Logan+Carlton

back to personal pages wikiquest Step One of Clue Assignment Step Two of Clue Assignment Step Three of Clue Assignment Step One EAR Assignment STEP ONE EAR FINAL Step Two of Ear Assignment STEP TWO EAR FINAL Step Three EAR Assignment STEP THREE EAR FINAL EAR Satire/Remix EAR Reflection TELL MOMENTS TELL Rough Draft TELL Final Draft TELL FINAL DRAFT WITH FOOTNOTES I learn visually. I hate group work. I like to hunt, fish, and play sports outside of the classroom. I would like to know their interests.

In reading the first 40 pages of My Freshman Year, I was surprised at how easily I could relate to the book and what the author was saying. The author's account of her freshman orientation and first week in the dorm halls were very consistent with what I experienced as a freshman in college. There was quite a few parts that made me laugh such as when the author had a beer in the lounge and some of the sayings other kids in her hall had posted on their doors. So many of the things that the author observed in her dorm hall made me reflect on my own experiences in college. I feel that her experience at AnyU is very similar to a freshman's experience here at Bloomsburg University.
 * Reading Reflection #1:**

In this next section of the My Freshman Year reading it talked alot about Nathan's experience with the "community", or lack there of, at AnyU. Nathan wrote about how students at AnyU wanted their college life to be a so called "community" but at the same time no one wanted to lose their individuality. An example from the book that I found interesting was when the RA's on her floor tried to organize activites for the students to get involved in but it didnt come through. The RA's distributed a survey asking what activities the students wanted to see available on campus. The RA's did this to get students to interact with one another and do things as a community. An overwhelming majority of students voted for a movie night in the dorm. So the RA's set it all up and when it came time for their first movie night as a floor, only two people showed up. So the RA's moved the date to another time and this time no one showed up. When I was reading this I could connect with this alot. I notice that same kind of participation here at Bloomsburg. There are lots of events going on all the time in my dorm but honestly I never show up to any of them. And when I see the events going on around campus from my dorm, there are very few people who actually show up. There are so many people in the Elwell dorm and yet I've rarely ever seen more than a handful of people at the events they hold. I ask the same question Nathan was asking, how can this be? Don't students want to interact with each other and do things as a community? I found the statistic, "76 percent of college and university presidents called nonparticipation a moderate to major problem on campuses" to be very interesting. I feel like college kids don't want to be told what to do so when they are asked to partipate in an event they don't show because they don't have to. We as college kids would rather do our own thing then be forced to do something we arent interested in. If our dorm building held a movie night, we wouldn't go because we can just as easily hold our own movie night with the friends we feel comfortable with. Why step out of our comfort zones if we don't have to? This can be tied to Nathan's example in her book when she talks about her experience with the SuperBowl and how no one showed for the SuperBowl event at her dorm. All the students were either at sports bars or in their own room watching the game with their own groups of friends. Many students at AnyU felt they were a part of a community. But the term community has so many different meanings to many different people and thats why we will never have the close knit, loving community that many people dream of.
 * Reading Reflection #2:**

This section of the My Freshman Year reading was very interesting and kept my attention while reading it. Nathan wrote about her encounter with Chiho in the beginning of this reading and I found it to be very true what she wrote. She said that American students tend to be so open and nice it seems when foreign students come to America. The American students want to get together and do things with the foreign students but they never follow through with the plans. I honestly feel that it is part of American culture to make plans and not stick with them. It goes back to the previous reading I did in My Freshman Year when Nathan talked about the CA's planning events for their dorms and no one would show up. We as Americans like to stay in our comfort zone and not step out of it. I had a foreign exchange student who came to my high school when I was in 12th grade and I feel like I can relate to this same thing that Nathan is talking about. Everyone was so nice and open to this kid. They would invite him to things but the plans would never come through. I invited him over to my house a few times to hangout and I remember him telling me that people would try to do all these things with him but then never call him or finish through with the plans that they had set up. So I agree with what Nathan is saying in this part of the reading. A big theme of this reading was how different American culture is from others. Nathan talked with students that couldnt understand our culture. Things she mentioned were leaving class as soon as it was over instead of conversing with other students, the lack of interest in the backgrounds and culture of foreign students and others that I can't recall at the moment. I have noticed these same things as I walk around the college campus here at Bloomsburg. There are people in my hallway that have never said "hello" to me still to this day. American people aren't very caring and respectful in my own opinion, myself included. I would probably be pretty shocked if I moved to another country and saw how differently their culture is there.
 * Reading Reflection #3:**

The article I read about E.D. Hirsch was very interesting to read. But I must say I completely disagree with the guy and I think he is really out there to propose ideas like he did. He thinks all kids should follow his 63 pages of what he claims to be culturally important terms and events. That in itself made me not like the guy. Who is he to say what is important and not important for cultural literacy? I think the guy is a joke and his views are truly unjust. He said he wants kids to lean early on about people and things he finds important to cultural literacy. He places it with the same importance as the alphabet. Well from my experience, if you didnt know the alphabet then you truly are illiterate. But if you cant say when the first World War occured then its really not that big of a deal. You can still read and be proficient in english. I think today's kids do need to have some background knowledge of what happened in the past in this country, but at the same time they also need to have knowledge of the present happenings and look at for their future. We cant focus all of our efforts on the learning things from the past. I felt like when I watched the interview with the guy from Harvard and his take on Hirsch that the guy from Harvard liked his ideas and thought they were good. And that backs up my theory that guys from Harvard are smart but have no common sense. I didnt really care for the video as much, it was long and boring.
 * Group 1 Reading Reflection:**

The first satire I read about the animal school was honestly really confusing to me. I read it over several times in a row and still didnt make sense of it. I felt like the animals were saying that school keeps you from being above average in what your good at and instead keeps you in only average by forcing you to do stuff your not good at. And the second satire about technology in the classroom was interesting and sadly someday will be true. I feel like the chalkboard is already being replaced by newer technology. I found the article to be somewhat funny how the author portrayed these 21st century things that we consider to be technology.
 * Satire Reading Reflection:**

1. Time Magazine- I found this article to be very interesting to read. I think it is so true nowdays. I personally believe that a college degree is meaning less and less because more people have them. I plan to get my master's degree as well because I know it will up my pay as a teacher. I feel that employers are looking for things that make people stand out. They want people who will make their company or school district a big name. They like important people who get the job done and done right. I was surprised about the statistics in this article. The stat about 70% of students going on the college surprised me. For some reason I was thinking it would be more than that. But overall the article was a good read.
 * 3 Article Reflection:**

2.The Atlantic- This article rubbed me the opposite way. I did not like the point this article was trying to get across. I felt like it was saying that students should not pursue college because for some of the fasting growing jobs it may not be needed. If I owned a big business and was looking to hire potential employees, I would definitely consider if they had a college degree or not. Yes, some jobs may not need a college degree for the person to be successful in the career. But the education people acquire from college is usually a good one and makes them a smarter person all around. Without those 2 or 4 years of college behind them, I wouldnt want to hire them. I also feel that the people who go on to college have more direction in their life and they are more concerned with their future than those who dont go on to college. Those who dont tend to be pregnant at 18 or other socially inept things of that sort.

3.I definitely agree with the statement in the article that students should be pushed to go to college because they may experience a growth there. I know people who did poorly in high school and didnt care, but when the got to college they stepped up their work ethic and did well in college because it was much more important to them than high school ever was. So the whole idea of "plan B: skipping college" does not work for me. I dont like the idea at all. Like the article said, many people who go to college earn more in their careers and have abetter outlook on life and attitude towards life. So I dont see any downfalls with going to college, even if its for a year or two. It will be a good experience that you can learn from.

I believe the purpose of a college education is to make us more intelligent citizens. As a country we need people who are smart and can run businesses. We need people who can do mechanical work and fix things. We need people who can your cut hair, paint your house, and serve you at a diner. All these different jobs require some sort of education or background knowledge. This is where education comes in. It can be either a high school dipolma or a college degree. But either way its an education. At the college level, we are being trained to be the best we can be in whatever our field is.
 * Tell Step One:**

To be educated means that you have a general background knowledge of different subjects and ideas that are out there. Someone who is not educated would have no background knowledge. So to be educated means you have attended at least high school or college depending on how educated you want to be. This education will lead you to be a better citizen and have more experience in the world.

I feel like my whole theory on what it means to be educated is based off of how I've grown up. I have seen people who didn't go to college and still be successful in life. So therefore, college is not the answer to being educated. Being educated is just having this broad background and being able to apply it in everyday life in whatver you do. There is a clear line between people who are educated and people who are not. The people who are educated are successful and do something with their lives.