Literacy Narrative

     For my portfolio I have decided to revise our first paper we wrote in this class, the literacy narrative. In this revision piece I am working on improving organization and ideas of my previous paper. I have chosen this paper as the one I want to revise because I think it is the one paper that I think I could really develop more on and turn in a better outcome than before.

     One of my traits of good writing that I want to improve is organization. This is because one of the main comments you wrote on my final draft was to organize the timeline of events better and collapse the time spread of events in my story. Another trait is the ideas in my paper. I feel like their are so many more things I can add into this narrative to make the story more vivid and have more of an effect on the readers about my reading experiences. I know, I now know way more about the good traits of writing than I did at the beginning of the year and I think I can make this paper a great edition to my portfolio.

Jane Goodall: Plagiarize

                 Jane Goodall a lot more than one sentence, she plagiarized lines and lines of information and wording from various websites that she continuously failed to cite, which is not okay. Goodall’s book, Seeds of Hope, about her love and knowledge of plants. Or what we thought was her knowledge.  In the article Goodall writes, “I have spent a lifetime loving plants, even though I have never studied them as a scientist.” Using other sources information is alright to use, but you must cite it.

                Although Steven Levingston writes that some authors accidentally plagiarize from co-authors, time, and the web, it still does not give writers an excuse. Even if Jane Goodall’s plagiarizing situation was an accident she and her co-authors still need to fix their mistake and give citations where needed. I think she should give citations for all the webs’ information, paraphrase the information, or just take it out altogether and do her own research in her own words to fix this problem. I think the situation became more serious when reporters wrote that she plagiarized more than a couple of lines. Plagiarizing a lot of the information in a book without citing is very serious.

Nervous Conditions Next Year

               I think Nervous Conditions by Tsitsi Dangaremdga should be included in the 2013-2014 freshman class curriculum. How do community and culture shape who we are? This is our overall course question throughout the year and has something to do with everything we learn and read. Reading this book is crucial if you keep this same question and guide through the class.

                Nervous Conditions shows the different culture in African communities in the 1900s. This book shows the diffusion of Shona and English culture and what it does to people and also the sexist and inequality ways in their culture at that time. Leaving this story out of the class would make the research question harder to answer without the knowledge and experiences we learned from reading Nervous Conditions.

                In all of the books we have read this year, they all have to do with community and culture. Nation, a book we read for summer reading, has experiences of diffusion of culture and getting along with different people. In Lord of the Flies, the boys on the island have to learn to accommodate with a new community and way of living with people they do not know and Nervous Conditions is basically all about culture and community and how it affects who someone is and how they act.

                In closing, I would like to say that without Nervous Conditions in next year’s plan, you will have to either change the overall question or find another book that answers, how community and culture shape who we are.

Free Post

     A couple of weekends ago I visited the Baton Rouge Arts Market downtown. The arts market is apart of the Red Stick Farmers market that they have every weekend, but the art is only the first Saturday of every month. It was surprisingly really interesting and all of the artists I met were really cool. Throughout the market they have all kinds of art such as jewelery, stationary, pottery, quilts, glassware, and so much more.
     I had to interview artists at the market for my art history paper. The two artists I met were Sid Gale and Diane Lewis. Lewis weaves baskets from pine needles and Gale make recycled art out of "junk". As I talked to them it was really cool to hear their stories and their passion for the art they create. I really enjoyed the Arts Market it was a good way to spend my Saturday morning.

Expectations

     In Nervous Conditions readers can clearly see the change in how Tambu acts from when she is at the mission and then when she goes back to the homestead. In my life I have many places which depending on where I am at I will act differently. The two main places where I have a major change in behavior would be at school and a home, the same as Tambu.
     When I am at school I try to be focused in class and just work on school work. I am kind of quiet and shy because I am not comfortable with everyone in all my classes. I feel like I am there to do the work and studies and then when I get home I change. Once I get home I am way more comfortable and can do mostly what I want. There aren't all of the rules and schedules to follow, I just do things as I please. As I said before at school I pretty shy and at home I'm the complete opposite. I don't know why it's just where and who I am with changes the way I act.

Reading/Work Times

Nervous Conditions:
Mon. Chapter 5- 47 min. 22 pages
Wed. Chapter 6- 7 min. 3 pages
                           13 min. 6 pages
                           12 min. 6 pages
                           10 min. 4 pages
                           11 min. 5 pages

C layer projects:
Wed. Vocabulary Test- 32 min.
Thurs. Character Bookmark- 25 min.

Nyasha

     My mom and dad are so annoying. They don't understand if we go to England for that long and live in the English ways I am now accustomed to the England behavior. Why can't anyone understand that? It is their fault for the way I act, they are the ones that made me go. I call myself a hybrid, half shona and half English. My father and mother get mad at me for everything talking back to them, talking to boys, the way I dress, and even reading. Yes, I said reading.
     My cousin Tambu just came to live with us and I guess she's cool, but she still has a lot to learn about how my family really is and her new world. My father beat me the other night because I was being "disrespectful" to him. I was so scared and I swear I thought he was gonna kill me. I've been going through a pretty hard time, but I think Tambu saved me.
    

C Layer Evaluation

     For my C layer projects I chose to do the guided questions for each chapter, the vocabulary test, and the character bookmark. I actually like doing the question for each chapter because it helps me reflect on what I just read and then I understand the chapters better. The character bookmark let me put all the characters on the table and make the important information needed to know for each character.The vocabulary test was tedious because I had to go back and forth on dictionary.com and find all the vocabulary throughout the book.
     For the next set of  C layer projects I am doing the questions again because I think the really help me with my reading. After C layer the projects get a little more complex so I will have to really focus and work hard to get the grade I want. These layered projects are better because everyone can pick what they want to do and what they are better at doing.