Peer Review Process

By doing peer reviews it helps the reviewer to become a better writer as well as the person whose paper is being reviewed. This process is more than just correcting basic mistakes such as grammar or spelling like we did in high school, it is reading through the paper and giving ideas based on how the well or bad the person did in writing there paper. While doing these peer reviews I have noticed that I focus more on clarity, context and detail than just the grammar aspects. As I read my peers papers, I still seem to notice the smaller errors but not as much as I did before I knew how to actually peer review. It is very obvious that throughout my peer review process I seem to make comments on the same types of things even in different kinds of papers. When reviewing the Literacy Inquiry papers, I found it hard to focus on the broader aspects of the paper and I think this is because it was my first time trying to evaluate whether there was too much detail or too little detail but I didn’t want to be superfluous in my constructive criticism. In both papers, the Literacy Inquiry and the Researched Based Argumentative, I found myself giving compliments and criticism where needed but also tried to give suggestions for ways I thought they could better improve the paper. As a reader, I felt I should try and give them my point of view on what was confusing to me and what I thought they did well. While reading the Literacy Inquiry I found myself looking more at how well they were telling the story and how they reflected on their experiences. In the Research paper, I found myself looking more at the facts, the supportive details and the counter argument than how well it was written. This process has definitely helped me to develop a better understanding of writing my own papers and also helping to develop my peer’s papers into better works of writing. 

The Blogging Life

When I attended my first college English class, I was told we were going to be blogging and commenting on other people’s blogs. My first thought was this kind of sounds like Facebook or twitter but it can’t be like that because this is English class. As I designed my blog site, I found it interesting that we were going to be writing about topics that were happening in our everyday lives. When I wrote my first blog, I found myself getting into what I was writing. Our word amount was 250-300 words and I was so interested in writing my blog that when I was finished I wrote almost 800 words. I have really enjoyed this writing process and I feel like it helps me to express what I am thinking and feeling at that time. I also feel like blogging has helped me to become a better writer by reading other peoples writings and comparing them to mine.However, I have to be aware of my audience when I am blogging because it is an academic point of view and you actually have to have a point and not just ramble on about something. I used to hate when teachers would tell us to write 5 paragraph essays about something that I had no clue about. I believe blogging gives me the freedom to write what I want and to choose the topics that I write about as well as read some other very interesting writing from my peers about stuff that I can relate to. I enjoy putting my own opinion out there and seeing what other people think about it. This is the best thing about blogging to me because I can get the situation off of my chest without any judgments from my peers. I have kind of struggled with coming up with topics that I was going to write about to begin with but I would just sit my computer down until something popped into my head.

Peer Review

Over the past few weeks in class, we have been discussing and reading about peer reviewing our peer's writing. In the readings, I learned not to be so harsh when leaving comments but to act like it is your own paper that you are editing. Give good feedback and help them to make their paper a lot easier to understand as a reader. When our teacher first told us we were going to have to peer edit papers, my first thought was how I am going to edit someone else's paper when I can't even edit my own. The first thing I think of when editing papers is correcting grammar and spelling mistakes so that should be easy. Well I thought wrong, there was much more to reviewing a paper than just spelling and grammar. According to the readings we have done and the process through which we have already incorporated with our literacy narratives, I have learned that after we read our peer’s papers we are supposed to comment on what we thought they did well, what we would change, and what confused us. This process has been absolutely wonderful in helping me to realize what my strengths were and what my weaknesses were.  However, I really don’t like reading so it made the process of reviewing my other classmate’s papers a lot harder than I had expected. It helped me to read the paper out loud so that I could hear myself speaking and actually comprehend their mistakes. I found it odd that reading these papers was actually pretty interesting and made me want to help my classmates with their paper because they did such a good job of commenting on mine and helping me through the process. 

Are you one of these people?

When I was walking back from class today, I happened to hear out of the corner of my ear, these two girls in front of me were carrying on a conversation about another girl that was walking the opposite direction. As I heard them say "ew that girl is hideous, why is she with that hot guy"? It made me start to think about how judgmental people are in the world today. We all like to think that we judge people fairly but obviously this is not true because judging people based on their external factors is not fair, when they usually can't help there appearance. Our first impressions of people usually have a strong impact on the way we judge a person and it is sometimes hard to change our minds when we already have made misconceptions. Whether we like to admit it or not, we judge people every day based on their looks or what they are wearing. You never know what a person is like if you just judge them by the way they look because honestly everybody has been through hard times in their life and if you don't take the time to get to know them then you’re just hurting yourself. The external factors that we most often judge people by are skin color, clothes they wear, weight, age, and gender. Clearly it is hard to change our personal biases that impact our judgment, but this is becoming a big issue in our country. Our minds seem to quickly jump to conclusions about people with very little evidence of who they are. However, these conclusions can keep us from building healthy relationships with loving and intelligent people. I believe that as a human being we can overcome these tendencies by consciously doing so, whereas animals do not have that choice. It is up to us as young adults to change our preconceptions of people and learn to open ourselves up to a broader range of people. It is very interesting for me to walk from class to class every day and hear people’s judgmental point of view because we don't know who they are. 

Surprises!

At the beginning of this week, I was getting ready to attend the UNC Charlotte vs. Temple basketball game when my phone rings. When I looked at it, I was surprised to see that my sister was calling because she usually only calls about something that she needs or wants to borrow from me. I answered the phone and she said "I've been meaning to talk to you about something". She then starts to ramble on asking me all these questions and then she says "Will you be the maid of honor in my wedding this summer?" My heart dropped because I didn't know what it was going to entail and I have never been a big part of a wedding before. I continued to talk to her about what exactly I had to do and she said that out of all of her friends, she would like for me to do her toast and to plan out her bachelorette party. I am not a very good planner nor am I a good public speaker so all that kind of hit me at once and I started rethinking my decision. When I talked to my mom later on that day, I realized how much of an honor it is to be asked to do such a thing in a wedding. I finally told my sister that I would do it and she started crying because she was so excited about it. I cannot believe she is already so grown up and getting married. It's hard to believe that she will be living with her husband in less than a year and we will have to call each other to even see each other instead of just calling each other to borrow something. I have learned to cherish every moment in life because life goes by way to fast and some people don't even get to enjoy it.

Born and Raised

When I actually start think about dialect and accents these days, it makes me wonder if North Carolina actually has a more popular accent over another because it seems that when we talk to each other we all seem to have our own individual accent. I was born and raised in Raleigh and would say that I have a southern accent or as some people refer to as a country bumpkin. I find myself often using words that are not a part of the English language or "slang", especially when I am talking to someone that speaks the same way as I do. I have started to wonder if North Carolinians can still be called “southern” because we have so many different origins of people that moved into our state. I often use double negatives such as “I ain’t got nothing” which is part of the way I learned to speak growing up in a southern state and family. When I first went to another state and I said something like “Can I have a soda”?, they would say they didn’t know what soda was because they call it “pop” in the northern states. I feel like every day when people carry on a conversation they don’t realize the difference in the way they speak even though there is usually a big difference but I have come to realize that we all speak in a way that we all understand but we use different words or phrases. Whenever I am at home for a while around my family and friends that speak the same way I do, my country voice starts to come out more because of my surroundings. I can imagine that it would be hard to move to a different part of the country and to get adjusted to the way that people speak around you because of the dialect and accent of other people. I believe that we often judge people by the way that they talk but in reality no one can help the way they talk because it’s just a part of who you grew up with and where you were born. 

Determining Literacy

After reading about literacy and having a discussion in class, it makes me think about what people do to become literate these days and how people are judged based upon there literacy. When I read “The Elements of Literacy,” it talks about how our social class determines just how much literacy a person should have. People who are of the high class should be a lot more literate than those of the middle and lower classes. However, we all know that someone of a higher class isn’t always smarter or more literate than other classes because if you can read or write should not be based on how much your income is. Do standardized tests really measure our literacy either? If we base how good a person can read or write on a few tests that supposedly measure every aspect of a person’s literacy then we are being bias towards people who are gifted in different ways. I believe that our literacy shouldn’t be based on a few multiple choice tests that are given at the end of the year to see what they crammed in our heads during a semester.  We should take more practical tests that are actually based on real life instances where as the tests we are required to take are based on what they want us to learn even when we won’t ever need to know most of the stuff that is required by the “No Child Left Behind Act.” Everyone has different views of how they think literacy should be measured and tested but it’s common sense that no one should be judged on their literacy based on their social class or the way they are raised in a household.

Growing up

On Monday morning when I woke up at my parents’ house in Raleigh, I was surprised to walk out of my room and see my dad sitting in his chair when I knew that he was supposed to be at work. I walked up to him and asked him "what are you still doing home?" He quietly responded "oh I had some work to do on the computer." I knew the reason he was still home is because he wasn't used to me leaving and he wanted to see me one last time before I left to come back to school. After he left home, I started packing my things and came across my cleats and my softball glove and at that moment tears started to run down my face and a lot of thoughts rushed into my head. Ever since I was 5 years old, my dad has been my softball coach and my inspiration in life. I spent 95% of every single day with him doing something that was sports related and we both enjoyed every minute of it. I still remember waking up every day and him being so excited about going to the batting cage or the field to practice so that I could improve my skills. He dedicated his whole life to me improving and having fun. I played softball pretty much everyday of every year from February to November because I was so passionate about it and enjoyed spending time with my father. Every time I think about how much time and effort my dad put into making me a good player and a teammate, it makes me cry because I decided to stop playing after 13 years of my life. Now that I am away at college he doesn't know what to do with all of his free time so he coaches my high school softball team even though it will never be the same without me there. Growing up is one of the hardest things I have ever had to deal with and it's probably even harder for my parents. They still call me everyday to check on me and see how my day went and make sure everything's okay. This coming up softball season will be the first season that I haven't played in 13 years. I think about it everyday, but with me already having 2 knee surgeries, 2 cortisone shots, a stress fracture in my back and buldging disks, I felt as if it were time for me to take care of my body and to give up the game. Everyone kept asking me why I wasn't going to play in college because I loved it so much and my answer was "I'm burnt out." However my response should have been "I need a break" because it's been almost 7 months since I played my last game and I haven't picked up a ball since. The first thing I did today when I got on my computer was look on the 49er website to see if there was any opportunities for me to get back involved in the game.  My father always used to tell me, you never know how much you love something until it's gone for good and I wish that I could go back and just play one last softball game so that I could be with my dad and show him the love and appreciation that he deserves for dedicating all his time and effort into making me not just a better player but a better person. The connection that me and my father had within this sport was so strong that no matter how many times we argued or got frustrated with each other, no one could ever break us apart. I will cherish the moments and time that we spent together for the rest of my life and maybe one day we can do it again. He has so much dedication to the sport that he wants to coach mine and my sisters kids when they are growing up and I would be more than happy to see them experience what he gave me the chance to experience because it was the most important and memorable thing that I will always remember. If I could choose one thing to re-live in my life it would be the relationship that me and my father shared within the sport of softball. Sometimes I wish we wouldn't have had those arguments and just lived it to the fullest because now that it's done I miss it more and more every day. No matter what, softball or not, I will always be my daddy's little girl!

My First Week of College

Since I was about 13, I have always looked forward to college and moving out of my house so that I could set my own rules and standards and not have to live by what my parents would tell me all the time. I wanted to feel that pride of being independent and not having to rely on my parents forever. It was time for me to grow up. Last Wednesday when I was packing up all of my stuff to leave home I got this feeling of joy and excitement that I had been waiting for all these years. I went to SOAR on Thursday and had to deal with a little bit of frustration due to Charlotte not having my transcripts, but once we figured it out I started to get more and more excited. On Friday, my parents helped me move all of my stuff into my suite and then they just left like nothing ever happened. This was when I felt a sense of urgency and impatience because I was ready to start living my own life. As the weekend passed I was excited to start all my classes and meet a lot of new people. As Monday approached quickly I started walking down the path towards my first class and I realized I was alone. I had no one there to show me where my classes were or to even talk too for a brief second. When I walked into a classroom full of 200 people, my heart dropped and all these questions came into my mind. How am I going to learn and meet people when I am surrounded by 200 other people? After my first class, I walked outside and it was like a completely different world. I didn't have a clue where I was or how to get back to my housing facility so without a thought in mind I start walking and about 10 minutes into my walk I realized I had no clue where I was and was very scared to ask someone. This is a time where I would call mommy or daddy but I couldn't. Finally after 45 minutes of walking around all by myself filled with frustration I arrived in front of my suite. I sat down in my room and just cried for hours upon hours. It was very upsetting to be so far away from home and not to have anyone there to talk too or to even be with. As the week went on things became a little better and I started to meet some new people. I am starting to adjust and I like all of my professors. The third day of class, I got really sick and had to go to healthcare on campus. I needed mommy and daddy there to take care of me and make sure I was doing what I needed to do to get well. All of this independence is starting to get to me now that it's actually happening. I'm not sure what to think about college right now because it's all hitting me at once and it is a life changing experience. Now I realize why when I was in high school everyone said don't wish your life away for it will only get worse. Overall I had a pretty good first week of college, but sometimes wish I was still in high school so I could have my parents there for me at all times when I need the small things. Nobody realizes how much their parents actually do for them until this point in their life when they have to let go and do for their self.