Midterm Assignment

Part 1 (Letter)


Dear Friend
          So much as gone on in my English 1102 class since this semester has begun. As usual Ms. Ingram has given us an assignment that's mainly about ourselves, which I love. The topic of our first paper was "What's it like to be You?" and I thoroughly enjoyed writing that piece. I was able to reflect a lot on my past, and was given the opportunity to gather my thoughts, prior achievements, and struggles, to supply a potential reader with facts about myself. Also, I learned a very important aspect about writing that I've never realized before. That realization was that while you write, you're actually having a conversation with the reader. You have to formulate your paper as if you're discussing something and you have to present factual evidence supporting your claims, just like a real argument in person. I think it's useful to know this because if you want to effectively get your claim and message across to the reader, you have to be able to know how to do it. Also, this semester we've had a lot more reading as compared to last semester. So far, we've read a book called Peace Butter & Jelly written by David Mark Seidel, one of Ms. Ingram's good friends. The book talks about his life story and has recipes in it that David loves to cook. I also feel like the reading quizzes that Ms. Ingram now assigns has helped to keep me in check with my reading. Last semester when we weren't held accountable for our readings, I wasn't as compelled to complete the reading. But now that there is a possibility that we'll be quizzed on what we read, I've taken it a lot more seriously. I never thought that I'd have a blog ever in my life as you may know. Our latest assignment was a research project in which we had to create a blog and update it weekly with our current progress and thoughts on it. With this blog, I was able to see how much I improved throughout the project, and was able to view other student's blog posts to get an idea on what they're doing as well. I really liked how it was really easy for other student's to give me feedback on my thoughts by just commenting below my blog. Everything went smoothly and although I was a bit skeptical at first, I really enjoyed completing my blog. Overall English 1102 has been a really educational and enjoyable class so far, I hope you'll have the same experience as I did in this class when you take it next year!




Sincerely,
Tim Tran








Part 2 (Major Assignment Reflection)


          The piece that I'm choosing to reflect upon is the Annotated Bib/Blogger assignment. As I stated above in my letter to a friend, I was extremely skeptical at first due to the fact that I've never done a blog before, and I didn't really know what it was all about. For this assignment, we were told to pick a controversial or interesting debatable topic regarding health in which we could formulate an argumentative paper with. At first my topic for this assignment was "Is it Really Worth It to Take Performance Enhancing Drugs?" but because I've already done a short paper about that topic in high school, I wanted to branch out more and research something entirely new that I knew nothing about. So I chose to write about whether traditional anti-bacterial hand soap or hand sanitizer was better.  Due to the fact of the more and more activities I'm involved in now that I'm in college, there's a much greater chance that I'll come into contact with bacteria and germs. My paper will be addressing the general public which would include but not be limited to my fellow peers, adults, and other youth who may be concerned about their health. While writing this paper, I had to fine-tune my researching skills as well as relearning how to properly cite sources so I wouldn't be accused of plagiarism. This paper has been relatively easy so far for me because I have a lot of interest in my topic, and no roadblocks have made be stumble along the way yet. So far from writing this, I've learned how soap and hand sanitizers work and how to maximize their efficiency to kill bacteria while washing my hands. Another thing that I found out was that I myself am guilty of not washing my hands long enough for bacteria to be killed, and that was quickly addressed. For this piece, I would expect a reader to learn that whenever water and soap are available, use them instead of hand sanitizers. Hand sanitizers only kill bacteria but do not removable surface grime, dirt, and other solid matters away from your hands like traditional soap and water would. For my final portfolio, I think I'll revise some of my blogs and answer the topic questions a lot more thoroughly. 






Part 3 (Viewpoint on Peace Butter & Jelly)


         I feel like Peace Butter & Jelly was an easy but yet enjoyable read. This book illustrates a good example of a nice book for students to be able to ease into the mindset for English 1102. Also, since the author of the book is local, you would be able to ask David himself to come in and discuss the book with the class like you did this semester, which I enjoyed.






Part 4 (Haiku)


Enjoying English,
Never thought it would happen...
But it really did!

Assignment #4

From doing this blog, I've been able to gather myself more completely as a writer. Due to the fact that I'm able to share thoughts and view other student's viewpoints, it helps me to formulate my paper. With this blog, I was able to track my progress while working on this research assignment and show me how I've improved along the way. Based off my first two blog assignments, a reader could tell my change in interest and topic change and follow my thought process on exactly why I made the decision to change my topic. A cool thing about blogging is that it's a virtual pathway for ideas to be shared by everyone. Anyone in the world right now could be viewing my thoughts and information posted, and maybe even use it in their own research material. Finally, I like the input standpoint of blogging. People can provide input and feedback right after you post a blog which is a plus because you'll know exactly where people stand regarding your ideas. That'll help you to edit and format your paper to excellence!

Assignment #3

1) Due to the fact that my topic is about personal hygiene/sanitation, I believe that everyone should be an audience of my argument. Everyone should be informed about which is better soap or hand sanitizer, so they'll make the right decision on choosing which one to use when it comes time to clean their hands. With the rapid increase of diseases and the ease of which they spread, knowing what effectively kills the bacteria that lead to these diseases makes my topic timely. I care about this topic because this has been something that I've been wondering about for awhile. It's extremely convenient to just carry around a little bottle of hand sanitizer to use when need be, but is it really that effective? I've always questioned that if something is too easy, it's too good to be true. Back in high school, most of the assigned writings that I complete I felt like they were just assigned for busy work. Teachers had a curriculum to follow and just threw in random writing assignments in order to meet the criteria. But now in college, I've realized that it's all about me. Teachers in college are trying to bring the best out of people, and the best way for a student to excel is when they're doing something that they care about.


2) With my research so far, I've been able to find two contrasting viewpoints. One viewpoint is from the people who use soap and anti-bacteria soap religiously, while on the other hand, another group of people are plain lazy and prefer to use hand sanitizer over soaps.


3) One interesting thing that I've learned about my topic this week is that, in certain conditions hand sanitizers may actually increase the amount of bacteria instead of killing it. I've learned that one should not procrastinate when it comes to researching, a lot of information is out there but deciphering between what is useful or not takes a good bit of time.


4) I commented on Natna Meskel's blog.

Assignment #2

2/12/12

• Tell us about the most interesting source you've found so far. What type of source is it? What's the title, and who is the author? Why is it interesting? Give us a brief summary of the source, in 5-6 sentences.
• As you've been researching, has your topic changed? Have you revised your inquiry question?  For instance, say your initial question was "Why do some people choose to be vegetarian?" As you've been researching, you've realized how you can narrow your scope to something like "Is it healthy for vegetarian parents to raise their children as vegetarians?" OR "In what ways is being vegetarian better for the environment?" How will narrowing your scope affect your research -and the eventual writing you'll do about this topic?
• What challenges are you facing in your research? How might you address these challenges? What research "tips" do you have for your peers?

Since my last blog post, I've decided to change my topic to " Is hand sanitizer or soap more effective to use to wash your hands". I find this more interesting and because sanitation is a huge issue in todays world, people should know whether or not that quick scrub of hand sanitizer is really effective. So far I've stumbled upon a website called biology.about.com. The article is written by Regina Bailey and it highlights what hand sanitizer mainly does, which is that it merely strips off the outer oil layer of your skin among other things. This apparently prevents the bacteria present in the body to come to the surface of your hand. Also, this article talks about how a manufacturers claim of being able to remove 99.9% of bacteria with hand sanitizer is false. These manufacturers use an inanimate surface to test their product instead of an actual human hand. Thus being able to make that claim. On the bottom of this source, there are also links to many other sources I can potentially use to find more information. So far I haven't faced any challenges with my research, and I hope it remains that way.

Assignment #1

2/7/12


-What is your research question/inquiry question? 
-Why did you settle on this question? What interests you about the topic? Explain.
-How is your question/topic timely? Why is it important to address this topic? Why should people care about it?
-What do you expect to find in your research? What preliminary research have you done that makes you expect this?
-Are you coming across scholars w/ different answers to your question, or different views of your topic? (If you're NOT and people seem to all agree, then your research question and topic probably aren't worth pursuing, right?) Explain what these answers/views are that you are finding. (Remember that our textbook warns us of the dangers of binary thinking on pg. 6.)What do you think about the different viewpoints? Where do you stand on the issue, and do you think your mind could change the further you get into this semester-long inquiry?
-Any questions or concerns you'd like to address?


For this assignment, I would like to inquire about the short and long term effects of performance enhancing drugs on the human body. I settled on this question because of my recent endeavors at the gym. I've seen many documentaries on people who've used performance enhancing drugs such as steroids, and now I would like to know more. I feel that not enough spotlight is put on this topic so a lot of the younger generation may start taking them, without knowing all the harmful effects they have on the body. I expect to find a lot of the negative affects as well as some positive affects that these enhancers may have on the body. I haven't done any preliminary research, but based off prior knowledge from documentaries and such, I have come to conclude that these drugs are negative. I believe that people should not take performance enhancing drugs because it gives them an unfair advantage over those that don't and it's morally wrong. I still wonder what exactly goes on in the body when these drugs are taken.


                                                                            Tim Tran