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Danielle Heck

9-21-2010

Today we had a trying class. People were confused and lost on what to do. We are all frustrated and trying to figure out what to do to make this class more easy and effective for everyone. We were seeing comments written to people that were not so much as bad advice as it was spite full. The comments were helpful but the way the tone was written, it seemed to strike nerves. We also are trying our hand at learning about Earth Democracy. I found some interesting sites that helped me learn some backround information about it.

Here are the pages:

http://www.earthlight.org/2002/essay47_democracy.html 

http://www.navdanya.org/earth-democracy

Continued on 9/21/2010

So, I was listening to music and I came across a song that I have not heard in a while. i love this song and i feel like it connects to my life right now. So I thought I would share it with you guys. :)

9/28/2010

Today we were talking and someone brought up a viedo. The name of it reminded me of this viedo that i was obsessed about when i was younger. I liked it so much and i felt it was so powerful. So here it is, i want you to watch it.

9/28/2010 (continued)

: / Well today we were going over blogs and finding our groups. I am about half here right now. I am trying to focus but i just seem that i just can not. Things have been buzzing arouond in my head all day. It all starts with the divorce of my parents. After 20 years of marriage my parents decided to split. So in june (right before i came to school) my parents made the divorce final. Well my dad got this girlfriend, her name is Kimberly but she likes to be called "kimmy." Now she is a nice person but I was not use to having a women other than my mom or myself in his life. I am really trying, truley i am. I see that she makes him happy, and i love to see him happy. Though i always get this nagging feeling that sooner or later "kimmy" is going to take a precedence over me. That became aparent to me today. About a week ago "kimmy" decided to move to New York to go live with her daughter. Now i knew my dad was thinking about going up there to visit her... THEN i got this email from her.

"hello girl,, sorry, I thought you didnt want to talk to me,, Its about your dad,, I want your honest opinion on him coming to NY to stay with me, I know that you will always be his baby girl, and he values what you have to say,, dad and i, are great friends, we talk everyday since i left to come live with my daughter,, i didnt leave him, because of him,, i left to be with my daughter after 9 yrs of being away,, it was about time i came home,, I think Steve will love it up here, if he can get past the cold weather,,ha ha, I know that he feels he is abandoning his kids,, but you both have your own lives now that you have grown up,, He needs someone to love and take care of him,, needs companie,, I know that he will always love your mom, and that is good,,, so i want to know what you think of him coming up here,, thank you for talking to me, love Kim"

WELL TO START WITH.... YOUR GRAMMER SUCKS!! Instead of periods she uses a bunch of commas. Ugh! Another thing, MOVING/STAYING. I know she did not just ask me to tell my dad to move to New York with her. Just because i do not live at home anymore and that I am going to school does NOT mean that I am foraging my one life without him. The way she is talking it makes me think she is calling me selfish. That I AM the one who has to tell my dad to go. WHY ME??? Why do i have to be the one to tell him to go? I am so lost. I have no idea what to tell her. Half of me wants to tell her FUCK OFF, and the other half wants to say WHATEVER. It should not be my choice, but his. Why do i need to convince him to go. If he wants to go, then he will.

Metadiscourse (Prof Connor Told Us to Type It)

9/30/2010

Blog About the Chapters We had to Read:

     Writing to convince is one of the biggest writing styles. When using convincing in college papers the biggest element that will be used in the paper is persuasiveness. When you do a persuasive paper you have to have evidence to back up your claim. You use persuasive writing in life all the time. For example you use it when you are trying to convince someone to buy a certain item. You use examples and facts about the product to make it more appealing to the person. There are all types of persuasive topics mayors, presidents; as well as school board officials use persuasive speeches and papers. They do this in order to show people why they should sit with them or vote for them in the next election. There are some considerations when you are writing a persuasive paper. One element is audience; you want to make sure your paper is geared to the right age groups. You would not sell anti aging cream to teenagers and you would not sell toys to adults. You want your piece, whatever it is to appeal to the right crowd. Another element is purpose; this is when you make sure that your audience knows your claim. It also means you are trying to convince them to take your side. A big element is voice and tone, this is use to make sure you are trying to make a connection with your audience. When you are trying to convince someone to take your view you do not want to have a mad or angry tone because that may turn off your potential supporter. You would more than likely want to have a personal or persuasive tone. The biggest element is context, you could have the best issue in the world but if you do not know what you are talking about then it does not matter. Your audience needs to be convinced that you know what you are talking about. The quality of a good persuasive essay is a collection of different things. Presentation of the issue is very important; you have to make sure your audience knows what you are trying to convince them about. A clear claim is just as important, this ensures the reader that you know you have an issue with your topic. An awareness of audience is important because your job for writing a persuasive essay is to convince the reader to take your side in the issue. So when you write your essay you want to make sure the audience you are trying to get the attention to will be able to read it. Convincing reasons are yet another important element. You need these because in order to effectively convince your reader to get involved with your issue you have to know everything about your topic. You have to be an expert of your topic or issue. You also need an honest discussion of the other views, this shows you are not bias but that you stand on a certain side of an issue. In the article "our own warrior princess" it talks about a woman who is brave and just like a warrior princess. This article was written to convince me that Jennifer was a hero and a life saver to her uncle. It had a lot of different elements that are used in persuasive essays. For one it had a good use of emotion towards the reader. The author was singing praises about this woman that it made me feel even proud of her and I do not even know her. This is what a persuasive paper is suppose to do, convince you to share the idea even if you know or knew nothing about it before the essay.

This chapter goes over the foundation to start writing an amazing persuasive essay. This is the most used type of essays that are written in college. When you are going to write a persuasive essay you have to remember all the elements so you are able to complete a paper worth convincing.

Writing to analyze, this is like taking a issue and splitting it up into different categories so you can see what is important enough to write more about. For example I your writing about abortion, you could spit it up into types of abortions, what can happen when you get an abortion, who gets abortions, or even why people get abortions. Then once you analyze what you have split up sometimes you can go further. Such as, Types of abortions, you can go through and pick out one and write all about that type of abortion. When you analyze something you come to understand it more. This is because you have broken down the topic so much you know everything there is to know, you know every angle. When you write an analysis you have to make close observations about your topic. This makes it so you write your analysis in your own words and ideas. You have knowledge of your topic but it is what you get out of the observations that you write about. You do analysis in your every day to day life as well. For example, when you decide to wake up in the morning or when you decide what you want to eat for breakfast, you make choices and subconsciously dissect your options. The qualities of effective analytical writing help you and your readers better understand what you are writing and what you want point you want to come across. Every subject will have many parts that will come together to interact with one another to help further explain your subject. You have to first break down your subject into parts so you can figure out how to explain your subject better. Then you have to present your parts into a full presentation. This is where all the pieces tie together to fully explain your subject.You can also write a visual analysis; this is where you write with pictures attached to the writing. For example when we wrote our issues paper, we added pictures to go along with oursubjects and all their parts. When you write with pictures it helps to draw the reader in more. It makes them seem like they are part of the story and not just reading it.The writing process is about the same as every other type of writing. You start with a subject, you research your subject, organize your findings, creae a rough draft, peer edit, revise, and then conduct a final draft. Though they might all be the same, the way you go about them is somewhat different. For example, when writing your draft you want to make sure your topics or parts of your subject help to support what it is that you are trying to say about the whole subject.Knowledge of conventions is when you go through and make your writing a more pleasant read for the people who are going to be reading it. This is when you edit your work. For example, when you are writing to a teacher you want to make sure you use the right grammar or punctuation. This is because when their reading your work they want to be able to read it fluently rather than guess on how you meant to write it. "When I sing well, ladies feel sick." means something different than "When I sing, well ladies feel sick." This is why punctuation matter so much.

10/21/2010

     So last night I was so sick and tired and about to go to sleep then i got a phoine call from my brother. It made my whole week so much better. I did not know i was having a bad week until i got to talking to him on the phone. I really miss my brother. I do not know what i would do if anything happened to him. He got to use the phone and he will be able to use it for a little bit. Im so excited, he should be able to call me tonight. AND he comes home in like 3 months. I can not believe he has been gone that long in the first place. Man i was an emotional wreck when he left. I miss him to pieces and love him so much. I am so proud of him and to proud to be his sister. It makes me so proud to say that MY brother is doing everything he can and giving his life to make sure that i can sleep everynight with the freedom i enjoy so much. I have been writing my brother a letter one a week, he wrote me this long email. It made me cry massive tears. He was talking about how he love that he can call me his sister. That he wold not trade me for the world. How he would do anything to make sure my life is the best the world could offer. That he is lying down his life not just for his country but for me. He would rather die then see me hurt. God i love him and i miss him. <3

10/26/2010

     So I know that we arent sopose to use this for personal use. But I need something to write my feelings on, so this is where I am going to write what I feel and why I am feeling that way. God I do not know what to do. My two best friends are dating. It is really hard to deal with, because I have loved my best guy friend for about 5 years and my best girlfriend knew it. Yet she is still dating him. Though I guess he will be happier with her then he ever would be with me. Concidering that he told her that he loved her after dating her for 3 weeks and i have known him for 5 years and he can not even say it to me as a friend. It breaks my heart. :( what am i sopose to do.. NO IDEA!!! I really love that boy and I would do anything for him. If he needed me I would probably drop anything I was doing and go help him.

Oh and I did the Poetry Slam last night, here is my poem:

Freedom

we walk in to find
her sprawled on the floor
her ticket to freedom lying loosely in her hand
and her battle scars displayed across her wrists
we see her snakeskin green eyes
staring blankly at a single sheet of paper
its the only thing not marked
by her parade of suffering
the paper has her writing scrawled upon it
saying
"i sat here and cried blackend tears
for days on end
alone in my room
i reached out for help
and no one came
i drew my pain
and let the paint pour from my body
so as to create the picture
of my affliction
that no one cared to see.
i spread my paint
all along my walls
and anywhere else
that had seen my torture.
so here i am
lying in front of you
and the only thing you care about
is where to hide my broken body
where to put the picture i so carefully drew for you
that represented everything you caused me."
and so we see her
knife in hand
blood caked on her body
and flung about her room
we close her eyelids
and call the police
we say "we didnt do it"
they classify it as a suicide.
her ghost haunts my dreams
saying
"you drove me to it
you put the knife in my hand
you saw the picture i painted for you
and you still wont admit that it is your fault."
we know we put her on the edge of the cliff
and we know we helped to throw her off of it
but she will never see why we had to do it
for if we did not
she could have become someone important
someone who made a change
someone who inspired.
and if we had allowd her to do that
our utopian world would have collapsed
and we would have had to allow
freedom.

10/28/10

     WOW! So now I really do not know what to do. I found out that my best girlfriend is cheating on my other best friend.  She is and I know it. I do NOT know what to do. He would never believe me if I told him. I really do not know what to do.  Anyway well my other friends told my best guy friend that my best friend was cheating on him with TWO other guys. (Which is true) I know for a fact.  If i tell him he could hate me forever. But if I don't tell him, and he finds out and then he finds out that I knew, he could hate me forever.

     Well, BIG drama. So my friend found out that the Girlfriend was cheating. So he called her and basiclly flipped on her. Yelled and screamed. He was so upset, ad hurt. It killed me to see him hurt so much. I died a little inside seeing him hurt so much. Then he told me that she tried kill herself. I was at a loss of words. I did not and i still do not know what to do. I can not figure out how I am going to deal with all this and still be sane myself. Anyway they are still together because she told him the cheating was a lie (which is wrong, it is not a lie) and that she loved him. God help me.