Final Prject Essay!

Blogging is such a unique tool that we should learn to use.  The various posts we write up to the different styles of what we can choose from are just some of these unique futures. Blogger, one of the many ways people blog, is the path we use to get this blogging experience. Blogging about subjects is a way for us to become better and up to date on events occurring in the world. This will help me become stronger in my language and also, more persistent in my speech.  I have not only discovered that writing is a joy, but i have found new ways to express myself in it.

I feel that blogging about a given subject has allowed me to become a more skillful writer. As we can see in the example below, i have matured enough to write about a topic that may be seen as confusing. Here, i wrote when humanity took a turn for the worst by selecting a tribal leader. “Well, I think we messed up, big time. I think it stared to go bad when we first elected the first tribal leader. Some say that we need a leader but i think that was our major and ultimate defeat. Egalitarian. That basically means in a crude and understated way equal.” Here, i explain that it is important to keep everybody equal and how that helps is by making the tribe step up to the plate. I wrote about his topic because it was once a discussion of dinner. We talked and I took mental note about it then dispensed these through my blog. Blogging helps this mature writer inside of me come out.

Another `way that blogging has improved in me is that i am now able to be more self
Confident in my writing. What i mean by this is simple. I wrote about personal experiences in my vignette project for a school assignment. I wrote about my life; how my brother and mother where and still are sick. I wrote about my true life, instead of some character “The last part of eighth grade was hell. God does things for reasons we cannot explain. I don’t understand and I wish I did. If I knew that, I could explain global warming, or why we still have not found a cure for cancer. I do not understand why people go starving every day and yet people can spend billions of dollars on birthday parties.”
There are so many things humans do that are not good for other humans. For instance, as some privileged Americans are living the good life, my mom and my brother both suffer. This is not right. Here, i write about my mom, and i strongly say that she has autoimmune disease. “My mom is that last person that should get sick. Ever. She is a trooper among troopers.
My mom has an autoimmune disease.” here, i wrote about the incurable disease known as autoimmune disease. This was very hard to right about seeing as my mom is very sick and yet, she will never get better. I think that this was a step in blogging experience that needed to be done. I am glad that i wrote about this. Also, blogger helps me cope with things that might be too hard to say in real life. For instance, the quote above is one from a personal vignette project.

Blogger is an awesome tool that allows me to become freer in my writing. I feel that the blog has made me open and free, like in 6th grade where we had passing time to get from one period to the other. Blogging has definitely made me more independent. Besides all this, blogger is fun. I have really grown to like blogger. For instance, i have used this to talk about serious matters (like the one above) and like this one, where all i talked about was friends. “So my best friend ever, Kathryn, she loves this guy named Edward Eric. So for all you anime love in anime club sorry but Edward is taken. You all should remember Kathryn because she shadowed me last Monday. So for all you people that don't know about Full metal Alchemist here is the best of it.”Here, i talked about how one of my friends is in love with this fictional character. Here’s another quote from the Sam random post. “All around the ride is stuffy and sink with old corn dogs, sail nachos, and sticky cotton candy. The railing is sticky and greasy from little children and their cotton covered hands. Impatient parents swiftly gave their bratty children a nasty look. However, the children just simply disregard the look and continue to be pests. Eager customers wait with impatience as the line moves an inch every two to three minutes. The person on the speaker (hardly loud at all because it was deeply muffled by the crowd) said something along the lines of "PLEASE DO NOT STAND, SIT, WALK ON THE RAILING. PLEASE STAY CALM ON THE RIDE. KEEP YOUR HANDS AND FEET IN THE RIDE AT ALL TIMES. THANK YOU AND ENJOY YOUR RIDE."” here, i was starting a story but eventually, just wrote about friends. See, with blogger, i have become more independent as a thinker and more skilled as a writer.

Freedom with blogging is unique. You are allowed to write about opinions. Here, i had to write a debate opener, “Between all these things above, I think that the most persuasive one was the definition of an elite college. This really made me believe what he was saying because he actually had the thought process. In anthropology, anthropologists should always site where they come from that can somehow have a negative effect on the outcome of whatever they are doing.” see, here, i wrote about an opinion that was eventually used in an online debate we had. I use these posts to form ideas during class. Also, this is a great way to find out new information that i did not know about. Like, the assignments where Mr. Sutherland would make us review another’s blog.

        However, it has become apparent that my blogging has been lagging. For instance, i would do so poorly on a blog, it seemed that i had an 8 year old witting them! The above is all true; blogging has matured me as a writer, and has made more self-confident. But, in the overall picture, i have become lazy in my posts. I show hardly any efforts to make them worth the while. It needs to improve and in order to do that, i have made some goals. First of all, i would like to make more time dedicated to reading and writing a response to the reading. I would like to start this during the summer. Another goal for me would be to read more. (Both of these goals go hand in hand). When i stat all this, then i will be more able to write at a higher level than i am now.

To conclude, blogger has changed my life as a writer and as an independent thinker. It has opened my mind so that i am able to work harder than before. I have become more self-confident and also more mature in my writing. However, i have been lagging behind on my post by not putting my full effort into them and also by missing a couple in the past. Everything i said above is true. I am glad to have been able to blog the year and i will defiantly be keeping these posts up during the school year.

VIGNETTE REVEWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!

While search through vignettes of my fellow peers, I have discovered that fear plays a role in Elizabeth's, Mercedes and Bianca's Blogs. They all show fear, whether they be afraid of it or not.


Elizabeth shows that fear for her can be over powering and sometimes frightening in its self. She explains that the monster in the last story is unknown and barely has any description. 

 "I looked nervously back at the house.     “You know, we’re kind of almost out of sight from there... we should head ba-” I said nervously, getting cut off,     “Wait! What happened to the flag over there...? The monster must of taken it!”" 

I like this quote because it shows that she can still be fearful of the unknown. This is a totally different Elizabeth i know. The one that i know is hardly afraid of anything, but, she can still admit when she is, which means that she is open with her self and with others. 


Mercedes shows in her vignettes that her whole life has been fear, well, at least after she moved from Santa Cruz. Here, she writes that she was afraid to be by herself, but yet happy to be with her family.

"No beds for us tonight. We all shared. But I didn't mind. I was scared, truly terrified"

Here, she admits that family keeps her safe and makes her feel comfortable. The beds could possibly be a symbol for separation perhaps and she is thus afraid of separation. She describes the feeling of her family well here so as if to picture your self there actually feeling that feeling of security. 


Bianca's however, is different compared to theirs above. She admits that she is worried but takes the challenge as if it were to be her last. She writes that she she stares into the paper and just starts writing things that end up being the wrong answer.

 "Once he leaves, I stare at the pieces of paper, which stares right back at me. On it were all these weird numbers, blank spaces and a long series of words standing above the numbers. What am I supposed to do with this? Oh well, might as well just put in random numbers. A two here, a twenty-five here, and soon all the blank spaces were filled with my scribbled, messy nonsense. I stroll back outside and hand Mr. Fong the papers."

This quote embodies what i mean because it shows how she is not afraid of the act of losing, even though she is. Actually this is what i see in all these writers. I see them every day with a strong assertive posture. they take life and really try to make the full of it by showing others that it is possible to be strong and courageous even though it may seem impossible.

EXTRA CRDIT BETA-READING!!! :O

Yes, the dialogue dose contribute to the story. with out the dialogue, or with minimal dialogue, it would not make sense and would be missing a key component, a life or a warmth. The story line, unforunately, is dry, but still has some potential. Also, it can sometimes skip around to much. where it skips is mainly the dialogue part. When Dorthy and Stella where talking, it was hard to keep up especially when the names and their nicknames where interchanged.

Yes the explanation allows us to see a secret in the story. if that is what ur story is about, then u shuld continue it. Hoever, keep in mind that a love story between a vampire and mortal is over used and can become cliche'd. Even though it is over rated, it can stil have a good grasp of a new take on this typical love story. having it be a phillipino folklore is pretty far out there and i would definately not have noticed it!

Yes, Dorthy's reaction is normal. However, it just seems so spread out. I think all the little detail about the songs the played was just to much....maybe. it is in that sense, easier to connect to as a teenager. But, it was a whole entire page of description about that little dance party (which was a little hard to follow, one moment they were looking stella, the next dancing.)

A little, the cultural aspects sort of assume i, the reader, already know Phillipino folklore. However, You do add decription which helps the reader conceptulize what u were saying.

I think that it is neat that she is fillipino because, in that sense, she is a young women finding out more about her culture. She will examine and explore her self and how she plays a role in her own culture, and thus, reguvinating her culture and making it more abmirable and proud to be who you are. Through discovering here self, she will then discover serets about her culture. MAKE SURE THAT THERE ARE MORE SECRETS OTHER THAN THE ONE ABOUT THE VAMPIRE. it will be way less over rated. this will also hook more readers in....Thank you for letting us read ur book and i ook forward to the rest.

Rebutted to Alex

So, before I rebut against Alex's blog post, i first have to say that i agree with what he says. However, for sake of getting a good grade in this class, i will pretend to be against this. Even so, a great debater should be able to think about both sides of an argument.

First off, my open begins his statement with that he would not want his DNA to manipulated. However, what if it is a matter of life or death? What if the DNA manipulation can help the baby but have negative effects as well like a problem with sight or hearing or skin problems etc. The life of a child is more important than any negative mutation of minor consequences.

another thing is what does it matter that a parent changes the DNA to meet their standards? So what? Nothing is wrong with that. It just seems to raise moral and ethical questions. But, what would the effect be if the baby comes out blonde even though they were support to come out a brown haired one? So, the question i guess remains with the parents and weather or not they want to change the DNA or not.

so, the last point i want to make is this ethics problem i mentioned earlier. Is it really un-ethical to change the DNA of a baby? Well, yes it can be if it were harmful. However, the manipulation of DNA to change something as silly as hair or eye color is not harmful. Also, my opponent says that the parents will need to tell there children what they did, but i think that they do not. It dose not seem that important to tell them what happened.

so, to conclude, I believe that it is ultimately up to the parents whether or not hey want to change the DNA sequience so that they could get the ultimate baby they want.





Again, just want to say that i do agree with what Alex says, this is just for sake of the class.

Here is a qoute from Bianca's blog:

Every time we have a substitute at ASTI, it seems that my class almost always takes advantage of them, and I personally get annoyed every time it happens. In fact, no offense to anybody, but it is rude. 

I agree with this. I think its very wrong to take advantage of subs, especially when they are having trouble getting use to the school.

The rite thing to do would to help them with trying to get to know the school. like would could show them good ol' ASTI hospitality by telling them the little things they should like no college students in the bathroom. We should also try to help them with names, instead of just letting it go. Like if a name is uncommon, then we should correct so the don't make an as* out of them selves. I think thats the one thing i can't stand most; when we laugh at the things they say or the way they pronuce words or names.

You know, that also goes for other things in life like the social background info we as teens spend so much of our time in. Like we make fun when people say things that either sounds weird or is weird.

Back to subs. Another thing subs are subjected to are the disrespectful comments behind their backs. I hate talking about people behind their backs because what ever you have to say, u should just say to them face on. I hate this. Every sub has to go through eventually, but some are good evaluations. Like the sub that Bianca was talking about. I was in her school so i had her too. She was awesome! she taught us real Spanish and taught us how to take notes. She is awesome. Also, she had something no other teacher had, and that was like this element around them wanted you to study. It was so awesome to finally learn Spanish from my sub. I mean this in no disregard to my real spanish teacher; she was a good teacher.  

Elite colleges VS non-elite colleges

I believe that, out of the seven debaters on this website, "Skip the admissions game" is the most persuasive one. I chose this one because they said examples of what they meant and had both sides of the argument, if i recall. Also, he defined what an elite college is; not many of the debaters did that. All of these things help me determine whether or not i should believe this article. Between all these things above, I think that the most persuasive one was the definition of an elite college. This really made believe what he was saying because he actually had the thought process. In anthropology, antroplogists should always site where they come from that can some how have a negative effect on the outcome of what ever they are doing. Like lets say if a white male was looking at the communication between black females. He would have to put that he is a white male and that he mite bring that to his studies with out knowing it.

Out of the seven again, the least persuasive was the "merit and race". I think the major down fall is the major vocabulary of this article. Now, going from what i sid above, I am a freshman that hasn't really expanded my diction to a level of a collegiate standard (however, thats why we have 3 higher grades above freshman). However, once i decipher the complex language, i still have some trouble with what he is saying about minorities. Is he saying that minorities should go to prestiugues school to raise their life's quality? Or is he saying, as a minority, we should be liable to programs that help us. if he is saying the second, then he is racist. There are to many factors to look at to determine whether or not he is being racist, so i wont mention them. Anyways, with all this trouble we had with this article, i have determined that this is the least persuasive.

Some things really important to stay out of: a)drugs b)materalism (or for some who are, to keep as low as possible) and c) drama. And, as far as darma at ASTI goes, Mercedes sums it up pretty good:

This is some pretty decent advice. Ok, I lied, this is damn good advice. Seriously fellow ASTIans, we need to cut ourselves off the drug that is drama. All it does is screw us all up mentally. I know how tempting it is to say horrible things about someone because they were cruel to you (as I always say, your peers are more cruel to you than anyone else), but it would be advisable to not take the bait. What is that thing they always said to us when we were little? It was something like... don’t react? 

 I think that drama is something that comes naturally to teenagers....or does it? Maybe it something embedied in our society that drives teens. Whatever it may be, it should be something we both embrace and shun. I agree with Mercedes and how she says that is side tracks us A LOT. In fact, sometimes whole entire days are cast into a bloom when some one disses others hair style. So when that happens, I must admit, it gets a little out of hand. However, it is important to see the positive side of drama (if there is any). So.......ah, it helps us defuse our ticking emotional bomb inside us all. Well....I guess thats why we have blogs. Well......how bout..... with out drama our lives would be boring? But, I fail to see the postiveness in that.
     So, I guess my "studies" show that drama is bad. You were right, Mercedes, like always. Happy holidays to you and to every one. I say holidays because not every one is catholic. Yeah, I dont think ill be blogging for a while, or maybe i will.... we'll see. good night sleepy world. Happy Holidays.

Bikes

I love bikes. All different types of bikes. I especially love road and fixie bikes. I always used to go on bike rides with my mom. we would travel along the rocky beach that surrounds our town. Even before I was born, i was exposed to the magical freedom biking gave me. My mom used to bike every morning and night. I believe that this is were i get my drive for biking.
     I used to follow my mom always first, me second. I used to love to think that i was going as fast as mom, keeping up with her right behind her, or even ahead. However, in reality, she was going as slow as me. I remember slowly coming to a stop at wooden bench, my awesome fire breathing dragon as the icon on the handle bars lights up as the breaks squeak. I look around and all i see is the beautiful Bay area that i was born in become even more beautiful as time progresses.
     My mom and me always await eagerly every month to see who is on the cover of pro cycling magazine. We are most excited when the Tour de france is in progress and all the new bikes and helmets and biography come out from all the players.
     Those memory's will be forever apart me. And, i still am making those wonderful memories.