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This week we did even more preparation for the AP test. It was similar to the last time, but it was more extensive. We did nothing the whole week except for this. It was kind of like a cycle. We would start out by taking the question portion of the test, then score it. After that we would do some work with looking at other essays and scoring them or just whatever we had planned that day, then we would actually write an essay. I believe we wrote three all together that week. I got the sixes and sevens on my essays, which is not a terrible score but it wasn't great. And for the question portion, the first time we took it I scored terribly, somewhere around the low twenties. The next few times we took it my score just rose and rose, and ended up in the high thirties, which is still not that great of a score. But at the end of the week when we used the AP test calculator it said that with those results I would have scored a four on the test, although I'm not sure if I believe that. I feel as though if I pass the test, it will for sure be with a three. But in all I am thankful for this prep week. I have learned just about how long it takes to write each essay to the best of my ability, so I can pace myself for the test. And I also have developed a few strategies for the question portion of the test as well that are specific to me. In the end I found this week to be extremely helpful and this website, http://study.com/academy/lesson/how-to-focus-your-essay-and-respond-to-the-essay-prompt.html is definitely helpful to me personally, but might benefit a few other people.
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This week we finished up our multimodal presentations and presented them to the class. To take the pressure off of us, we got to show our presentation in groups instead of going up in front of the whole class to present. I'm not sure it made a difference for most people but it didn't matter much to me. This project I think was one of the harder ones we've done, at least in my opinion. I wasn't in charge of the writing, but I was in charge of creating the website and designing it. It took me forever. I am not a computer savvy person by any means. All I can do is turn it on and use its basic functions. Maybe download a few things but outside of that it's like walking through a maze for me. So to sum it up I had a fun time wandering in circles trying to figure out how to make the website do this, or that but I ended up figuring out with a few google searches. This project in the end though was one of the most fun for me. After the frustration with the technical issues had passed I had fun being able to design the website and make it look tasteful and pretty. But I do believe we had way too much time to work on the project. I often found myself slacking off just because of how much time we had left to work on the project, that I don't think anybody was in a rush to finish. But like I said earlier, this for sure had to be one of my more favorite projects. This website, http://www.howdesign.com/how-to-design-a-web-page/ definitely helped me throughout this project.
This week our class started to prepare for the AP Lit test, even though most of the class wasn't taking it. We started out by reviewing other written essays, and judge how they would be scored based off of the writing. Most of the ones I scored I got right, and it was easy to see what constituted a high score, and visa versa. We then started taking mock tests, instead of writing the essays. I would like to say I did fairly well on them and that they were useful for the insight they gave me, to know what type of questions would be on the AP test. Then finally we started writing essays. We would then give them to our peers to score and judge, which I'm not sure that it was an accurate way to score our papers, even though we had an idea of what paper got what score. With the AP test coming up I find the time that we spent this week invaluable, because for myself personally, I am not a great test taker. And when it comes to writing essays, I tend to see things in a different light than other people, summing up my essay response "wrong". A lot of why I took this class though was to save money for the future. I am hoping that I get at least a three on the test. Even if I didn't, I wouldn't say my time here was wasted. I learned a lot that in the future will come to help me when I write or in any of my English classes. In all though, I am happy that I took this class, even if I don't happen to get a passing score. This website, https://www.ivywise.com/ivywise-knowledgebase/newsletter/article/tips-to-prepare-for-ap-exams/ definitely helps on how to prepare and study for upcoming AP tests. This week we have worked solely on our Pecha Kutcha presentations, and it has been extremely helpful. We have not necessarily learned much in the way of classroom learning or from books, but how to prepare and present. I find these kinds of projects extremely helpful, mostly because all of my previous High School classes haven't dealt much with public speaking or public presentations. That's why I appreciate having projects like these to help prepare me for future public speaking opportunities, or for my future career. It's also interesting to research a topic we got to choose, it just makes the project that much more enjoyable and easier to get through, instead of researching something that you could care less about. I chose to study "How oppression leads people to make radical decisions". Weather or not that was a specific enough topic, I decided to go with it anyways. The two books I read was Great Expectations by Charles Dickens and Beloved by Toni Morrison. The two books could not have been more different in context, but the climaxes were the same that related to my proposal. I enjoyed reading the books and it took me no time at all to get through them, and has definitely made this project that much easier to do. I also appreciated the chance to be able to use this type of presentation format, especially since I have never heard of it before. This website, http://cmmr.usc.edu//Pecha_Kucha_TipsResourcesExamples.pdf along with the ones given to the rest of the class definitely helped me in creating my Petcha Kutcha and I cannot wait to present my very own. This week we did not do much in the way of learning. For the most part the week consisted of the class finishing up their video projects, and then presenting. I found the project to be quite fun in the end. I prefer the video project to an essay anyday, anytime. I've never done something like it before, so now not only have I acquired new skills for the future, I had a pretty enjoyable time doing it. When we watched each others videos it was interesting to see what others believed in. Some of the videos were very personal, while others not so much. But when it came time for mine, I could not have been anymore embarrassed. Sharing something so personal, then to add a personal story on top of it was hard for me to do, because those are things I don't usually show or tell to people, let alone a class full of my peers. In the end though, I'm glad that I had this experience with video editing. I've never used video editing before, and now I know the basics. That's probably more along the line of what I learned this week, how to be more tech savvy. It took me a while to get the hang of the We Video editor though, especially when I went home and there was no one else to help me. This website, http://www.thirddegreeadv.com/4-tips-for-video-projects talks about how to creat a compelling video, and I will definitely keep this article in mind for the future.
This week we have been working on our multi media videos with our I believe project. I have not had a project or writing assignment that has been this personal. I am excited to make the video, but scared to let other people watch. It's a little unnerving to let so many people see such a personal belief, but then again that's probably what everyone else is thinking. I based my paper/ video around, "I believe that everything is going to be ok". This is a true belief of my and I couldn't have gotten through a lot of things without telling myself that. This project is definitely new ground for me. I had no clue how to use We Video, but now I have somewhat of an idea, and I also wasn't sure how to convey story through media, but after this project it's made me more confident. Then again I have immensely enjoyed this project. It's also been easier than the others, as the rubric is a little less strict than the others, and doesn't require professional writing. This project has also been very fun. I don't think I've enjoyed any other project as much as this one, because obviously it is more interesting. All the other projects is, sit down on a computer, type up something acceptable and call it good, whereas this project lets you interject your own personality into this project. This website, https://tools4students.wikispaces.com/Video+Projects gives tips on how to creat a compelling digital story, and has also given me just a few more tools to use in this project. I'm excited to see what everyone else has done with their projects next week, as well as to show off mine.
This week, we learned how to create a story in various ways. We were asked to pick a ted talk video out of five or six. I picked "The Mystery box" by J. J. Abrams. His basic point that he was trying to get across to the audience is that to get the audience, there needs to be some mystery. Leaving that unsaid or unsolvable question up to the listener, reader or watcher to decide or ponder on is what really draws them in. It's what lets the audience relate to the piece by filling in the blank with something that can relate to them. That's how J. J. Abrams tells a story, by letting the audience decide. He also used a great analogy. When he was a child, he visited a magic shop. That day he bought a "mystery box" with something magic related inside. But something compelled him that day to not open the box, and to this day he still hasn't. He constantly wonders what's inside the box, but to him that's what makes it exciting. I found that to be somewhat inspiring. Abrams seems to make story telling easy, but also gave great tips for people aspiring to be writers. When I write now I tend to think about the Ted talk, and make sure to incorporate that "mystery" factor that J. J. Abrams talked about. This link here, http://www.copyblogger.com/capture-reader-attention/ talks about how to capture an audience even further. I hope this week has improved my writing skills. These past few weeks we have done not so much learning but preparing for our projects, and in the end our presentations. But the things I did learn about were more so skills and studying techniques that helped get me through this project. I learned to decipher what was important information and what was not. My group picked psychoanalytical theory, and psychology is basically an endless void. There are so many theories and concepts, and each one is more complex than the previous. It was a challenge to go through the theories we chose and decide what about that theory would help our presentation and what would not. We especially had to be picky about what information we chose to present to our audience, because most of them do not know anything about the theories we chose. We had to be able to word them in a way to get the audience to understand the theories is a two minute span so they would understand the applications to MacBeth our group was trying to make. We also learned about time management. With five snow days during this project we had to keep rerouting our plans to be able to make the dead line. The final obstacle our group had to overcome was managing on the fly. The night before our group mate told us she would not be there for the presentation, so my group mate and I the next morning on the fly had to reroute the game plan we had set up for the presentation, and we ended up doing very well in the end. Here is a website that talks about how to prepare and present so that you end up with a successful presentation. http://www.garrreynolds.com/preso-tips/. .This week we have not necessarily done much learning, but more so with our own endeavors and with our group mates. We have been working on our Shakespearian project, and depending on which play you chose, you either have King Lear or Macbeth; and I chose Macbeth. To say the least, it is a very very interesting play. Seeing Macbeth slowly transform into a completely different, as well as insane, man was pretty watchable. For our proposal we chose to do pshychoanalitical theory, and there is an endless amount of usable information to put into our presentation from Macbeth, there's just no end to all the pshycology packed into the play. But as easy as it is to find information, I personally have found it extremely hard to put it all together in a way that makes sense, and flows seamlessly throughout the project. I'm gratefull to have group mates to work through this with, it makes it much easier. Although this project has given me an insight on to more than one subject. Taking a look into what makes a pshycoanalitical theory led me to another road full of information that I never knew about, things like Lacan's and Freud's theory. Being able to go into depth on this and actually utilize them in the project was a lot of fun to me. In the end I'm positive that we will make it through the project with a decent grade, but for now I'm finding it very difficult to make it through the piece. Attatched here is a website, http://www.apsa.org/content/psychoanalytic-theory-approaches. It goes more into depth on what pshycolitical theory is and how it works. this week in class we did not do much learning, but we have been watching the plays Macbeth and King Leer. Depending on which play we chose, we watched one or the other, and I happended to choose Macbeth. So far, if I had not spark noted the play or had not had the preview from the teacher, I would not really understand what was going on except that there was a creepy lady and a guy killing people. A lot of it is due to the old English. I have a difficult time understanding old English on the first read, so not having anything here to reference makes this play really hard for me to follow, causing me to look up spark notes once every fifteen minutes or so. But with these resources, I can piece together what is going on, and all in all I am enjoying this play. I will admit though, there are some strange, strange scenes. We were also told that there was said to be actual "dark magic" verses, or something along those lines in this play, and it's supposedly cursed. It's very interesting I think. This play we are watching is also an updated version, set in world war two or somewhere around that time period, although the old English is still there, making it come off a little weird. But in the end it still works. When we finish watching this, I know for a fact I will go through an updated English version to get a better understadning of what is going on. This project is already going to be difficult, let alone with not getting a 100% of the play. This website, http://people.umass.edu/sharris/in/gram/GrammarBook/HistoryOfOE.htmlhttp://people.umass.edu/sharris/in/gram/GrammarBook/HistoryOfOE.html talks about old English and how to understand it, as well as the history behind it. I am very excited to see the end of this play and get started on our new project! |
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