Good Evening Everyone, 

     This blog post for tonight is meant to e a reflection on the entire writing process performed in these last five weeks. These are the four questions we were instructed to answer in this blog. 

1. Do you agree that one opinion is better than another one?

     *I personally do not believe one opinion is better than the other one. If everybody agreed on the same thing then there would be nothing to discuss about. It would be nice for everyone to agree with each other but that would result in nobody having to prove their point. All the different opinions causes the discussion to be interesting. It is nice to have different viewpoints on a topic. 

2. What did you discover in your process of researching?

     *While researching my topic, issues in the American education system, I discovered how bad our education system truly is in the U.S. I knew it wasn't as good as other countries, but I didn't realize how many problems there really are. So many people are unaware of these issues. Also, I found out urban schools are treated the worst because they don't have as much money as other schools. A lot of teachers prefer not to teach in urban schools also because they are so bad. This results in urban schools not having the best teachers there to teach their students. 

3. What was the most challenging problem you faced and how did you fix it?

     *The most challenging problem I faced while writing this paper was narrowing down my thoughts. This topic is something close to my heart since I want to become a teacher. Since I am so passionate about this topic I struggled with not writing a super long essay. I could have talke all day about the issues in the education system but not all readers would want to read that long of an essay. The word count requirement caused me to hit my points but not ramble on and on about them. 

4. After all of this what have you taken away from the experience and what have you learned that you can actually use?

     *The thing that I took the most away from this essay was how much can truly go into writing an essay. A lot of times I would end up writing an essay two nights before its due date. I learned a good essay could take up to five weeks. In the five weeks there are many brainstorming exercises the writer can perform. The more time spent on forming the content of the essay the more pit together and well-written it will usually be. I took away that it pays off to take time on an essay because I feel much more confident in my writing. I believe I feel this way due to how much time and thought I poured into this essay. 

Today for English class we were told to bring a copy of our rough draft for our third essay. First, we exchanged essays with a partner and peer edited them. The point behind this was to make sure the point of our essay we intended to get across was the same as what our partner perceived it to be. After my partner read my rough draft and wrote down what she though my main idea was, I found out it matched up with my intended main idea. Then, we had to tear our rough draft apart by paragraph so all of the paragraphs were separated. We were then instructed to create a discard pile, paragraphs that did not match our main idea, and a keep pile, ones that matched our main idea. All of my paragraphs ended up in a keep pile. Next, we had to read the paragraph and give it a reason for what it does for our main idea. The five things the paragraph could do are: provides important evidence, explains something that is key to understanding what I am trying to say, illustrates a key concept, helps establish the importance of what I am trying to say, and raises a question that I must explore. Lastly, for this blog post we are told to find at least two ways to rearrange our paragraphs and develop two different set-ups. Finally, after this we need to come up with some questions we had for this assignment. 

1) What makes the set-ups different?
     After doing this I was able to see the set-ups are different, because the paragraphs are rearranged in a different order. The order of how information was revealed to the reader was not the same. Personally, liked the way I had the paragraphs arranged in the original copy. I had already thought about this while writing my rough draft the first time. There were transitions into each paragraph and the first paragraph led into the last paragraph to help my paper flow nicely. 

2) What did I learn?
     I learned that it is okay for your first paper does not have to be your final. After writing out your rough draft the first time you are still allowed to rearrange it as much as you want. This is very reassuring, because I was able to see there were so many possibilities for me to order my information in my essay. 

3) How did the paper help you re-see your essay?
     This helped me see there is not one way you have to write your essay. There are so many different ways you can arrange your information to get your main ides across to readers. 

Hello Bloggers,

     I have reached the point in my research paper where I have all of my information and thoughts together. When you have reached this point, you are able to begin writing your rough draft. So that is just what I started to do on Sunday night. We then looked over our rough drafts in class yesterday morning. In class we we told to use two highlighter, highlight our voice with one color, and highlight other voice with another color. After we finished highlighting all of our paper we had to answer these following questions.

1) What voice dominates?

    My voice was found more then half of the time. I think this was good, because readers need to be able to pick out the original author's voice easily.

2) Are you turning over too much of your text to your sources?

     I don't think I am turning over my text too much at all to my sources. If anything I should insert some more outside sources. 

3) Are you ignoring them or rattling on too much about what you think? 

    I would say there are times in my rough draft where I was rattling on a little too much about what I think. I need to work on inserting some outside sources in with some of my opinions. 

4) Or does the source use seem appropriate to support your purpose?

    The use of my sources is a good amount, but I think it would be best to add some more sources. Adding more sources would help to make up my purpose even more. 

5) Are you taking turns paragraph by paragraph with your sources or is your own analysis and commentary nicely blended within the paragraphs?

     I am not really taking turns by paragraphs. I am inserting sources within my paragraphs. So I would say I am taking turns every few sentences. There are parts where my voice takes up a whole paragraph though. I need to blend my own analysis and commentary a little more to make it flow better.

6) Do you surround quote passages with your own voice and analysis? 

     I surrounded all of my quotes with my own voice. This was done by introducing the quote with my own words and then summarizing the quote after I ended the quote. I made sure to summarize the quote with the same amount of lines of the quote or more. 

7) Who wins the wrestling match? 

    In the end, I would say my voice won the match.  

Forming an Introduction

Good Evening Everyone,
    I hope you all had a wonderful week and are able to have a restful weekend. As stated in my other two blogs from this week, we started getting our topic and thesis points for our essays in English class. The exercise for tonight was to develop three different introductions for my research paper. Here are my three possible introductions I could use for my essay.

1. Everybody always says America is the best country ever. Sadly though, if it were based off of our education people would not be saying that anymore. Education in the United States is not nearly as good as it could be. There are so many flaws in the education system here, and their are a lot of people who do not know how bad it really is. Some of the downfalls of our education system are; inequality of schooling for every race or background, unfair funding for certain schools, teachers not there for the students but for the benefits, and the increased rate of high school drop-out rates. Education is not valued in America nearly as much as it is in other places around the world.

2. I have always grown up being blessed with a wonderful education. Since I grew up with a good education, I never thought America had a bad education system. All the way up until this past semester, I thought the U.S. had an excellent education system. I am an elementary education major and we were required to watch a documentary called Waiting for Superman. This movie followed the lives a couple students lives and their struggle of getting a good education. Most of the children could not even afford to go to school. This showed me that if I did not even know about the poorness of our education system, then the issue is not being addressed nearly enough.

3. Maria Regalado says she is "stuck" because of where she lives and applies for the lottery in a school an hour away so her son Francisco will get a better education. Gloria McGee enrolls her grandson, Anthony, in a boarding school so he will receive a quality education. There are both awful situations families are having to go through just to get a good education. For students to have to apply for a lottery  just to get into a school is heart-breaking. If a student does not get pulled, then they are unable to go to school. A grandma having to send her grandson to a boarding school just to be able to receive a decent education is saddening. I am devastated by the extent people have to go to go to school. In all my life I never even thought about not going to school. At the end of every summer, I knew I would be returning to school that September. Urban schools are not given as much money as the should be. People with different races and ethnicity's are not provided fair treatment of education, just because of who they are. This is horrible our education system has gotten to this point. This needs to change, now. But what can we do as a small person in a huge population do to make this issue known and get it fixed. 

Sharpening Your Point

Today in my English Composition class, we talked about making our question and thesis points not as broad. In order to make our points more believable, it is important to not be as wide when making our statements. We were told to choose from a list of five different types of thesis's which one ours related to. The five ways a thesis can be formed are: from a question of value, a question of policy, a question of interpretation, a hypothesis question, or a relationship question. For my essay's thesis, I chose to go with a question of interpretation. My topic is dealing with past and present examples of the U.S. education system's flaws. None of the other types of thesis's went along with my topic so I decided to use a question of interpretation. The question that I used to derive my thesis was, why is the U.S. education system not doing as well as other countries? I used a question of interpretation, because there are so many reasons people can say the education system is doing poorly. In my essay, I am not covering every single issue. When readers read my topic question, different answers can pop into their head that are not necessarily wrong if I do not mention them. That is the reason why I chose my topic question to be listed as a question of interpretation. Therefore my thesis point is, The pattern in the U.S. education system that is most obvious is that it is know where near the effectiveness of schools in other countries. 

Dialogue with a Partner. (Bri)

Good Evening Fellow Bloggers, 
     
     This week's focus for my English Composition class is forming the rough draft for my paper. In order to be able to have a well-prepared rough draft, a writer needs to be able to answer questions about the topic if someone were to ask them. Today in class we paired up with partners and answer the exercise questions in The Curious Researcher book. The exercise for tonight's blog is answer answering the questions based on our topic. My topic is the current issues in the U.S. education system, so these answers will apply to this topic.  

Here are the questions and their answers:

1. Why? Where? Who? When? What?
*Why?- There are many reasons for why these problems are occurring. Some of them are unequal education, uneducated teachers, poorly funded schools, teachers teaching for the benefits, and an increase in high school drop out rates. 
*Where?- The issues with the U.S. education system.
*Who?- The children are being affected by the poor and unequal education.
*When?- These problems having been occurring and still currently are.
*What?- My topic is the current problems dealing with the American education system. 

2. What do you mean by ______?
*What I mean by the issues in the U.S. education system is that compared to other countries our education is not what it should be like. There are a lot of things wrong with our schools, but many people do not notice anything is even wrong. 

3. How do most people see this? How do you see it differently?
*Most people do not see how many problems there truly are. I suppose I see it differently, because I have a heart for education and want to become a teacher one day. Since I hope to become a teacher one day, I am interested in doing anything I can do to make it better. 

4. Are you kidding? I didn't know that. What else did you find out?
*While researching I discovered how awful the education system truly is. I have grown up being privileged with an amazing education. When I started researching this topic, I was in awe of the awfulness of our education system is especially in poor and urban areas. 

5. Can you give me an example?
*An example of a struggling urban school is Elmhurst Community Prep. This is a Title 1 middle school in East Oakland. The neighborhood this school is located in is not very safe. Many of the children walk  to school and they pass police arresting people each day. Children attending this school receive free lunches and 15% of the sixth graders cannot read yet. 

6. Did that surprise you?
*This was very surprising to me. I knew urban schools were doing more poorly than other schools, but I didn't realize it was this bad. It is awful that some sixth graders can't read yet and that young children are witnessing police action on their way to school. 

7. What other questions does this raise?
*One question that is raised is, what can I do to make the schools better and more equal. 

8. Who does this affect, mostly?
*This mostly affects children in poor and urban school districts. 

9. What should we do about this?
*We should fight for equal funding in schools, hire teachers who truly care about the children and not the benefits. and make this issue as aware as we can. 

10. I'm not sure I believe this. Why do you? 
*I believe this is an issue, because I have witnessed it be true. There are many struggling schools. All someone has to do is travel to the inner-city to see failing schools. 

11. What do you think we should do about it? 
*As I stated in number 9, I think we should fight for equal funding in schools, hire teachers who truly care about the children and not the benefits, and make this issue as aware as we can. 

This is just some information on my topic. I hope through reading this you have been informed of the major issues in our education system. Hopefully, you will join with me in making this problem known so we can fix it. 

Annotated Bibliographies

Hi Everyone!! 

     This week in my English Composition class we focused on finding credible sources that we could use for our essays. I found each class to be extremely helpful. All through high school I would choose sources only because they talked about my topic. I did not really dig into my sources and check their credibility. The classes this week forced me to break apart my source and make sure it was credible. These are five annotated bibliographies on five of my sources I will be using for my third essay in this class. 

Zhao, Emmeline. "Students Still Have Unequal Access To Educational Opportunities." Huff Post Education. TheHuffingtonPost.com, Inc., 30 June 2011. Web. 1 Nov. 2013. 

This article is a credible source for my research because it’s written by Emmeline Zhao, the Associate Education Editor of the Huffington Post. She has also written for The Wall Street Journal’s Economic’s desk. Emmeline earned a degree in Public Policy Studies and a certificate in Policy Journalism and Media Studies while studying at Duke University. While studying at Duke, she was News Editor for The Duke Chronicle. Two other places she has worked are  FTChinese.com and as a reporter for the Olympic News Service at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. The article was published on The Huffington Post website which is an online news tabloid which features many different columnists. This specific article, Students Still Have Unequal Access To Educational Opportunities, was published two years ago (6/30/11). The author’s main goal of this blog post was to inform readers there is unequal distribution of educational resources and opportunities for students in the this country. Some schools do not offer some important classes. Children growing up in high-poverty areas are very unlikely to take advanced programs because they are not as easily accessible. Florida is a great example of state who distributes education fairly and equally. The Huffington Post generally targets any citizen who is interested in being informed about current events in the world. Mostly people who are wanting to be educated about the world visit this site and read blog posts. People who are out of the loop with the education system or are passionate about changing the education system would be interested in reading this specific article. This source is credible because Emmeline incorporate actual facts and statistics into the her article about this current issue. Based on my own opinion I agree with this article. It is important for everyone to read this because this is just one of the many issues in the American education system. The article is extremely informative of the issue of unequal education opportunities. I believe this article is important to include in my essay because it helps me back-up my broader topic. My topic is the issues in the American education system today. This article talks about one of the many problems in our education system. 

Townsend, John Converse. "How Should We Rebuild the U.S. Education System?" Forbes. Forbes.com, 15 Feb. 2013. Web. 7 Nov. 2013.

This article is a credible source for my research paper because it’s written by John Converse Townsend. He is an editor, blogger, and connector or people all over the world. John is a producer and media mobilizer at Ashoka. His main topic of writing is the latest change dealing with pressing global problems. Another one of his jobs is a consultant to the Population Council which is committed to making the reproductive health and well-being of recent and coming generations better. Lastly, he is an NBA writer for the ESPN TrueHoop Network, which covers the Washington Wizards for Truth About It.net. The article was published on the Forbes website which is an online American business magazine owned by Forbes, Inc. On the website, articles on finance, industry, investing, technology, communications, science, law, and marketing topics are featured. This company can be found in New York City and was founded in 1917 by B. C. Forbes. This specific article, How Should We Rebuild the U.S. Education System, was posted on February 15, 2013. The author’s main goal of this article was to inform readers of some steps we can take to fix the education system in America. John Converse interviewed three people who are working to form a better U.S. education system. Forbes generally targets anyone who is interested in being informed about the current issues in our culture. People who don’t want to watch the news or read the whole newspaper would find this beneficial to read because they are current issues in our culture today. I believe this article is credible, because the three people interviewed have put their hearts into making our education system better. The three people are, Sam Chaltain (previous national director of the Forum for Education and Democracy), Nikhil Goyal (nominated to be the future U.S. Secretary of Education), and Rahila Simzar (specializing in educational policy and social context, with interests in learning, cognition and development.) Based on my own opinion, I agree with this article. Everyone should read this article so we can make the education system better. People would become well informed on the issue of the American education system. My topic is the issues in the U.S. education system and this article covers my topic well.

Gordon, Robert J. "The Great Stagnation of American Education." The New York Times: Opinion Pages. The New York Times Company, 7 Sept. 2013. Web. 7 Nov. 2013.

This article is a credible source for my research because it is written by Robert J. Gordon, a professor of the social sciences at Northwestern University, is at work on a book about the American standard of living since the Civil War. The article was published on the New York Times: Opinion Pages website. On this website, viewers are able to see articles from the printed paper, along with blogs, and videos. Their website is updated constantly throughout the day with events. This article was written on September 7, 2013. The author’s main goal of this blog post was to make known to viewers the un-improvement in our education system. He talks about many of the main reasons the education system is stuck. I find this source to be extremely credible, because the author made sure to incorporate statistics like percents, years, and important names. This makes a huge difference, because then readers can trust the article since these are facts not just opinions. New York Times reaches out to anyone who is interested in being informed about the current events going on around us. I found this article to be extremely helpful and informative. Since this article was very factual and the author was confident in the topic he wrote about I was able to believe everything mentioned in the article. I believe this article is important to include in my essay because it talks about the issue of not fixing the problem in the U.S. education system and our need to make it better. 

Williams, Rachel. "What's Wrong with Education? Teachers Reveal All: As the Teaching Union Conference Season Gets under Way, We Ask What the Everyday Worries Are in Schools Today." Theguardian. Guardian News and Media Limited or Its Affiliated Companies, 2 Apr. 2012. Web. 8 Nov. 2013.

This article is a credible source for my research paper because it is written by Rachel Williams. She is a writer who focuses on topics like social affairs, education, and for the Guardian and other websites. The Guardian is the website where her article is from that I am using for one of my sources in my paper. Her article is covering the issue with our education system. Within the writing she inserted various teachers opinions on why the schools are how they are today. Some of the reasons mentioned were: efficiency cuts, increased class sizes, changes to course and exams, low morale, bad teachers,  These are just some of the huge issues causing the problem in our education system. I enjoyed reading this article, because it was interesting to get a teacher’s perspective on their opinion on the american education system. The author’s main goal of this article was to inform readers what is causing these issues in the education system. I enjoyed the fact that she did not only use her opinion but teachers personal experiences. This article’s intended audience is anyone interested in getting others opinions on the main issue with the american education system. I believe this article is credible, because even though this article consists of opinions, they come from personal experiences. I am glad I read this article, since I am now more informed with visible issues in schools. This with be a good source for paper, because my topic is the issue in the U.S. education system. 

Lloyd, Jennifer R. "Elementary Class Sizes May Grow." MySA. Hearst Newspapers, LLC, 24 Apr. 2011. Web. 8 Nov. 2013.

This article is a credible source for my research paper because it is written by Jennifer R. Lloyd. She is an author who covers problems in higher education and takes part in the San Antonio Express News by researching science. Jennifer has been a part of the Express News since 2008, but has only been a part of the education team since 2009. At first, she covered K-12 education, especially the school districts. She attended the University of Washington in Seattle to receive her bachelor’s degree in communication. Along with that she received her master’s degree in journalism from the University of Texas. Lastly, she has previously taught journalism classes at universities. The article was published on mySA, the San Antonio Home Page on April 25, 2011. The author’s main goal of writing this was to inform the public of the growing class size issue. This can be a good thing but on the other hand there are some negative factors to bigger class sizes. They can be good, because this will help the students form more friendships. A problem that can result from larger class sizes is a student feeling lost. Teachers, with up to 24 student in their class, easily struggle with making each child feel loved and important. As a result of large class sizes, students tend to feel lost and unforgotten in the sea of children. The author’s intended audience in this article is anyone interested in learning about an issue in schools today. I believe this article to be credible, because the author is extremely educated in this topic. Readers can see this by the way she present the topic. Within the article are example of current class sizes in schools and statistics of how much money is being saved through making class larger instead of smaller. I agree with this article, that growing class sizes is an issue needing to be dealt with. It was great how Jennifer included the pros and cons. I enjoyed the way she didn’t make her opinion stand out. She gave examples from both supporting and opposing perspectives. Overall, this topic will be extremely useful for my essay.