The Magazine Reflection!

I learned some very valuable writing techniques and tips such as the use of punctuation and I also found that drafting is way more useful than I thought it was. I also learned that keeping it simple is the best way to do it, at first I wanted to put a lot of big words in it so that it would sound intelligent but my writing got so much better when I made them simpler. I was one of those people who went for the minimum and just chose to do their photo essay or interview, regardless I think it was a really good story and it is very interesting. I think I was one of the most creative when it comes to storyline. I thoroughly enjoyed writing it and I think that others will enjoy it. But the truth is that I feel like when I wrote it no one liked it because it was different, as though because it was not an informative piece of writing it was wrong. But then again, it’s getting published in a real book.

Magazine Reflection Take Two!

1. Overall, when you think about the big picture of your writing, what improved? How did it get better? Why?

The way that I approach my writing, I learned that if I want my writing to be good and professional I need to stop writing for myself and start writing for an audience. I’m not the best at it yet, but I’m getting there.

2. Overall, when you think about the big picture of your writing, what still needs work? What do you think will help you improve? Why?

Grammar. My paper had to go through so many drafts and the things that would usually come up where grammar mistakes. I would use the wrong “where” or the sentence would be off because of something.

3. Specifically, show us something that improved and describe the path it took to get better. You can quote your article, your drafts, link to evidence, etc.

When I made my first draft I wanted to make it very “smart.” So I started to fill it up with very large words that I did not need. I started using things like “He wanted to be inconspicuous.” Randy gave us lessons on how to make our writing better, one of these lessons was how you should keep It simple and not use jargon. This is when I realized that I did not need these large and smart sounding words to make my writing sound good.

4. Describe something specific (or a few things!) that you learned about writing.

I learned that I use big words when I should not. They are unnecessary and they confuse people. It is better to keep is simple.

Magazine Reflection: the beginning

What went well?
i had great editors and that helped my piece of writing, which was not very good. with all the editing that went on my writing improved a lot.

Challenges
my writing did not connect with Internship hardly at all. no one saw how it was related so i had to add on some paragraphs connecting it with my internship immersion.­­­­­­­

Obama a socialist?

I don’t think hes a socialist. I think that even know the media has been exploiting the fact that “Obama was endorsed in 1996 by the Chicago branch of the Democratic Socialists of America for Illinois state senate” and there is other “evidence” that he has socialist ideas.
I think that he is just a guy who wants the best for his country and even though his ideas are too “spread the wealth around” and other of his ideas are socialist sounding, I don’t think they are; a little leftist? Maybe, but not socialist.
Greg Pason of the National Secretary of the Socialist Party said
“A socialist program (even a reformist one) would not be a program that props up capitalism when it fails, but one that transforms the economy. None of Senator Obama's proposals do that.”

Photo Essay

A long, long time ago in the not so distant future lived a peculiar creature. This creature was moss green and deep purple and resembled a swamp monster. Some people would say that this creature was indeed a monster made to destroy and when it got especially angry, kill. This was widely accepted by people all around. This creature called itself “Jack” for he did not like his real name; Pneumonia. He did not understand why it started with a P, and thus the main reason he hated it. Jack never slept, he was always on the move. Killing and weakening innocent people that had never done anything to him. He considered this a sport and enjoyed it thoroughly, it ran in his DNA.

One especially beautiful sunny day Jack got bored and decided to go make someone’s life miserable. Now we must understand that Jack was extremely strong and dangerous. So he set out looking for a tired, overworked victim that he could take down easily. He roamed around for several days until he got to what seemed to be a church. Jack arrived at a very large tan two story building with a brown roof. He went in search for people. After a while of searching he discovered that the main office was upstairs and there were several people inside. There he spotted a middle aged man with long-ish hair and a scraggily chin slaving over large quantities of work at his desk. “This is the perfect specimen” he thought. He soon discovered that this man was called by the name of Matt. But then the man got up and moved to a larger room downstairs where he proceeded to take a stringed instrument and play soft tunes but soon got distracted with his electronic device called a phone.


Jack saw that this was the perfect time to sneak up and attack the un-expecting victim. He did not want anyone to notice him, so with his cunning strength and stealthy abilities he snuck up and pounced on him, delivering a blow that could shatter bone to the lungs that caught the victim off guard “KA- POW!” Matt started coughing and fell to the floor moaning. Matt felt so weak and he passed out for what seemed like ages, although he knew it was only seconds.


Matt spent several seconds on the floor regaining his composure, for he had not realized what was happening to him. All he knew was that one minute he was doodling with his cell phone and another moment he was on the floor and his lungs felt like they were burning up. Coughing on the floor he looked around and saw the monster. That moment he what had just happened to him, he was already very tired but he knew that he must fight!
So Matt, with a start, got on his feet and then they started to fight. They fought for many days and many nights. It was a tiring and gruesome battle.
After several days of fighting, Matt was weary and very, very tired. Jack was also very tired but he was confident that he would be victorious. Matt was so tired that he could not come in to work for about 4 days. Jack thought he was victorious
But Matt had something that Jack did not…the element of sleep. When Matt slept, he would regain energy and hence he was able to fight, this would help him not only to be able to get up and fight but it allowed him to fight better. So one evening after getting a full night of uninterrupted sleep, Matt launched a full scale attack on Jack. This time Jack was the one who was overwhelmed and soon started to lose the fight. Jack had never felt fear before but this was different, he was losing faster than he had ever lost before. He was desperate to win. He was so desperate that he started to make mistakes, these mistakes proved to be fatal. After a few more days of fighting matt was able to find an opening and killed Jack…or so he thought. Jack can never die, but Matt was able to scare him so bad that he left Matt alone for a long time after that.

1. What article(s) would you like to write for the magazine? What photography could you contribute? Art? List three different ideas for your major contribution.

if i have to write an article, i would like to possibly do a short article on internships and the importance of them.
i would also be interested in submitting my photo essay, because it is funny, clever and my pictures will be rad when they are finished.

2. Suggest at least one (or more) possible title for the magazine. This could be a title with or without a subtitle. For example, I work for UnBoxed: a Journal of Adult Learning in Schools.

HTHMA: The Real Us

3. Suggest a topic for an article that you were personally like to read in a magazine inspired by the internship semester.
Why internships are so great.

What did you learn at Internship?

I learned some things about myself. I found that I do not want to have a desk job that involves staring at a computer all day. I think it is just very boring and I don't think I could handle that for long periods of time. Also, I just don’t have the attention span to do that and I also get antsy.
I also found out that I enjoy recording and music involved activities very much. And through my internship I discovered that I would like to pursue recording in college and as a career.
I think that this internship was a very valuable experience because I found out that I do not want to do that for a job and I could have discovered that the hard way and used much more of my time in that work place as opposed to only two weeks. I am very glad I discovered these things about myself before it was too late.

Internship Immersion!!!

1. What are you most excited about in regards to your immersion experience? Why do you feel this way?

To be honest, I am excited about the fact that I wont be coming to school for two weeks. I am also excited because I will be having a taste of the real world and what people that actually work do, this makes me excited and uncomfortable at the same time. Although my project is challenging, I can’t wait to see if I can do it and when I do, see how it all plays out.

2. What are you most concerned about (what causes the most stress) regarding immersion? Why do you feel this way?

I am nervous for my project. I don’t know if my project will be a little over my head. But I think that if I pace myself and don’t goof off then I will be able to do it. I hope that I am also a little nervous because we will be having homework to do on top of our immersion work and I think it will be hard for me to balance those, I think that after work I will just want to go outside and play and not even think about homework but I wont because I have homework.

The Progressive era

Workers & Working Conditions

In the progressive era the working conditions were not good but slowly got better. There where rules that were set in place so that workers would have a good work place and they would be safe but these were largely ignored.

One example where the working conditions where poor because the employers did not enforce the safety rules was the triangle shirtwaist fire. The triangle shirtwaist fire was a big deal because the employers violated the law because they looked the doors and the workplace had poor working conditions.

After the fire, people got angry and went to court. The owners of the company did not get in trouble but after the lawsuit was over the laws making the work place better started to get enforced.

Freedom

In this time period, freedom of the people was challenged and it was also granted in some areas. One area where freedom was in 1919 when prohibition was set into place: the making, selling, or transporting alcohol became illegal.
An area where freedom was granted was when in 1920, women were allowed to vote.

Outstanding Blogz

1- Economic advice to Obama

I think that Ana Forsythe had a very good blog for “Economic advice to Obama”. I enjoyed it because the ides portrayed where very original, I had never thought about them as even an option and they were also very interesting.
“My advice to you would be to create more Green Jobs that would put Americans back to work in a secure work field.”
I also like how she connected it to Franklin Roosevelt: “Franklin Roosevelt's responsibilities during the Great Depression are very similar to the responsibilities you take on today”

2- Literary analysis

For literary analysis i liked Diana Barlow’s blog.
I like the analysis of that she made in her blog titled “A thousand splendid suns” I thought that it was very good and I like the part where she said “The biggest symbol in the story is the title “A Thousand Splendid Suns” where it refers to a poem in which the city of Kabul was described as having a thousand splendid suns, and also used as a symbol for Mariam. The reason for that is because after Mariam gave up her life for Laila to live out hers, Laila realizes that Mariam is still looking out for her and her family as she always has been. “Mariam is in Laila's own heart, where she shines with the bursting radiance of a thousand suns.”” I like this because I can see that she really understood the book and she looked for the meanings and symbolism of the aspects of this book.

3- Historical writing

I also liked the historical writing in Diana Barlow’s blog. I thought it was interesting how she linked her advice to Obama blog to civil rights, “The beginnings of black education occurred during the Civil Rights Movements in Virginia.” I don’t think many people linked their Obama blog to this topic.

4- Anything else that makes blogs good?

Pictures and visual tidbits make blogs fun to look at.