Book Club Blog #2

Summary: In the second half of our book club cook, "Island" by Aldous Huxley, the main character, Will Farnaby, finds out the ways and customs of the Palanese people.  He learns more about the history of the island from Dr. Robert and Susila. He learns that the the islands customs have been in place since Dr. Susila's great grandfather influenced the Raja to tryout his ideas. One of these ideas that is still being enforced on the island is the drug. Murgan refers to the drug being given in Pala as "dope".  According to Dr. Robert, this drug is referred to the people as "moksha medicine" or in other words a "reality reliever". This drug causes the Palanese people to undergo an "out of body" experience. The drug causes the people to feel constantly happy and mentally healthy. As we continue reading, Will exposed to some of the Pala culture an rituals. Part two ends with Will meeting Vijaya's wife and experiencing the different styles of parenthood that makes the Palanese people unique.

Quotes:
#1 "We all belong," Susila explained, "to an MAC- Mutual Adoption Club. Every MAC consists of anything from fifteen to twenty five assorted couples. Newly elected brides and bridegrooms, old-timers with growing children, grandparents and great-grandparents- everybody in the club adopts everyone else." (Pg 89)

#2 "God has nothing to do with it," Ranga retorted, "and the joke isn't cosmic, it's strictly man-made. These things aren't like gravity or the second law of thermodynamics; they don't have to happen. They happen only if people are stupid enough to let it happen." (Pg 80)

#3 "But Pavlov, purely for a good purpose. Pavlov for friendliness and trust and compassion. Whereas you prefer to use Pavlov for brainwashing, Pavlov for selling cigarettes and vodka and patriotism. Pavlov for the benefit of dictators, generals and tycoons." (Pg 195)

Reflection:
In this section, the readers finally get to see the unique culture and customs of the people of Pala. Their customs seem to be very different than what the Westerners are used to which is why Will fins it hard to adjust. However, at the same time their ways seem to be more productive and helpful to the environment and their health. Although they are different it could potentially be a better lifestyle. I am curious to find out what Will will discover next on Pala.  

Practice Write 4/26

In school the most common type of writing I usually do is persuasive writing. Most of my writing assignments in my classes require me to write papers to persuade my readers into believing a certain viewpoint. Most of the reading I do in school is reading from textbooks or assigned class books. Outside of school, the only writing I usually do is just text messages or sending messages to people over social media. The most common type of reading I do outside of the classroom are reading popular news articles on the internet. I usually read websites such as Pinterest, Buzzfeed, or Yahoo News.

Unit 3 Reflection Blog

I have found that unit 3 has been the hardest out of all the units for myself. You would think since this is just the research and analysis unit it would be pretty straight forward, but I found this challenging. However, finding the actual resources and my 3-5 sources was not difficult. I found many scholarly articles on my topic. The only difficult pat was narrowing it down to the sources that I found was most useful for my essay. The part I found most difficult was figuring out how I wanted to incorporate these articles into my writing and use them in a way that coincides with my point of view. I've never been that great at integrating quotes into my paper so I came into this unit having my doubts. However, I found that the quote sandwich videos and activities we did in class were really helpful. I ended up using these quote sandwiches in my essay as well. I also thought the "They Say I Say" chapters about integrating  quotes was very helpful. They provided me with easy to understand template on how to integrate quotes. At the end of this unit, I felt much more confident about researching scholarly articles and using quotes in my writing.

Practice Write 4/19/16

I have finally decided who I want to interview for essay 4. I haven't actually emailed this person or even thought about the actual questions I want to ask them yet, but I just know that I will interview this person. I have chosen to interview my English professor from last semester at SFSU since she is the one who opened my eyes to the conversation of standardized testing. I plan to send an email out to her today letting her know I would like to interview her. Hopefully my professor will be available for me to interview, but if not I do have a backup person that I can interview. If my English professor falls through, I will interview a different professor in the education department at SFSU.

Fieldworking Pg 305-307

Summary: In this chapter of "Fieldworking",  the author discusses techniques to accurately and honorably represent your informants voice in your paper. One way is to borrow techniques from fiction. This is basically including your entire conversation between you and the informant in the paper with quotes. The second way is quoting with transcripts. This is basically telling a story with your voice as narration while still including quotes from your informant. The final technique is summarizing the dialogue. In this technique, the author summarizes what the informant says instead of using direct quotes from the author. This section of Fieldworking" also talks about a research portfolio. A research portfolio reflects all the work that you've done in the process and also helps you shape your future.

Quote #1: "As fieldwriters, we need to create texts that embrace our informants' diverse voices and also include our own." (Pg 105)
Using other people's words in your texts does not only represent your understanding and concept of the topic, but also the informants. You don't want to insult the informant in any way or misconstrue their words. It is also important to use your informants voice in a way that also includes your own. This will rightfully represent the informant and make them relevant to yourself.

Quote #2: "As with any art form, how you choose to display your informants' language for the reader must be a conscious and carefully considered choice." (Pg 107)
This is very important to remember. How you choose to display your informants voice will not only affect your own paper but also the informant. Representing the informants words in an untrue way give you an untrustworthy reputation. You have to use your informants information in the truest way possible that still represents your own voice.

Quote #3: "It offers you an opportunity to reflect on what you've learned and on how your research writing fits into the larger picture of your research." (Pg 107)
This quote is talking about research portfolios. Research portfolios represent all the hard work, research, and analyses you have done over a period of time. You can use research portfolios to reflect on the work you've done and use this to remember the techniques you've used to get to the point that you are at.

Questions:
1. Do you always have to incorporate quotes when talking about another persons work?
2. How do you summarize and informants words?

Practice Write 4/12

I'm actually some what nervous about the interview process. I have never been the person to interview someone, especially someone who is an expert in their field. I have also never been given an interview assignment in any of my previous classes. This assignment is still very new to me which is why I am nervous about interviewing someone. However I am also excited to get to hear real opinions and viewpoints on my topic from someone who is credible. I feel like this would give me a whole new perspective on my topic and maybe broaden my horizons. The only thing left for me to do is to actually pick the person I would like to interview.

Practice Write 4/7/16

An annotated bibliography should include the authors main argument or point and how this relates to your own topic and point of view. You should also be writing down meaningful quotes that support your argument.

Quote Sandwiches 4/5/16

#1 The increasing dependency on standardized testing has resulted in high stakes for all students. With more pressure on students to not only pass standardized tests but exceed them has caused worry for parents and educators all around,"...many parents and teachers have become increasingly concerned that the high stakes attached to so many tests are actually harming our students and school." The higher the stakes are for standardized testing results in more concern for the parents and more pressure for the students.

#2 Standardized testing focuses mainly on cognitive skills, mainly memorization. Theses tests are designed to test how well you can memorize information and perform on the spot. Because of the pressure of doing well on tests, more and more teachers are only teaching their students how to succeed on the test instead of other important educational skills. Valeria Strauss, author of  "13 Ways High-Stakes Standardized Tests Hurt Students"points out, "Students are learning how to take high-stakes tests but cannot demonstrate mastery when tested in a different format." Students will only memorize what they are required to memorize to take a standard test. However, this does not mean they understand what they have been learning, it simply means they can memorize it for a test. This shows concern for students who excel on standardized testing in school, but cannot show these same results in other real life situations.

#3 The purpose of the education system is to teach the students how to be well rounded individuals who can not only succeed in the classroom, but also in the real world. However, with the increasing dependency on standardized tests results educators are forgetting this. We see many teachers in every school teaching directly to the test. Although students tests scores may improve significantly from this method of teaching students are losing valuable skills needed to succeed in life. Anne Ruggles Gere, author of "How Standardized Tests Shape and Limit Learning," provides the readers significant statistics that show how teaching to the tests is hurting the students in the long run. "Research shows... that GED recipients perform about as well as high school graduates on standardized tests but have much worse life outcomes because they often lack important qualities such as curiosity, conscientiousness, perseverance and sociability."  

Practice Write 4/5/16

So far I am feeling pretty confident about essay 3. I have already done a majority of my research. I've found great sources that I plan to incorporate in my essay. These sources are all very different from each other and give me different points of views about my topic to reflect on. All of my sources also support my main claim in my essay which I believe will provide a strong influence to my readers. I have found four strong articles so far, but plan to find at least one more strong one. However, I did come to a few dead ends while researching. I was encountering articles that had nothing to do with my topic. To fix this, I changed some of the key words to expand my search. This actually helped the research process and got me to some of my most important sources.

3-4 Annotated Bibliographies 4/4/16

#1 Strauss, Valerie. "13 Ways High-stakes Standardized Tests Hurt Students." Washington Post. The Washington Post, 11 Mar. 2014. Web. 05 Apr. 2016.

• lost learning time, teachers are now strictly teaching to the test instead of giving an actual education, students are forgetting about other subject such as history or science because tests do not ask those subjects therefore teachers do not teach it 
• students are being presented with harmful stress, teachers have reported students vomiting, increasing anxiety levels and unexpected bowel movements 
• students begin to believe they are "bad" students and are incapable of passing, standardized tests are made to fail a certain percentage of students across the country. These students are more likely to dropout easily because of their inability to pass tests. 

Quotes:

"As we enter the March Madness of testing season, many parents and teachers have become increasingly concerned that the high stakes attached to so many tests are actually harming our students and schools. There is particular concern about the disproportionate impact high stakes testing may be having on our own poorest students, most struggling students, English Language Learners, and students of color." 

"Students are learning how to take high stakes tests, but cannot demonstrate subject mastery when tested in a different format." 

#2 Gere, Anne Ruggles. "How Standardized Tests Shape-and Limit-Student Learning." National Council of Teachers of English. James R. Squire, 2014. Web. 4 Apr. 2016.

• The roles of teachers are changing, loosing more time to actually teach an education in the classroom.
• Standardized tests squeeze out subjects such as music, art and foreign languages. Tests limits the type of writing students learn. They aren't learning how to do rhetorical analysis or how to apply writing skills in real life because standardized testing isn't measuring it. 
• Tests limit student learning because they focus on your ability to memorize instead of other qualities 
• Student learning is limited because of the tests sorting students into proficient or non proficient categories.
• Solutions to standardized testing: having multiple assessments of student achievement, providing special accommodations to certain students. 

Quotes: 

"Research shows, for example, that GED recipients perform about as well as high school graduates on standardized tests but have much worse life outcomes because they often lack important qualities such as curiosity, conscientiousness, perseverance, and sociability"

"One study found that teachers lose between 60 to 110 hours of instructional time in a year because of testing and the institutional tasks that surround it."

"Studies show that elementary school students can begin to lose their sense of themselves as capable, able to do well in school and graduate, when they see unknown adults as controlling the administration and consequences of the standardized tests they are required to take."

#3 Barth, Patte. "Standardized Tests and Their Impact on Schooling: Q&A." Center for Public Education. N.p., 16 Feb. 2006. Web. 05 Apr. 2016.

• Every state is different with how much they depend on standardized test scores, some are more high stakes than others 
• High stakes tests means serious consequences 
• Standardized tests are used to monitor students progress, diagnose areas of strength or weakness, place students into categories or to judge institutions or educators 
• Stats prove that teachers teaching directly and strictly to the test produce higher test scores than providing an actual education

Quotes:

"Research is beginning to show that teaching to the test can be either good or bad depending on how administrators or teachers approach it."

"Research shows that when schools teach curriculum aligned to state standards and use test score data to reflect on the practices, students will produce higher test scores. School leaders should therefore make sure their teachers have an aligned curriculum."

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