Writer’s Journal

Friday September 17th 2021

Framework for Success

 

The habits of mind outlined in the “Framework for Success in Postsecondary Writing” covers not only the essential foundations for writing, but I believe that these habits are essential foundations for success in one’s learning. The elements of individuality and exploration outlined in the habits of curiosity, creativity, and metacognition helps someone develop their own voice and identity as they gain experiences and new knowledge, while the habits of persistence and responsibility develop a necessary discipline for success in any area of life. Personally, I have always struggled with the habits of persistence and responsibility while I try my best to remind myself of the existence of these habits. It’s easy for me to slip up, leaving all the hard work and responsibilities behind me as I slip into the comforts of my fluffy blanket and pillows. But neglecting the work that needs to be done will ultimately hurt my learning which is why I believe that out of all the habits of mind, persistence and responsibility are the most crucial ones. All the habits are foundations of learning, but those two especially set a solid foundation for those of creativity, curiosity, and metacognition to come into fruition through repetition of practicing those habits. The habits of openness and metacognition are the ones I think I practice the most because of what I have learned about learning. I try to keep an open mind because I believe that someone who is overly certain about their answer are usually the ones who are prone to being wrong. Learning should be trying to ask more questions and when you get the answers to those questions, question those answers again and again until you believe that you have explored your options. There may always be a better answer out there since a lot of the questions that are asked in writing and other areas of study are made up of many components. I think that I have not challenged myself enough in some areas such as curiosity and engagement where I hope to be more active in my own learning and persist through the hard work necessary to achieve results. 

 

1. What worked or went well this week

• The feedback I received for my draft was very good. I really like the audio format for the feedback because it helped me think through what ideas I should change or include in my essay
• Starting earlier than usual for assignments for my other courses

2. What was hard or didn’t work this week

• Breaking some of my habits and letting it slide from time to time. The tub of ice cream wasn’t a good idea causing me to nap and forgetting about what I had to do.

3. To-Do list for next week

• Personal journals
• Waking up early even on days I can sleep in
• Start my assignments early and begin studying for upcoming exams

4. Where you left off/ Last thing you did

• Literary Narrative
• Accounting Connect

5. How you feel or felt about the week, your project, and/or your writing

I definitely have been slacking off these past few weeks compared to the schedule I forced myself to stick to prior to the month of school starting. I remember feeling super positive and over the top in terms of productivity and I hope to get back into that groove in the upcoming weeks. This will definitely have a positive impact on my work and writing which is why I hope to push myself to stick to the habits of persistence and responsibility.

Saturday September 11th 2021

 

Vacation Week

 

Write about a previous writing assignment that was a challenge for you. What strategies did you use at the time? After reading the chapter, what other strategies do you think might have been useful?

 

When I took a class on demography, I had to do a 5-6 page research paper on a country of my choice. The goal of the assignment was for the students to utilize the skills they have learned in the class to come up with questions and create visuals such as graphs and charts to present their findings. My strategy for approaching the paper was to find interesting statistics in the demography reports of the country I was interested in to build an outline and what to find out more about. I found out about the events that had happened during the years the statistics were behaving abnormally or if the statistics were shaped by policies enforced by the government. I think that the assignment was a good example of how the strategies used to incorporate personal voice in a paper can help improve one’s writing because it helped me to gain an interest in whatever I was writing. To ask questions and it made the writing process smoother than a traditional research paper. 

 

1. What worked or went well this week

• Had time to rest and catch up with what’s going on

2. What was hard or didn’t work this week

• Spent almost too much time off because of the short break
• Lost track of my schedule

3. To-Do list for next week

• Still working on allocating time for self-learning
• SAM projects
• Finishing all readings I need to do
• Macro assignments
• writing in journal

4. Where you left off/the last thing you did

• Quarterly survey

5. How you feel or felt about the week, your project, and/or your writing

This week went by slower for me and I am honestly not too happy with the amount of time I spent on my work. I feel like I got way too comfortable and am now in a place where I am resisting the push for productivity because I was too over the top before. I want to get back into a better pace so that I can keep the work consistent in the days to come.

Saturday September 4th 2021

 

Literacy Narrative

 

Maxwell and Dickman believe that “a story is a fact, wrapped in an emotion that compels us to take an action that transforms our world.” How would you define the term story? What do you think are the most important elements of a good story? What examples help support your thoughts? 

I really like Maxwell and Dickman’s definition of the term story because I believe that the world is the overlap of billions of people and the stories they lived out. Everyone has their own truths in their story of their lives and when these truths overlap with one another, the efforts and emotions of those people bring forth those truths that only existed in their personal stories. Stories bring people together to transform the world and that creativity is what makes the world perpetually more advanced. The examples of these are all around us and the perfect example might be the one in front of you right now. Whether you’re reading this on your laptop, cellphone, or any computing device, these inventions are a part of a larger story. The ideas of stories that came before us involved technology that never existed and they probably had to dream bigger than ever to imagine a world where people could talk to each other over thousands of miles across continents and oceans in a matter of seconds. I like the definition of the story that it is wrapped in emotion, compelling us to transform the world because that’s exactly what makes inventions like these possible. The computing device needs electricity to run on, internet service to connect you to a larger world wide web of information, to people, and so much more. The laptop or cellphone would have no use if it wasn’t a part of the larger story that holds everyone together to work together to make it as useful and powerful as we know it. This is why I think a good story should be relatable and connect people to one another. 

1.Describe the writing you did this week

•   personal journal entries
•   literacy narrative rough draft

2.What worked or went well this week

• exploring and organizing my thoughts through the literacy narrative
• thinking about revisions for my new schedule

3.What was hard or didn’t work this week

• sticking to my schedule
• pushing back work for later

4.To-Do list for next week

• work on literacy assignment more often
• make revisions for a better schedule to fit my needs

5.Where you left off/the last thing you did

• literacy narrative 
• reading the texts and material

6.How you feel or felt about the week, your project, and/or your writing

I felt that I could have made this week a lot easier for myself had I pushed through to do some things that I was too lazy to do, but the initial inertia stopped me from breaking out of my comfort zone. I am aware of that and wish to make next week a better week for myself.

 

Friday August 27th 2021

 

INTRODUCTION 

 

Name : Shi Yu and Steven (went by Steven most of my life but I’m not too picky about it now)

Pronouns : He/him/his

Goals: After going through the assignments, my goal for this course is to try and attempt to work on at least one of the projects digitally. And in order to accomplish that I want to improve my communications skills particularly in speaking along with writing a script for a podcast. 

Question: If an assignment is done in a podcast format, can there be a guest (a friend, or maybe even the professor!) or is it only limited to the student doing the assignment?

“Rule” about writing: One of the only rules of writing I remember learning about in school is the introduction, body paragraphs, and conclusion outline. And these paragraphs will also serve its own purpose: the introduction will give the audience a general idea and introduce the thesis of the essay, the body paragraphs will reinforce the thesis by diving further into the topic, and the conclusion will wrap it all up and maybe give the audience something to think about for the future revolving around the topic. Almost all the writing I did in my academic career revolved around this rule with the exception of poems and it gave structure to my ideas and stories. It allowed me to follow an outline that worked for all the writing I ever had to do from book reports, to research papers, to essays on standardized exams, and more that I can’t remember at this moment. The rule is not true because you don’t have to follow this format of writing but it is definitely helpful. It can be a great way to organize my ideas but it does not challenge me to explore new ways to display my writing and I hope to do that more in the future. 

Writing and Me: My relationship with writing has been, for the most part, an academic one. We never really spent time outside of school together unless it was for an essay or assignment for a class. I’ve always avoided writing until the last minute until writing would remind me that if we don’t cooperate, my grades would suffer and I would be sabotaging myself in the long run. But our relationship has been a tolerating one. Writing never failed me and I have never failed writing. We have always managed to get the work done one way or another. improved our relationship. Writing has always been there for me but I never opened up to accept writing. But some time off over the last year or so has really improved our relationship. I started journaling and writing has helped me explore how I feel, why I feel a certain way, and what I can do to change how I feel if I don’t like it. Writing reminds me what I need to do and keeps me on track though I slip up from time to time and ignore writing because of my flaws: my laziness, my anger, my irresponsibility, and the list goes on. Writing is like a perfect companion that deals with all of my imperfections and it’s up to me to contribute to the relationship because I have all to gain and nothing to lose. 

 

1. What worked or went well this week

• setting up the blog 
• responding to the prompt

2. What was hard or didn’t work this week

• Didn’t plan out my schedule for the start of school 
• Lack of time to balance work and personal time

3. To-Do list for next week

• Begin assignments as soon as possible (homework, reading, and writing assignments)
• revise my schedule and rest more
• begin allocating time for self-learning

4. Where you left off/the last thing you did

• adding to my new blog
• prioritizing tasks to put on my schedule

5. How you feel or felt about the week, your project, and/or your writing

This week hasn’t been ideal but it’s not a bad start because I can see many things I can improve on. I am excited to see how implementing small changes will have great outcomes.