run-on or comma splices. I also mixes up the noun-adjective relationship. I sometimes use singular adjective for plural nouns or vice versa. The effects of this is that the readers will become confuse because they don't know who I am talking about. They also will think that I am not a good writer because I have fragments, run-on or comma splices in my paper and that I can't do revisions on my paper. The solution to this is again paying more attention to what I am writing. Using Microsoft word, I won't have problems with fragments and noun-adjective relationship because they are flagged. I just need to review basic writing skills in general because I feel that is my biggest problem when I write in general and  if I don't have the basic writing skills down, I will always have problems when I write.

Peer Review

The effectiveness of the peer review we do in class is decent. In these sessions, the reviewers of my papers have given me ways of how to fix my paper, what are the strengths of my paper and its weakness. I have gotten feedback on everything from my papers. These sessions have helped me see the mistakes I don't see when I do my own revision on my paper. Lastly, these sessions have made me see that no matter how good or bad you think your writing or draft is, there is always something that is good and something that needs help. The only way I see that the peer review we do in the class can be improve is by if we could have two reviewers for our people because everyone pay attention to different things.

My strengths as a peer reviewer is that I always can see what the writer of the paper I am looking over is trying to do in their paper. I can see another point of view that the writer can talk about in their paper if they want to. I can see the best way of organizing someone's paper and I can see the small mistakes that someone can make in their own paper that I sometimes can't see in my own paper. Also I can spot run-on and fragment sentences.

My weaknesses as a peer reviewer is sometimes I put too much into something, that I over-think what the writer is trying to show or say in their paper. Also sometimes I am not as tough as I should be when I review someone's paper and lastly, when I am reviewing a paper, I sometimes talk to the writer about random stuff and don't fully pay attention to the person's paper.

My ideal peer review process is that I write my paper first before any one looks over it. After I have written a first draft, I do my only edits and after I finish the errors that I have seen in my paper, then someone can look over it. At this point, I would like at least two people to review my paper because the more people who can look over my paper, the better my paper can be because everyone pays attention to different things. After I fix the mistakes the reviewers have spotted, we should have another peer review session with different people to see how better or worse our papers have become. This is my ideal peer review process.

With the review process we have used so far in our class, I do find it helpful to have a peer review session in the early stages of the writing process because then you have time to make sure the way you are going with the paper is correct and you don't have to worry about wasting more time on the essay by way of redoing the whole thing compare to just changing a few sentences, paragraphs or the way the paper is organized. I find it better to have small groups because then you don't have a lot of people of telling you stuff and you can allow your reviewer more time to look over your paper. Large groups are good when you are first starting the writing process because then you can see how everyone is perceiving the essay prompt. I feel the amount of time we spend on peer review session is decent, but I would like another day or two so that everyone can have another peer review session with another student because I feel the more eyes you have looking over your paper, the better your paper can be.

Communication is Power (#9)

I know many people will write about whatever they want for this blog assignment, but I won't. I am not going to write about something, I am going to write a poem to show my topic. If we have the freedom to write about anything this time, we should also have the freedom to choose the way we write our blog as well.  So here i go.

Who said language equals power?

For the matter of fact,

Who said proper English equals power?

In this world, we all each have our own dilate, our own slang.

We each have our own accent.

Who said we need to speak and write proper English?

I can see how that view became,

But why?

Yes, if we all speak and write in the same language,

We can all communicate with each other,

But we communicate with one another before proper English,

Before any language.

We spoke by using our bodies, our faces, our expressions.

We could have communicated how we are feeling just by how we smile.

So who said proper English equals power?

I do agree that language equals power,

I disagree that we all need to speak and write proper English to have power.

We shouldn’t be afraid to speak, to express ourselves,

By way of any language we have.

So speak,

Tell people what is on your mind,

Show who you really are.

Don’t be afraid of people making fun of you

For how you speak or write.

Don’t go back to your shell,

For it is the people who do speak and write proper English that should be afraid.

They know that if we can communicate,

With our broken English,

With our simple English,

With our ethnic accent,

That we will then have power,

For proper English doesn’t equal power.

Even language doesn’t equal power.

What truly equals power is communication.

And that,

Is true power.

So let’s go out and show the world who really has the power.

College Drop Out

The argument that Charles Murray is stating in his article is that having a bachelor degree shouldn’t be a job qualification. He first started with president Obama’s two ideas for improving post-secondary education by expanding the use of community colleges and tuition tax credits. Then he suggests a battle cry for president Obama on education. The battle cry is “ it’s what you can do that should count when you apply for a job, not where you learned to do it.” Mr. Murray ‘s argument is that he feels that having a bachelor degree shouldn’t be a job qualification, for that many youths don’t have the intellectual ability to do college-level work they need to do in college. He stated that 10% to 20% of all 18 year olds can absorb the material in their parents’ old college textbooks. He also states that many college students don’t want to success in rigorous liberal arts or are too dumb to get through college. That a century ago, these students would have gone to work right after high school, but now need to have additional skills and treat college as vocational training, not a journey of learning. As Charles Murray continues his article, he talks about how colleges have adapted to the new time by expanding the range of courses and other oriented majors, but we still keep the bachelor degree as the measure of job preparedness, as the smallest requirement to get a job even for a job that doesn’t require a bachelor. He says discarding the bachelor degree wont be hard. The solution would be to use certification tests to provide evidence that someone has the skills needed for a job or to show work samples of a person’s work. The benefits of getting rid of the bachelor degree as a job qualification are huge for both employers and job applicants. Certifications would tell employers more about the applicants and many people can get the right job for them without going back to school for a degree. Also having certifications exams would even the playing field for everyone. Everyone would now be depended on their skills and not their degree(s). So in conclusion, the best way to summarize Charles Murray’s article is the battle cry he stated in the beginning, “It’s what you can do that should count when you apply for a job, not where you learned to do it.”

The reason why I chose the article I did is because the title caught my attention. I wanted to know why the author called the article Should the Obama Generation Drop Out? I wanted to read all of the articles but this article got my attention the most compare to the other two. I knew that the author was going to talk about education, specify about college education, but I didn't know what exactly he was going to talk about. I wanted to know why he was thinking that my generation and the generation after me should drop out of college. I wanted to know what exactly he was going to talk about for that I am right now in college, debating on where I should end my academic career and if I should go get a Phd.  I don't think that this article will have any affect on me but, who knows. It could later on in life after I get my bachelor.  Lastly, I also didn't know what Obama view on education was and this article gave me some insight on his views. So that is why I chose the article that I did.