Reflective Letter
When I first began this course, I was unsure of what to expect. Though I have seen how writing has grown from Writing, Research and Technology with the creation of my website, blogging, and various assignments that I published.
When the first class began, we had to create our own website to put all of our assignments online. This was the first time I had ever created a site, and I found that there are so many different ways to publish my work online. My website, www.nicoleczaja.weebly.com, was very easy to create and manage and I had a lot of fun with the process. It was different from the traditional papers we have to hand in, where we could not add graphic elements, pictures, videos and audio. It was nice to be able to explore those options within my work. Though I did experience some difficulties when using the site in editing where I had lost some of my work. I quickly learned to always type everything into Microsoft word and paste it into the website editor. I also had some trouble with publishing my work online and public as I mentioned within my blogg titled public vs. private www.nicoleczaja.weebly.com/blogg. Though I basically tried editing so many times before I would go to publish but after awhile it became easier. Then I began to feel more comfortable with my writing and sharing it online as well.
Then we started working on the twitterive which was an assignment I knew that I would really enjoy doing. I already had a twitter account from one of my last technology courses though I did not really use it. The twitpic was something that was new to me, but It was not hard to get used to with the application right on my phone. It was interesting to actually tweet our observations or thoughts. It started becoming more aware of the little details within nature and relating them to my life. The actual place I observed at was a park, but after a lot of thought its about finding a happiness. That no matter how bad things may seem at the time, they could always be worse. Through that assignment I learned to focus on the positive things… And I think the only problem I struggled with was that it was very personal to me, and it was something I was going through at the time that made it difficult. Even though I knew that it still helped me overall to grow as a writer. Also, with the assignment being mulitmodal, it allowed me to explore my creativity. In result of that I found how much I like writing poetry and it will be something that I keep up with.
Then our next assignment was oral history, I immediately thought that I would like to interview my grandmother. It would be a great way to know more things about her that we wouldn't always necessarily discuss. I started out discussing the assignment with her, and let her know about the three interviews and some details. At first I was unsure of what I direction that I wanted to take. So, I began with some questions about literacy because I think it would be interesting with the difference in generations she has experienced. I found out a lot of interesting information, however she did not recall much information on the beginning of her literacy. Then from there that led into a discussion on technology which I found the differences to be interesting. My first Interview discussed what it was like growing up with when she did not have a phone in her house until she was 18, and other things I never really thought of since I always felt she was in the technology of today.
The most rewarding aspect about conducting these interviews was that it was a chance for me to find out more information about my grandmother. We had a close relationship when I was growing up, but over the years have lost touch. It was interesting to hear about many details from her past, and her greatest childhood memory. It brought to my attention the differences in our generation compared to when she was growing up. I felt that sometimes as we were talking, we would get carried away and stray off topic. So trying to get the right information I was looking for was somewhat of a challenge. Though the most difficult aspect I found when conducting my interviews was making sure I was recording all of the data properly. My first interview was in person and handwritten, and that felt unorganized and all over the place with my notes. Since then she has went to Florida, and I wanted to be able to record the interviews. So, then I went to purchase a voice recorder and just had her answer my questions that way. Then uploading that to the site was another story! The end result was to purchase Weebly pro… that was the only way I could figure out how to get it onto the site.
The collaborative research project was interesting, and it came out better than I thought it would. With our process, my group and I first decided on what our primary research question would be that we all wanted to investigate. We found a lot of interesting ideas with the film Food, Inc. that we watched in class. Then when we had an idea in mind for our primary research question, we came up with our others as well collectively. The we figured out how we wanted to work together to write the paper and divided it up into subtopics between each of us, and I thought that it worked out very nicely. Then we each focused in on our portion writing about two pages each. After that was completed, we then meant up and put everything together reviewing what we all had written and completing the paper as a whole to make sure it all sounded good with what we added. The last thing we did was work on our bibliography and published it to our site.
I think that the product of our collaborative research project came out pretty well, but it's still a work in progress. I think that I learned a lot from doing the research on the topic as well as coming together with my group to hear what they found out. One things I learned from this assignment was how the animals were really being treated, and its something that you never really think of when it comes to buying food. Factory farming is more about getting production faster and cheaper but there are no true concern of health. They put antibiotics to help the animals be free from disease but it still has an effect within our food. Some other things like what the workers go through and the laws they have in place to protect the consumers. Overall, I think that we answered our research question and the group worked very well together.
Though my journey as a writer is still continuing and there is always room for improvement. I learned many things this semester that I can carry with me into my future writing courses and utilize the tools in technology.
When the first class began, we had to create our own website to put all of our assignments online. This was the first time I had ever created a site, and I found that there are so many different ways to publish my work online. My website, www.nicoleczaja.weebly.com, was very easy to create and manage and I had a lot of fun with the process. It was different from the traditional papers we have to hand in, where we could not add graphic elements, pictures, videos and audio. It was nice to be able to explore those options within my work. Though I did experience some difficulties when using the site in editing where I had lost some of my work. I quickly learned to always type everything into Microsoft word and paste it into the website editor. I also had some trouble with publishing my work online and public as I mentioned within my blogg titled public vs. private www.nicoleczaja.weebly.com/blogg. Though I basically tried editing so many times before I would go to publish but after awhile it became easier. Then I began to feel more comfortable with my writing and sharing it online as well.
Then we started working on the twitterive which was an assignment I knew that I would really enjoy doing. I already had a twitter account from one of my last technology courses though I did not really use it. The twitpic was something that was new to me, but It was not hard to get used to with the application right on my phone. It was interesting to actually tweet our observations or thoughts. It started becoming more aware of the little details within nature and relating them to my life. The actual place I observed at was a park, but after a lot of thought its about finding a happiness. That no matter how bad things may seem at the time, they could always be worse. Through that assignment I learned to focus on the positive things… And I think the only problem I struggled with was that it was very personal to me, and it was something I was going through at the time that made it difficult. Even though I knew that it still helped me overall to grow as a writer. Also, with the assignment being mulitmodal, it allowed me to explore my creativity. In result of that I found how much I like writing poetry and it will be something that I keep up with.
Then our next assignment was oral history, I immediately thought that I would like to interview my grandmother. It would be a great way to know more things about her that we wouldn't always necessarily discuss. I started out discussing the assignment with her, and let her know about the three interviews and some details. At first I was unsure of what I direction that I wanted to take. So, I began with some questions about literacy because I think it would be interesting with the difference in generations she has experienced. I found out a lot of interesting information, however she did not recall much information on the beginning of her literacy. Then from there that led into a discussion on technology which I found the differences to be interesting. My first Interview discussed what it was like growing up with when she did not have a phone in her house until she was 18, and other things I never really thought of since I always felt she was in the technology of today.
The most rewarding aspect about conducting these interviews was that it was a chance for me to find out more information about my grandmother. We had a close relationship when I was growing up, but over the years have lost touch. It was interesting to hear about many details from her past, and her greatest childhood memory. It brought to my attention the differences in our generation compared to when she was growing up. I felt that sometimes as we were talking, we would get carried away and stray off topic. So trying to get the right information I was looking for was somewhat of a challenge. Though the most difficult aspect I found when conducting my interviews was making sure I was recording all of the data properly. My first interview was in person and handwritten, and that felt unorganized and all over the place with my notes. Since then she has went to Florida, and I wanted to be able to record the interviews. So, then I went to purchase a voice recorder and just had her answer my questions that way. Then uploading that to the site was another story! The end result was to purchase Weebly pro… that was the only way I could figure out how to get it onto the site.
The collaborative research project was interesting, and it came out better than I thought it would. With our process, my group and I first decided on what our primary research question would be that we all wanted to investigate. We found a lot of interesting ideas with the film Food, Inc. that we watched in class. Then when we had an idea in mind for our primary research question, we came up with our others as well collectively. The we figured out how we wanted to work together to write the paper and divided it up into subtopics between each of us, and I thought that it worked out very nicely. Then we each focused in on our portion writing about two pages each. After that was completed, we then meant up and put everything together reviewing what we all had written and completing the paper as a whole to make sure it all sounded good with what we added. The last thing we did was work on our bibliography and published it to our site.
I think that the product of our collaborative research project came out pretty well, but it's still a work in progress. I think that I learned a lot from doing the research on the topic as well as coming together with my group to hear what they found out. One things I learned from this assignment was how the animals were really being treated, and its something that you never really think of when it comes to buying food. Factory farming is more about getting production faster and cheaper but there are no true concern of health. They put antibiotics to help the animals be free from disease but it still has an effect within our food. Some other things like what the workers go through and the laws they have in place to protect the consumers. Overall, I think that we answered our research question and the group worked very well together.
Though my journey as a writer is still continuing and there is always room for improvement. I learned many things this semester that I can carry with me into my future writing courses and utilize the tools in technology.
