New Blog Design

Blogs should be easy to read and pleasing to look at.  Memorable blogs however will look a cut above the rest.  I remember seeing some awesome websites, and the reason I remember them was because it was unique and different.  My blog has a black background with white text.  It is different, but easy to read.  The colors that were put on the black makes the blog have life, and not just have it black and white.  The texts of my writings are also easy to read.  They are not like Comic Sans MS where it looks childish, but professional and clean.  The title of my blog “YYam’s blog” is a different font, because it shows uniqueness and some creativity and leniency.  I have also seen some websites, where they are plain and boring with a white background and black text.  It’s like reading a document meant for lawyers fighting for a case.

            Blogs should represent people’s characteristics, and I feel that my blog is an excellent representation of my characteristics and personality.  The black background gives it a mysterious look to it.  For a college classroom about rhetoric and writing, I would say that my blog is appropriate, but could use some improvements.  I feel my blog expresses my writing as well.  It gives the reader a clear picture through the clarity of the text which was white on black that gives it originality.

            I chose the new design for my blog to freshen it up.  A whiter background makes the print easy to read, and having a gray background makes it distinct.  The gray background is also to make it represent like a newspaper.  I made it look like a newspaper because that is what blogging essentially is, news, but opinionated.  I also blue in most of the text to support Penn State’s blue and white.  It goes with the motto, “I bleed blue and white.”  I chose white text over black still, because black on grey would still look like an eye sore, unlike white on gray.  A site that inspired me is Apple’s main site.  It has a gray background that is classy, which fits for an English 15 class.  It is a refreshing feel compared to the previous black background.  I also liked New York Time’s font different and it was still professional.  For my blog, I chose a more relaxed title font, because it represents my characteristics.

            The purpose to refresh for a cleaner blog is to make it easier to read and pleasing to look at.  The hyperlinks are in a distinct color difference between clicked and unclicked.  I also feel that having the background white represents something.  It represents innocence and clarity.  Cleaning up my blog makes it look nicer, and I actually have a thought process when I chose the color scheme, font, size of certain texts, as well as the width of the main article versus the side bar.

Investigative Report Blog

1.

In the study lounge in Findlay Commons, you sit at a desk noticing how people around you seem to be diligently working on their homework.  You have your laptop open, typing up a research paper for a class, and you feel you phone vibrate.  Curious, you take it out and see that it was a Facebook notification.  This starts the chain reaction, to open your browser, log onto Facebook, and see that your friend had posted a comment on your wall.  You then read other statuses, and post birthday messages to people, who you barely know.  Before you realize it, you spent ten minutes on the paper, and two hours on Facebook.  Now it’s ten o’clock at night, and you type up a paper, worthy of trash.  People often go on Facebook to check what’s new and feel that they are connected when they read other people’s post and pictures.  They often multitask homework with Facebook, and unknowingly pass the majority of the time on Facebook instead of their work.  We tend to make careless errors when we are distracted, and Facebook is the perfect distraction.  Not only is it found on your computer, it could also be on your phone, which makes it all the more distracting.  Some might even say they are addicted to Facebook, where deleting their account seems like an implausible feat.

2.

Mike George-Freshman

“I don’t use Facebook too often, just use it keep involved sometimes.”

            “Facebook is a huge distraction for some, thankfully, I don’t have this problem.”

Anonymous-age 38

            “I use Facebook to connect with my peers, as well as family.  I don’t go on it often, but I use it to keep in touch, and know what’s going on in my friends’ and families’ lives.”

3.

Facebook connects so many people together, that anything can become viral. An example would be having to pay for the service

            http://www.nbcsandiego.com/blogs/press-here/130546308.html

Something such as Facebook could start a big movement

            http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1351070/Egypt-protests-Twitter-Facebook-blocked-Government.html

Grades could possibly go down

            http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-10217704-71.html

People could seem addicted to Facebook

            http://articles.cnn.com/2009-04-23/health/ep.facebook.addict_1_facebook-page-facebook-world-social-networking?_s=PM:HEALTH

4.

I feel that I also need to talk about twitter, and other websites that distracts people on the computer.  Maybe even change the question to what causes GPA declines for students.  I want to research more about the companies of Twitter and Facebook, and see what comes up, statistically.

We are...Number One

The issue of the piece is Penn State being the number one party school, and what that title entails.  The main issue with being the number one party school is the drinking involved.  As stated, although it is part of the college experience, it has become bothersome for most people living around on campus.  Public health is a reason for the issue to be investigated.  The neighbors of the frat parties have a major problem with drunken students going to the bathroom in the lawn, littering everywhere, be loud at three in the morning, and vandalizing the streets.  The intended audience would definitely be the students at Penn State, the community, and alumni.

            A fact that was really sad was the one with the guy found dead, after falling and hitting his head after a fraternity party.  Even a death would not change the habit of college drinkers, because it was not about the amount he drank, but the fact that no one walked home with him.  It tells the audience to make sure you always help a person out, for instance when they are walking home.  A detail that explain how drinking affects the community, would be the people going to the bathroom on private property, or stealing a stop sign from a street.  There was also the example of the police stopping for girls who asked for help, and wanted a ride.  One girl ran, while the other two held the officer back telling the girl to run.  It’s these ridiculous stories that show how drunk some people are.  The students see it as a great reputation, wanting to keep it going, while the officials and community want the drinking to be toned down.

Some interviews and research that were provided offered insight of what living at State College feels like.  Although I feel that this was very bias, it is still true for most residence that the endless parties are bothersome at times.  They interviewed a wide variety of people, from sober underclassmen, to drunken students, to fraternity people, to state officials.  The interviews were very informative and relevant to the issue.  The one death was sad, and as the President of Penn State said, although it may have a little impact to the people in school, he says that the freshmen that come in would just start the cycle all over again.

There were many narrative techniques used by the creator, but the ones that stood out the most, was the use of dialogue from the interviews as well as the dialogue of the parties and what it was like to be there.  They also made it as a radio talk, not a written piece, which made the amount of audience even bigger.  It was also more affective for the listeners, because emotion could almost be felt in the voices, unlike a black and white print.  Since it was on a radio show, there were more people who listened and got something out of it.  The narrator gave points of view from everyone, even though it was mainly the people who were against drinking at Penn State.

Anne Lamott's Interesting Book Reflection

Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird was an interesting story to read.  The part that sticks out the most for me would be her advice to tell writers to always keep writing and make sure you write it down.  For most, as I recall from the book, we have voice in our heads that dictates to us of what we should write, and it also tells us what to not write.  Lamott’s advice of just pushing through all of your writing, and then revising it later, really helped me in a way that I will later use in my writings.  Her stance on saying that it is okay to write a “shitty first draft”  really opened my eyes of not just writing what is right on paper, one sentence at a time, but put it all on paper first, and then reorganize later so nothing is lost.  What I liked most about Lamott’s book, was her writing style.  Although at times she could be slow and drawn out, she makes the reading fun and enjoyable for any mature reader with some jokes here and there.

Another thing that Bird by Bird has taught me is to know the purpose of writing.  Sometimes, it might just be for a dull scientific paper, but Lamott has taught me that casual writing is also important too.  She says that writing is because of the spirit and heart, which gave me the idea that when one writes, it should not only be for finishing a homework assignment, but also give your writing nurture, and take time to write it.  I really liked in the end, where she gave her class advice of how to make up a story.  She told her class about writing about someone, and also lie for most of the time, such as having a friend who had a priest, and the friend wanted to write about how bad he was.  Lamott’s suggestion was to emphasize some points and then she added something to protect the writer as a joke, such as writing that he had a small you know what.

I like how Anne Lamott can smoothly change from being funny to also being serious at the same time.  She tells the reader her life experiences, even the sad ones that really make an impact on the reader.  For example, the one baby that died, and Lamott talked about it on the radio.  Or another one would be the story where a boy needed a night to think about donating blood, and that the innocence of the boy was that he thought he had to die to save his younger sister’s life, and he still agreed to it the next day.  I felt that that was the most affective part in the book to bring the reader’s emotions into play.  Lamott was then able to smoothly bring the reader back to casual reading afterwards, and I feel like it was a well-executed skill Lamott has.

Another part that I liked in the book was the chapter of the Polaroid.  Her analogy was clever saying how you don’t really know what exactly what your writing will be yet, but you will slowly see it develop as you write.  This really helped me in the process of my writing, and I feel that I will use this process in my writings from now on.  Thanks to Anne Lamott’s book of Bird by Bird, I feel that I have already become a better writer.

Analysis of Shirt-Worthy

            After reading Shirt-Worthy, my critique of this writer's short story is that is has a purpose that is very well written.  He started with a comment that relates to the title, which grabs the attention of the reader wanting to read more.  He then had a flashback to when he was boy, and talked about how he borrowed a shirt from his older brother.  He then transitioned smoothly into a later date, where he had a child, and his son wanted a Ramones T-shirt.  He perfectly executed a reference to the past of the store, Hot Topic, which he explained that he wasn't thinking he was above it, and referenced that he never had a reason to go in using a metaphor of parallelism.

            He also used common allusions, such as telling the reader he isn't a “cool detached person” who doesn't know what a Hot Topic store is.  I liked how the structure of his story was, from a flashback, working its way to the present.  Although there was no super high tension, the climax of this short story was when his ten year old son ripped his new shirt at a cookout.  That was when one of the messages of the story came out with the phrase, “No, you just made it better.”  The point that the writer was trying to make was that getting the same thing as the guy next to you would just be boring, originality and faults makes one unique.  It ties into the main message of having any plain “shirt” is worthless, if there was no background to it.

            The writer also tells the reader an analogy of those words of wisdom to a ten year old kid, is like telling a person given a math problem when they are in quicksand in need of help.  This analogy was to tell the reader, that the kid wants to hear that he'll get a new shirt, not words of wisdom that only adults can appreciate.  That's why the father's resolution was to buy his son a new shirt in the end, and keep the snug ripped shirt to wear himself.  This message also brings me back to the beginning where just getting a shirt from a store versus getting a shirt after a concert as a souvenir, the latter has sentimental value, and is special to the person who bought it, which is why the writer mentioned that he only borrowed his brother's shirt.  The shirt that his son ripped however, was about to go to waste anyway, and he took it for himself to wear, which gave him a reason to wear his own Ramones shirt.

            His intended audience was probably for any mature person who feels lost in material objects.  It could be for anyone as well, but it would be like the analogy the author used with a quicksand victim.  I particularly like how he wrote his story in order.  I feel like I will use a similar format when I write my memoir, and try to incorporate his techniques for writing, such as using analogies and including some dialogue.

And the Award goes to...

It was just another usual day in fifth grade, wake up, go to play on the playground for half an hour, and then class.  Midway through, we have our lunch break, which was only about thirty minutes.  The lunchroom was a gym, auditorium, and a place to eat.  To a elementary school student, it seemed humongous with a cargo net in the back, and twenty-four wooden tables that extend from the wall.  I bought my lunch as usual, and sat down with my friends and classmates.  It was a small group of twenty-five or so students.  Then something out of the ordinary happened.  The principal, my fifth grade teacher, as well as other teachers were up at the foot of the stage.

They had an announcement to make to the class.  There was an award for "The Most Improved Student," which was for someone in the lunchroom.  The teacher slowly narrowed it down until it was only the twenty-five students in my class.  One of the kids, being the most popular, was expected to be the winner, with him seemingly being the obvious choice, and all twenty-four of the other students, even me, thought it was him.  My teacher narrowed it down to a boy, so now everyone was certain it had to be the popular kid.  The teacher said my name, which was a shock to most, even me, and I was astonished.  I would have never imagined that I was the most improved, and yet, it was me.  My classmates gave me the applause, and I was thrilled.  It was basically the first major award I remember.

So after I happily finished my lunch, I went back to class and my teacher told me what the award consisted of.  He also told me that he and my fourth grade teacher talked about how I got the award this year, and my fourth grade teacher was a little bit jealous.  To get my award, I was a going to a lunch banquet with my parents, teacher, principal, and the person who gave out the award.  He is part of the Rotary Club and also the manager of the bank in town.  They gave me a fifty dollar check, the award, and a free lunch!  It was also put in the local newspaper, and everything was very professional.

It was one of the most memorable school lunches that I have had, with me unexpectedly being the winner of an award, and also getting some money out of it.  I was astonished, and my classmates patted me on my back, and congratulated me.  This basically initiated my pursuit for academic success, which really picked up during seventh grade where I went from being an average B student, to an average A student.  After seventh grade, I continued to do well in school, and I think that that one lunch really made a difference for me.  It was the last push up the hill to have the ball start rolling down the path of academic success. 

Me? As a writer?

Think about your past experiences as a writer and rhetor. What are two of your strengths as a writer and rhetor? What are two of your writing weaknesses? Specifically, how would you like to improve as a writer? What could you do or learn to make such improvements? How do you anticipate that this particular course will help you improve as a writer and rhetor?

Before I begin to answer the prompt seen above, let me introduce myself. My name is Yee-Kuen Yam, but I prefer to be called Jacky. I speak up to three languages at home to my family, at the same time, so that might be why I dislike English classes (no offense!) and also why I am horrible at writing. This is the first time I'm using Blogger, and so far, it seems easy enough to get started.

After just reading part of Bird by Bird, it has really opened my mind as to how I should write. I've had very few strengths when it comes to writing, I always remember waiting until the day before a paper is due, to start. A strength that I have would be being able to write with a guideline. Knowing where to start, how to follow through, as well as how to end it, gives me an imaginary highway to cruise on. Another strength that I have at my disposal when writing, is being able to remember everything I need in my head, and start typing all of it down, without forgetting too many things. It might not be a true strength, but better than nothing!

My weaknesses; where to begin. Being multilingual, I would say that I have a hard time finding the right words to express what I need to. The papers that I hand in would almost always have corrections on them when the teachers hand it back to me. Whether the issue was using too many of the same words, or having a few grammatical errors, I would say that my writing always has some sort of error in it, no matter how many times I review it. Another issue with my writing would probably be that I am not concise enough. Seeing my friends' written work sometimes, they always seem to have superior skills, and I guess this is where the saying, "the grass is always greener on the other side" would be appropriate. They always have short, well developed sentences, while mine seem long and diluted in comparison. Although I have weaknesses, I know that I have to push through them, in order to become a better writer.

What inspires me to write, which is not often, would most likely be songs. One example would be the song Lighters by Rocye da 5'9" featuring Bruno Mars and Eminem. This song motives and pushes me to go further in everything I do, even writing. Another inspiration, which is pretty childish, would definitely be the movie, Ratatouille. The major theme of anyone can do anything, really inspires me to do anything I want, even write.

Improvements that I hope to see after taking English 15, would be for me to write in a more clear and concise manner, as well as expand the use of my vocabulary. I know that improving my writing skills will be no easy task, but after reading some of Bird by Bird and Norton Field Guide to Writing, I feel like the task seems reachable now. I anticipate that this course will actually make me a better writer, and perhaps even making me want to write.

Hope I didn't bore you too much!