Save Water

Summary: Water waste leads to a lack of clean drinking water.

Paraphrase: Save water, save the world. Gallons of water are wasted every year, causing shortages in clean water. These shortages lead to several deaths every year. Places like California have gone through droughts that call for a need to safe water for cleaning drinking.

Quote “Thirsty?”

Textual analysis paper questions 1-7

1. The companies that publish the ads are, PETA, Freedom For Animals, and Mercy For Animals.
2. These adds are intended for human beings in general.
3. Because these organizations clearly do not want anyone to mistreat animals in any way. They use their ad techniques in a way that doesn't appeal to one group of people. 
4. The purpose of these is to make people think about what they do. The creators of these ads are wanting people to realize that maybe the way they treat animals is wrong.
5. These people are clearly animals lovers, and believe that animals should have the same rights that humans do. They are working towards their purpose by getting the word out through ads, and making people think twice about what their doing.
6. Its obvious when they say things like "If you wouldn't wear your dog.... please don't wear any fur." Its basically saying why wear any animal if you wouldn't wear your own.
7. "Stop the mistreatment, and cruelty of animals today, by using ethos, pathos, and logos to appeal to us."

Understanding Writing Analyses

What we now understand about analyzing writing:
You need to follow certain steps, in order.
You need to know what questions to ask.
You need to know what the point of the analysis is.
How to identify patterns in data and info.
You need to know how to connect to readers.
You need to look at text and see how it supports your claim.
You need to know how authors establish authority .
You need to know what emotions the text appeals to.
You need to know that analysis has to be instructional and informational.

How "Stay Sweet As You Are" fits the criteria:

The author uses a clear point to establish the topic sentence. He claimed that advertisements aimed at women encourage them to like beauty products that reinforce a male's role in their life.  He identified patterns in his data by analyzing the advertisements. He specifically picked apart ads that used men to reinforce the product. In the soap ad he proved that the soap was showing that women who want to get married need to have clear skin and even if they have wit and grace men wont be attracted to them. He looked at the text in the ads and explained how this supported his claim. He also knew what the emotions in the advertisements were and showed that they were trying to shame women into buying the products. He also is informative in his analysis by sticking to his claim, and using three different ads to prove his point. The essay "Stay Sweet as You Are" definitely fits the criteria to be an analysis essay.

Learning How to Read

Have you ever wondered what your most important educational tool is? Well I believe that the ability to read is the biggest advantage in life. Knowing how to read can help lay the ground work for the rest of your future. With the ability to read comes the ability to write. With these skills come numerous amounts of potential to thrive in today’s society. For example, I am writing my first college essay, and my writing skills are all directly linked to my reading ability. Without learning how to read, I never would have gone to kindergarten, and I definitely would not be where I am today.

This day was going to be like every other Saturday. I was going to get up, brush my teeth, and then go downstairs for breakfast. Saturdays were always my favorite. The whole family was home, and my mom always cooked breakfast on the weekend. As I walked down the newly carpeted stairs, I could smell my favorite breakfast ever, waffles! The aroma grabbed me and yanked me down the stairs, the strong smell of vanilla floated me into kitchen and plopped me on a stool at the breakfast bar. My mom knew me so well, she had already pulled the peanut butter and syrup out of the pantry. I instantly grabbed the freshest waffle, threw it on my plate and smothered it in peanut butter. Next came the waterfall of syrup creating a lake on the plate. As I took my first bite my mom said, “How would you like to learn how to read today?”

            Perplexed, I swallowed my enormous bite and responded, “Read? What do you mean?”

My mother tried to come up with something creative to trick me, “Like instead of me reading you a story at night, you could read one to yourself. It’s so much fun!”

I questioned my mom’s new idea, “By myself? Like I could read Magic Tree House every day? That would be awesome!” Little did I know it would be so difficult.

My mom continued with her weekend routine, she cleaned the kitchen, and washed the dishes. My father was forced to brush the dog, and then proceed to clean the carpets to make sure there were no more “Buster Bunnies.” After all the morning activities were out of the way, my mom pulled a box out of the closet with the words “Hooked on Phonics.” I had no idea what the words meant but I was about to find out!

In order to get me to focus, my mom brought me into our empty living room and opened up the Hooked on Phonics program. The freshly cleaned carpets felt so nice on my hands and feet that I almost fell asleep. My mom kept prompting me, running through the alphabet. I didn’t realize this was going to be such a long process, only being able to learn the sounds of uppercase and lowercase letters. I knew most of the letters, but didn’t really know what they sounded like. But this wasn’t even the hardest part, Saturday was long but pretty easy. Sunday was going to be difficult, on Sunday we started putting the letters together.

Knowing the sounds of letters was a good start, but I didn’t know many words past mom and dad. My mom kept saying, “Sound it out honey.” I didn’t really know what that meant. I felt the need to put the information I learned Saturday, to use on Sunday. I started reading words like ingredients to a cake, “There is a c, an a, and a t. Cccc-aaaaaaa-t. Cat! It’s a cat!” It felt so good to get a word right, but I got frustrated easily with words I couldn’t figure out. It was so easy to want to quit when I got words wrong. I felt so disappointed with myself, I thought my mom felt the same way, but she was always so positive and encouraging. When she could tell I was really down on myself she said to think about it and then she disappeared. I was confused because she had left, but I did what she said, I kept trying to figure out the words. My mom came back a minute or two later with popsicles! My favorite flavor is blue raspberry, it’s so sweet, yet it is also a bit sour, giving a wide range of flavor. Plus the popsicle left a vibrant blue on my lips and tongue, which for some reason made me feel like a super hero. My mom knew I loved the blue raspberry flavored popsicles. Holding up a fierce blue popsicle, so she prompted me by saying, “If you can get this word right I’ll give you half of this popsicle.”

I was determined and focused on getting that popsicle, so I sounded out the word again, “t-rr-u-cckk. Truck. Truck!” my mom then split the popsicle so there was half on each stick and gave me one half.

Trying to keep me attentive, my mom said, “Good job Nash. Now I’ll give you the other half if you can read this whole sentence.”

Now this was a sentence that I had seen before, but I wasn’t sure what it said. Pondering the sentence, I got frustrated, but I knew I just needed to stay relaxed. I had already tried to read the sentence four times already, every time getting hung up on what my mom called the “verb.” I knew I was talking about my dog, but what did he do? Looking at Buster, thinking about what he does every day, I remembered him playing around and jumping all over the place. I then took one more try at the sentence, I thought over every word very carefully. “The dog jumped on the bed.” My mother looked ecstatic! She was so proud, it was the first sentence I had ever read. She gave me the second half of the popsicle plus, she said I could have another one after dinner!

            I was only able to read very basic sentences, but it was a work in progress. I tried reading everything after that Sunday, cereal boxes, magazines, and newspapers. Anything I could find that had words, I would try and read from top to bottom. Every weekend we would practice reading. Every time I worked on reading, it became easier and quicker.  Learning to read seemed like such a small success, but as I look back, learning to read set the foundation for my education. Learning to read led to writing, then came kids’ books. Next came books for school. High school came around and I had textbooks to read. Now I’m in college and I find myself recalling this skill I learned almost twelve years ago.

            Without this experience I would never have done well in school. I would have never been able to read books for school, and definitely never would have been able to write a strong, cohesive essay. I credit a lot of my education to my caring parents. My parents have always been by myside, helping me when they can, and pushing me to be the best student I can be. So for that, I thank you mom and dad, you mean the world to me!

Analyzing Texts

Think About Your Own Use of Analysis

	Small Decision	Large Decision
Week	I decided to eat Special K for breakfast, to maintain a good diet. This decision made for a better eating lifestyle.	I decided to start a 14 week workout plan created by the Toronto Blue Jays. This choice will help me get back into top notch shape for baseball.
Month	I decided to go to Klahowya’s homecoming with Jacob Henson. Deciding to go to the dance has stretched my social horizons.	I have applied to five different colleges to attend next year as a freshman. Applying to these schools has set a plan for my educational future.
Year	I decided to by my first pair of Levi’s jeans. The Levi’s I bought have expanded my wardrobe immensely with only one addition.	I decided to attend Olympic College as a Running Start student. The decision to start college a year earlier will help with my college debt, being able to get a big chunk of college credits out of the way while still in high school.

 

Look For Analysis in Everyday Use

I analyzed to websites, Travelocity and Trip Advisor. I felt more comfortable with Travelocity because I felt like it was a more thorough search of what you are looking for. Both had a good search bar, but Travelocity felt more in depth, asking about number of people and number of beds. Trip Advisor almost felt like it was hiding its tabs. I felt I could plan a complete trip more easily with Travelocity, it had everything from the flight, the car rentals, cruises, and even things to do where you’re at. While Trip Advisor felt like you had to do everything one at a time, and not plan everything as one big trip. Both sites had great reviews, which helps immensely in deciding which airline to take, or what hotel to stay at. With the reviews, both sites had pictures but Trip Advisor’s seemed fake and photo shopped, while Travelocity seemed more realistic to what you would see while at your destination. With Travelocity, they have great coupons on the home page ready for you to use, where Trip Advisor has you find codes to enter in at checkout. I feel that if I was Trip Advisor, I would have a similar homepage with coupons out in the open, along with maybe having customers take pictures of the hotel for the reviews. As far as Travelocity goes, I know what site to use to plan my senior trip to San Diego California.

Taking Stock of Your Writing

1.       “Moral of Your Story”     The moral of my narrative was that learning to read can lay the foundation for the rest of your education and life.

2.       My audience would be my professor, classmates, and followers of my blog. I knew at least for my professor’s sake, I needed to have a certain level of maturity, yet also it was a narrative about learning how to read so it had to have somewhat of a childish charm.

3.       I received great feedback from my peers on how to make sentences flow a little better and to make them sound a bit more interesting. I will be using these great tips when I get a chance to edit my narrative.

4.       Before writing this narrative, I never really thought about the importance of learning how to read.

5.       My introduction paragraph felt very strong, coupled with strong descriptive imagery.

Learning How to Read Rough Draft

Have you ever wondered what your most important educational tool is? Well I believe that the ability to read is the biggest advantage of life. Knowing how to read can help lay the ground work for the rest of your future.

This day was going to be like every other Saturday. I was going to get up, brush my teeth, and then go downstairs for breakfast. Saturdays were always my favorite. The whole family was home, and my mom always cooked breakfast on the weekend. As I walked down the newly carpeted stairs, I could smell my favorite breakfast ever, waffles! The aroma grabbed me and yanked me down the stairs, the strong smell of vanilla floated me into kitchen and plopped me on a stool at the breakfast bar. My mom knew me so well, she had already pulled the peanut butter and syrup out of the pantry. I instantly grabbed the freshest waffle, threw it on my plate and smothered it in peanut butter. Next came the waterfall of syrup creating a lake on the plate. As I took my first bite my mom says, “How would you like to learn how to read today?”

            Perplexed, I swallowed my enormous bite and responded, “Read? What do you mean?”

My mother trying to come up with something creative to trick me, “Like instead of me reading you a story at night, you could read one to yourself. It’s so much fun!”

Questioning my mom’s new idea, “By myself? Like I could read Magic Tree House every day? That would be awesome!” Little did I know it would be so difficult.

My mom continued with her weekend routine, cleaning the kitchen, washing the dishes. My father forced to brush the dog, and then proceed to clean the carpets to make sure there were no more “Buster Bunnies.” Once all the morning activities were out of the way, my mom pulled a box out of the closet with the words “Hooked on Phonics.” I had no idea what the words meant but I was about to find out!

To try and get me to focus, my mom brought me into our living room and opened up the Hooked on Phonics program. The freshly cleaned carpets felt so nice on my hands and feet that I almost fell asleep. My mom kept prompting me, running through the alphabet. I didn’t realize this was going to be such a long process, only being able to learn the sounds of uppercase and lowercase letters. I knew most of the letters, but didn’t really know what they sounded like. But this wasn’t even the hardest part, Saturday was long but pretty easy. Sunday was when we started putting the letters together.

Knowing the sounds of letters was a good start, but I didn’t know many words past mom and dad. My mom kept saying, “Sound it out honey.” I didn’t really know what that meant. But felt like I needed to put the information I learned Saturday, to use on Sunday. I started reading words like ingredients to a cake, “There is a c, an a, and a t. Cccc-aaaaaaa-t. Cat! It’s a cat!” It felt so good to get a word right, but I got so frustrated with words I couldn’t figure out. It was so easy to want to quit when I got words wrong. I felt so disappointed with myself, I thought my mom felt the same way, but she was always so positive and encouraging. When she could tell I was really down on myself she said to think about it and then she disappeared. I was confused because she had left, but I did what she said, I kept trying to figure out the words. My mom came back a minute or two later with popsicles! She knew that I loved the blue raspberry ones, so she prompted me by saying, “If you can get this word right I’ll give you half of this popsicle.”

I was determined and focused on getting that popsicle, so I sounded out the word again, “t-rr-u-cckk. Truck. Truck!” my mom then split the popsicle so there was half on each stick and gave me one half.

Trying to keep me focused, my mom said, “Good job Nash. Now I’ll give you the other half if you can read this whole sentence.”

Now this was a sentence that I had seen before, but I didn’t know what it said. Pondering the sentence, I got frustrated, but I knew I just needed to stay relaxed. I had tried to read the sentence four times already, every time getting hung up on what my mom called the “verb.” I knew I was talking about my dog, but what did he do? Looking at Buster, thinking about what he does every day, I remembered him playing around and jumping all over the place. I then took one more try at the sentence, I thought over every word very carefully. “The dog jumped on the bed.” My mother looked ecstatic! She was so proud, it was the first sentence I had ever read. She gave me the second half of the popsicle plus she said I could have another one after dinner!

            I was only able to read very basic sentences, but it was a work in progress. I tried reading everything after that Sunday, cereal boxes, and newspapers, anything I could find. Learning to read seemed like such a small success, but I as I look back, learning to read set the foundation for my education. Learning to read led to writing, then came comic books. Next came books for school. High school came around and I had textbooks to read. Now I’m in college and I find myself recalling this skill I learned almost twelve years ago.

Literacy Narrative

1.       Here is an example of strong visual description from Lydia’s Story is, “She described the shelf area as about three feet wide and about a foot and a half tall. Crouched there, she watched the water continue to rise.” (Lydia’s Story, pg 130)

2.       A great example of vivid dialogue from Bidding Farewell to Arms is, “I hereby tender my unqualified resignation as a Reserve officer of the Army, USAR, under the provisions of Chapter 6, Section III of . . . . I understand that if my resignation is accepted, I am entitled to an honorable separation and will be furnished an Honorable Discharge Certificate.” (Bidding Farewell to Arms, pg 119)

3.       A nice piece of sensory description from Lydia’s Story is, “Entering the large VFW hall, we were struck by the chemical odor of a cleaning solution so strong that it seemed toxic.” (Lydia’s Story, pg 128)

4.       List of possible topics:

a.       Learning how to read

b.      Learning how to write

c.       Teaching my brother how to read

5.       I am going to write about the time my mother taught me to read. My purpose is not just to fulfill an assignment, but to bring back a loving memory of my childhood.

6.       Most likely my audience will have gone through a very similar experience, learning how to read is a necessity in our culture, therefore I believe it will bring many good thoughts to the readers.

7.       My stance will be somewhat affectionate, and sincere. Having my mother teach me to read is a great loving memory.

8.       My narrative will be printed out, and also post in my blog for the world to read.

9.       I remember seeing my mother, the reading program, my great-grandfather’s chest, our two windows in the living room, and a beautiful blue sky.

10.   I remember hearing my mother’s sweet voice and the sounds of the reading program.

11.   I recall smelling a freshly cleaned carpet, along with the smell of my dog’s breath.

12.   I was a little frustrated at first, but when I got the hang of it I became so proud.

13.   I don’t remember much of what I taste, but I do recall my mom giving me popsicles when I did well. Blue raspberry anyone?

14.   My mother is in her pajamas because it’s the weekend, her beautiful auburn hair and brown eyes glimmer in the sunlight. She talked slowly and soothingly trying to help me out. My dog buster, who is a golden retriever, shared a similar auburn colored coat with my mother.

15.   “Mom, I cant do this!”

“Yes you can honey, just keep trying. What’s this word again?”

“Dog.”

“Good! Now what did he do?”

“The dog jumped.”

“See, I told you could do it!”

16.   Pondering the sentence before me, I got very frustrated. I had tried to read the sentence four times already, every time getting hung up on what my mom called the “verb.” I knew I was talking about my dog, but what did he do? Looking at Buster, thinking about what he does everyday, I remembered him jumping on the couch. I then took one more try at the sentence, “The dog jumped.” My mother looked ecstatic! She was so proud, I was so proud!

17.   This event seemed so miniscule at the time, but I as I look back, learning to read set the foundation for my education. Learning to read led to writing, then came comic books. Next came books for school. High school came around and I had textbooks to read. Now I’m in college and I find myself recalling this skill I learned almost fifteen years ago.

Redefining Rhetoric

Most students felt that when writing rhetorically, you attempt to persuade the reader to see the subject in your point of view. They all talked about taking in account the different elements of rhetorical writing, purpose, audience, stance, medium, and design. As a writer you must know why you're writing, you have to be able to know your side well enough, and your audience well enough to effectively get your point across. So after reading others post, I feel I should keep my definition:  to write rhetorically is to be educated on your topic, inside and out, know your audience, what you really are trying to say, how you want the message to come across, and make sure that what you are saying is accurate, in order to effectively persuade your audience.

Defintion of Rhetoric

My definition of rhetoric is that a person thoroughly thinks through what they're writing before letting the public see it. Everyone has used the rhetoric process of thinking through their writing, whether it's a text, short story, class essay, or a textbook. When being rhetoric you have to think about who you're writing to, your purpose, your accuracy, to make sure you most effectively get your point across. Everyone has had that moment when you write something, you send it or hand it in and then you look back and you cant figure out at all what you're trying to say. Most likely you were tired and just trying to get it over with. In that case you probably weren't thinking about the all the aspects of effective writing. Your writing should be appropriate for the subject, the audience, the purpose, and the medium. To be rhetoric, you must consider all of the above aspects, and maybe even go above and beyond, and do a little homework on the subject of your writing. To further expand on my definition, to write rhetorically is to be educated on your topic, inside and out, know your audience, what you really are trying to say, how you want the message to come across, and make sure that what you are saying is accurate.

Rhetorical Situations - Narratives

Differences and Similarities of “Lydia’s Story” questions:

Throughout the questions referring to chapter two we had many more similarities than we did differences. For example, question 1, we all pretty much agreed that the main point of the story was that you should keep hope, a level headed mind, clear thoughts and things of that nature. Similarly with question 2 we all agreed it was told from Lydias’ perspective in the third person form. As well as in question 3 we had words and phrases that made the story standout but probably some of the more important ones were of the phrases that talked about the crackling TV and the crisp cool AC. However, question 4 is where we differed the most by far. One member believed that it was pretty formal while the others thought not. We also had similar ideas about the original audience but different enough to mention. We thought the audience could be either health care Politian’s, works, or individuals.

Connections between Chapter 2 and “Lydia’s Story”:

Chapter two was mainly about knowing who you’re talking to and knowing your position and really knowing who you are before you post or print what you’ve wrote. “Lydia’s Story” had its strengths and weaknesses given its unique constraints and opportunities. However we believe that the largest connection between “Lydia’s Story” and Chapter 2 was the fact that “Lydia’s Story” was an example of many of the items presented in Chapter 2.

Summary of “Think About” activity:

Personal List:

1. (Song) Smoke Filled Room- Mako (about a girl trying to make herself look older when she should really be embracing her youth and innocence)

2. (Story) My day to my girlfriend (mainly about what I’ve done for the day what I have planned for the rest of it)

 

It seems that today most of the things that we talk about with our friends and family is egotistical because it’s all about us and what we’ve done most of the time. Similarly with mainstream hip-hop/rap music. It’s all gotten to this point where it’s one big morph of these big names talking about their life with girls, drugs and money.

Summary of “Think Beyond Words” activity:

The most compelling videos we agreed on were those who had fitting music and those who tell their life story’s in a compelling way that is interesting. For example a woman is telling her life story but while she’s telling that they have picture from her lifetime on the screen.

Summary of “Compare Narratives” activity:

Narratives: Magazine articles and Music Videos

The largest difference between a Magazine Article and a Music Video is perhaps obviously is one is print and one is electronic. Each case is different because with an Article in most cases it needs to have visuals of some sort to maintain the reader’s interest. However with a video you don’t need a lot to keep someone’s attention, a video could be jaw dropping with no sound or anything else but the video at all. If a video was presented in a different medium a person’s amount of interest would change dramatically more so for the lesser, although if a magazine was made into a video it can instantly become more interesting considering in our day and age our attention span has dropped considerably. 

Rhetorical Situations

Chapter 2 brings to light a concept that many are familiar with, but don't even know it. This concept is the idea of having a rhetorical situation, a genre, an audience, a purpose, a stance, a context, and a medium and design. No matter if you're writing a birthday note to your mom, tweeting about a new artist, or writing an essay about a book for school, you have a rhetorical situation to think about. When you text a friend, you don't write in third person, you don't use slang in a college application, you have to take in account a handful of things when using words to express an idea.

At times it can be hard to see the intent of written words, so it is important to know your genre. Whether you are assigned a genre, or you get to choose your own, take in consideration how different genres will affect your tone in writing. Following your genre is your audience, who will be reading your work. How will your words effect your readers, and how they respond, this leads into the next stage. Your purpose may be perceived different if you don't take in account who you are talking to. Along with your purpose is your stance. If you don't stand by what you're saying, how will others? Stay strong in what you believe and don't worry about changing for others. Make sure your stance is justified though. Context is a strong tool that can help prove your point, or completely destroy it. Do your homework! Lastly is your medium and design. Make sure that your medium is works the best for your audience and purpose you are trying to portray.

Ultimately, as a functioning human being you use this process daily. Everything you write or say goes through this filter. Yes, at times you might miss a step or two because you aren't thinking of consequences. But to get your view across most effectively, run through this filter to make sure you are saying the right things to the right people.