For this blog post I have written a midterm reflection for myself in 3rd person. The purpose of this reflection is to make me better for the rest of the course. To help me write this reflection I used the reading Genres in Academic Writing: Reflection
It is the end of week eight in this English Composition Course. That means half of the semester has gone by. For half of a semester Ani Tapia has had many experiences. He has also learned many things from these experiences. One thing Ani has learned about are symbols. To help him learn he read the reading “Hills Like White Elephants” (Ernest Hemingway). While reading this Ani was able to see the symbols Ernest Hemingway used. For example, he saw that Ernest used a table to symbolise an operating table, or gray clouds to symbolise a bad event. However even with readings like this, Ani struggles to stay consistent on developing symbols in his writings. Some of his writings have clear symbols, while others don’t. An example of when Ani used symbols was in his blog post titled “Composing a Present Scene with Dialogue and Symbolism”. In this post Ani used a broken wheel on a shopping cart to symbolise his tendency to easily give up. On other writings Ani struggles to develop a good symbol. For example, in his blog post titled “Composing a Past Scene” he tries to symbolise the crumbled relationship between him and his mother by using crumbled green grass, and green symbolising growth. Another thing he struggled with was finding topics to write about. Since most of his writing has been about his life, he has struggled to come up with topics other find interesting and read instead of skipping through. This has resulted in last minute topic changes in more than 95% of his blog post including his narrative project. Fortunately, it hasn't all been negative. There have been some positive experiences. Throughout the course a main learning topic has been creating scenes. Through readings like “Making Scenes in Memoir” (Lee Martin) Ani has learned that to make a scene requires using sensory details. He’s also learned that to get a reader's attention, he has to start his writings by diving straight to the scene and giving context later. Ani has shown this growth through out his blog posts and narrative project. In his early blog posts like “Presentation Day” didn’t dive straight to the scene but rather begin by describing the setting. This is not the case with his narrative project in which Ani goes right in. Going forward, Ani has made a couple of intrinsic goals for himself. His first goal is to keep practicing the stuff he struggled with in the first half of the semester. This includes developing more symbols in his writings. Another goal is to find better motivation. Ani has missed a couple of deadlines this semester which shows that his current motivations might not be enough. These were Ani Tapia’s experiences through out the first semester.
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I have made a found poem for this blog post. A found poem is made by taking words or phrases from text and arranging them to forum a poem. I used my narrative project to for the poem. My narrative project is about how I became shy. OH PLEASE DON’T BE ME, PLEASE DON’T BE ME!!!” I was saying to myself. “Ani” she called out, “Come up to the board.” I felt my heart drop to and my cheeks turn red. “NOOO” I was eight years old. It was 3rd grade in Berat Albania in 2008, and the 2nd day of English class. It wasn't a class where you would learn about literature and read books. It was a class where you would learn to speak the English language. Facing in front of me stood my English teacher. She was blond, skinny, tall, and in her 20’s. To the right of me was a big classroom of 25 people and they were all staring at me. With an upset look on her face she asked me “Pse je vone dhe pa uniformen” (Why are you late and without your uniform?) “Sepse po bie shi perjashta” (Because it’s raining outside.) “Edhe cha pastaj, ata nuk jan vone.” (So what, they’re not late.), she says pointing at the rest of the class. “Ata jan ne koh” (They’re on time.) “Me fal” (I’m sorry.) As I looked down at the floor feeling sad I felt her pen smacking the top of my head. “Kjo nuk lejohet” (This is unacceptable.), she said, “Shko mbrapa classes dhe ri tek cepi” (Go in the back and stand in the corner for the rest of class.) As I walked embarrassed to the back I heard her tell the class “ Mendon nga qe po iken ne Americ, mund te bej cfar te doj.” (Thinks he can do whatever he wants cause he’s moving to America.) “ Nuk eshte e vertet ”(That’s not true.) “ Qepe gojen dhe vashdo “ (Keep your mouth shut and keep moving) Later in the class the teacher started to call out students to write draw and write the name of shapes in English. I knew some shapes but not all so I was hoping I wouldn’t get picked. I felt my heart drop and my cheeks turn red as she said “Ani… ajde visato dhe skrual rethin ne Anglisht tek drasa.” (Ani.. Come draw and write the circle on the board in English) “MOS” (Oh no!), I said to myself. “Un sedih cfare eshte rrethi ne Anglisht” (I don’t know what a circle is in English.) I went up to the board barely moving my body and grabbed the chalk and drew a circle. Not knowing what to write below it I took a guess. Lookin at what I wrote the teacher said “ Aje serioshizht? Ti shkruaj katror, Square esthe katror jo reth o budalla.” (Are you serious? You wrote square. Square is a square not a circle you idiot.) I was so uncomfortable not just by this, but by the sound of laughter coming from the class. She then said something that I remember clearly to this day “ Wow, dhe ti do ikesh ne Amerik.”(Wow, and you’re moving to America.) With a tear rolling down my eye I walked back to the back of the class. Do you think the narrative provides enough descriptive language to create a compelling found poem? not really If not, how do you plan to revise the descriptive language in the narrative? I plan to look at the words I used and find better synnonims for them. Do you think the descriptive language more so creates a setting or delivers the subtext of a theme? I think it creates a setting but not much of a theme. In revision, will you focus on using description to develop more of the setting or more of a theme? I will focus on using description to develop more of a theme. In class my classmates presented their scenes. After hearing feedback, I made some changes to my own past scene. The scene in this blog post is the revision of a scene I made in a previous post titled “Composing a past scene.” If you would like to read the original, then click here.
A sudden feeling of da-dum..da-dum..da-dum went across my chest as I noticed her right index finger facing toward it on the wall. “What’s this?” she said. It was a cold windy afternoon in an otherwise clear sunny day in 2007. I was seven years old. At the time my family and I were living in an apartment in Berat, Albania. We were on the 2nd floor. “Alright, here you go” my mom said as she rested the plate on the table in front of me. It was green peas. A meal I enjoy today, but back then, my tongue just couldn't stand it. It didn’t matter who cooked it. Seeing a disgusted look on my face my mom added “That plate better be empty when I get back” as she closed the door. I grabbed my spoon and tasted it. “Ew!!” Just chewing on them left a bad taste. “Ughhh, how am I going to finish this?”, I said to myself. Then an idea came to me. I went and opened the window in the living room. I looked down to see nice green grass surrounding the building. “This is brilliant.” I say to myself. I came back to the kitchen to grab the plate. As I was walking toward the window I notice that I spilled some juice on the floor. I put the plate on a table, grabbed a napkin, and cleaned up the stain. “Phew”, I said to myself as I threw the napkin on the green trash can, “Good thing I noticed that.” I continued towards the window and felt a light breeze come in as I opened it. I grab the plate and gently tilt it over. The sound of those peas hitting the grass shocked me a little as it was coming to me what I was doing. It didn’t stop me tho. I continued until the plate was empty and that the only thing remaining were the stains around it that showed it previously contained something. I closed the window and put the plate back on the table. About twenty minutes later I hear the front door open as my mom came back. After we greet each other she asked “Did you finish?” “Of course” “The whole thing?” “Uhuhh” “Let me see” I grabbed the plate and tilted it for her to see. “Good job!”, she said. A couple of hours passed. I was in my room doing homework when I hear my mom call “Ani!” “Yeah” “Come here!” I left my room and went to the kitchen. to see my mom by the window pointing at something below it on the wall. I could feel the left side of my chest beating as my heart was racing. It was a stain. “What is this?” she asked. “Umm… I don’t…. Um… I don’t know.” “It’s a stain. It smells like peas. Did… Did you dump them outside?” “No” “Don’t lie to me” “No” “You swear?” “Yes” “So if I go outside I won’t find them?” “Yes.” There was a brief pause. Then she said “Okay.” I felt a bit of relief that I got away with it. It was short last hoewer as I saw my mom putting on her coat and leaving. She came back a few minutes later. I can’t remember what I saw first: the anger on her face, or green peas covered by crumbled blades of green grass sitting in her right glove. “You lied to me!” she said. With tears rolling down my face I cried “I’m sorry!” “Why would you lie” “I don’t know, it didn't taste good.” “I don’t care if it didn’t taste good! It’s healthy and you should if ate it.” “Okay!” “There are people out there begging to eat not only do you just toss it, but you lied to me about it.” “I’m sorry.” A tear rolled down her left eye as she said “I can’t believe you lied to me.” To help me write this post I listened to the podcast What You Don't Know (Lulu Wang) ,and read My Name is Margaret. For this blog post I’m practicing writing a scene from my past in which I made two decisions that had a negative impact. The scene takes place in Albania. I didn’t speak English back then so the dialogue was spoken in Albanian. Hoewer I have translated it.
It was a cold afternoon in 2007. I was seven years old. At the time my family and I were living in an apartment in Berat, Albania. We were on the 2nd floor. “Alright, here you go” my mom said as she rested the plate on the table in front of me. It was peas. A meal I enjoy today, but back then, my tongue just couldn't stand it. It didn’t matter who cooked it. Seeing my disgust my my mom added “That plate better be empty when I get back” as she closed the door. I grabbed my spoon and tasted it. “Ew!!” Just chewing on them left a bad taste. I said to myself “Ughhh, how am I going to finish this?” Then an idea came to me. I went and opened the window in the living room. I looked down to see grass surrounding the building. “This is brilliant.” I say to myself. I came back to the kitchen to grab the plate. As I was walking toward the window I notice that I spilled some juice on the floor. I put the plate on a table, grabbed a napkin, cleaned up the stain and continued to the window. I felt a light breeze come in as I opened it. I grab the plate and gently tilt it over. I hear the peas flying down. The sound of it hitting the grass shocked me a little as it was coming to me what I was doing. This didn’t stop me tho. I continued until the plate was empty and there was nothing left except the stains around it that showed it previously contained something. I close the window and put the plate back on the table. About twenty minutes later I hear the front door open as my mom came back. After we greet each other she asks “Did you finish?” “Yes” “The whole thing?” “Uhuhh” “Let me see” I grabbed the plate and tilted it for her to see. Seeing it’s empty she smiled and said “Good job!” A couple of hours passed. I was in my room doing homework when I hear my mom call me. “Ani!” “Yeah” “Come here!” I left my room and went to the kitchen to see my mom by the window pointing at something below it on the wall. I could feel the left side of my chest beating as my heart was racing. It was a stain. “What is this?” she asked. “Umm… I don’t…. Um… I don’t know.” “It’s a stain. It smells like peas. Did… Did you dump them outside?” “No” “Don’t lie to me” “No” “You swear?” “Yes” “So if I go outside I won’t find them?” “Yes” “Okay” I felt a bit of relief that I got away with it. It was short last hoewer as I saw my mom putting on her coat and leaving. She came back a few minutes later. I can’t remember what I say first: the anger on her face, or grass and peas in her right glove. “You lied to me!” she said. With tears rolling down my face I cried “I’m sorry!” “Why would you lie” “I don’t know, it didn't taste good.” “I don’t care if it didn’t taste good! It’s healthy and you should if ate it.” “Okay!” “There are people out there begging to eat not only do you just toss it, but you lied to me about it.” “I’m sorry.” A tear rolled down her left eye as she said “I can’t believe you lied to me.” It took her a long time to forgive me. |
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