Reflective Letter
_ A cold winter
day, finally, but I wish it would leave. The only good thing about this is the hot
coffee and the wood room, which isn’t really a wood room at all. When I close
my eyes and imagine what a “wood room” looks like to other people, I see stacks
of chopped wood lined against the walls. I guess you could say that’s what this
is except the stacks of chopped wood are floor-to-ceiling wood paneling and an
8-point buck head hanging with two of my grandfather’s hats resting gently on
the tips. The cats are sleeping soundly on my stepfather’s recliner and little
Jack, our Yorkie, is prancing around on the wood floors, clinking his way around.
Plastic tarps hang from the door opening
blocking out the dust from the demolition project my parents started three
weeks before Christmas and won’t end until three weeks after I return to
school. My stepfather is steaming his jeans and button down shirts for work
while I sit and enjoy the time being home. These little things are what I
missed the most while away.
I bet you’re wondering what this has anything to do with the assignment, huh? Being away at school for over a year has helped me value everything I have at home so much more. That isn’t enough though, is it?
Writing, Research, and Technology opened up my big brown eyes to see the world in a different way. Instead of looking at things as concretely as I did before, I now am able to notice the small, fine details; the ever-so-important branches that are needed to tell the entire story. I can’t leave anything out. Now, go back and read my first paragraph over again. I bet you’ll understand. These projects were work, don’t get me wrong on that aspect, but they were enjoyable work. I put blood, sweat, and tears into these projects because I could use them as a tool to better myself. Just like every other project in this class, the audience understood if I gave them just a little bit of information, just put the paintbrush down on paper, brushed a few lines with the color of feeling, and let them guess the rest. You feel what I feel, you see what I see. When I read a book, the best kind of story is the one that I am a part of.
The Twitterive was the best example of this. I had absolutely no idea what I was going to do for this. As weeks passed on and the haunting words, “you should have an idea of what your place is… 5 genres… 10 genres… rough draft…,” crept up on me, I panicked. Not to mention the fact that it was Jeremy’s anniversary coming up- wait… Jeremy’s anniversary… That’s all it took. I had it. I fought with myself for days over this dilemma. How could I open back up about this? One year ago I shut myself down to the world and kept my life to myself and now I was even considering presenting this much of myself to a room full of people whom half of them I had never met outside of these four walls? “Stupid idea,” I convinced myself until I sat down and opened up Weebly.
I have to admit, Weebly is one of my favorite things about this class; it’s like my own personal artwork. I can create, design, delete, and revise any way I want. This was my playing field, my blank canvas, my opportunity. I was nervous. I knew nothing about creating a website, but after the first week of playing around with it, I created a masterpiece that would consistently grow and become a piece of artwork in a gallery for all to see. I take pride in the work I have produced on this website. It is simple, understanding, caring and open. It became a friend to me over the last fifteen weeks. I wrote both boring and exciting blog posts, projects that made me both pleased and gloomy but most of all; I succeeded.
I wrote in a more organized fashion that ever before. I found a part of myself that I never knew existed. I mean, I have always known that I am organized but not to this extent. Someone told me once, “you are so organized, you lose things.” EYE OPENER but I’m proud of the work I have produced and if I wasn’t as meticulous as I was, I don’t think that project would have been as good. I was thorough in every detail, big or small. I paid attention to the details of my writing to fine out the details and promote the importance of each and every project or topic. My Twitterive spoke for all ages, the importance of keeping hope near and dear to your heart. On the other hand, the only writing I did for the Oral History project was the introduction, which even that, I believe, promoted our project. With the Collaborative Research project, I felt like I was writing only with other's words. I have never been a fan of research projects. Regardless of the interesting topic and spectrum we could abide by, I enjoy writing from a deeper, more imaginable place, one where I can be someone, where I have a voice. My voice for this project was that of a community member; I am small in this aspect and the chance of me changing the world is slim to none, despite the fact that it crosses my mind almost every day.
I researched more than I thought I was going to. Well, no, that’s a lie. I thought we were going to walk into the class, write three or four shitty research papers and leave, gaining nothing from the thousand dollars we spent on this class. I was wrong. I found genres on my own, I produced the best work I ever have, I became somebody. Never before have I wanted to research so badly and find new and exciting things to add to my projects. For example, I found ifaketext.com which enabled me to recreate my text message conversation with Nicole the night I found out about Jeremy’s accident. Then there was Wordle. What a silly word but then again, aren’t they all? Anyway, I was able to use Wordle to express my feelings of a certain date that I used in my Twitterive.
Twitter was another story. I felt forced to tweet. It didn’t take Twitter for me to figure out what my place was; It took reality, a complex form of technology. The shitty part is, I still use Twitter. I’m not sure if I will continue after this, but for now it is okay in my book… just okay. I’m still indifferent but without Twitter, this project wouldn’t be called a Twitterive. I hope in five, even ten years, we all see this project in schools. The use of genres made it interesting and exciting. I used so many new applications. For the first time in my life I uploaded a video to YouTube, a video that I had created, which was also a first. I used YouTube to create my second-ever video, an interview with Derrick Braun, for our Oral History project. In my opinion, and I guess this could be because we took too much time presenting our Twitterives and unifying as a class, but the Oral History aspect could have either been discarded or just solely been a part of the Collaborative Research Project instead of being named individually. It doesn’t deserve a name. The Collaborative Research project was the brunt of all the work. Although, I do appreciate the knowledge I gained from our interview. The use of technology made it interesting and hopeful. I worked side by side with my group mates to research and evaluate our “big question.” It was an enjoyable topic to research because it helped me to better my eating habits and promote the diminishing of industrial farming and supporting of local communities.
Each and every aspect of these projects was written to the best of my ability, researched to the best of my ability, and technology was used to the best of my ability. I can confidently say that I was given an opportunity to gain knowledge, experience and wisdom with only myself to catch, and I did. I used my resources wisely and I came out of this class, a better person than when I walked in. I learned to revise, edit, delete, add, anything to make my work better. I used previous pieces to enhance my point. I did the best I could in this class and I honestly believe that it shows in my work. I am now confident in my abilities. I am no longer Emily Minion, the education senior from Rowan University; I am Emily Minion, the writer, the organizer, the researcher, the technologist, the creator.
I bet you’re wondering what this has anything to do with the assignment, huh? Being away at school for over a year has helped me value everything I have at home so much more. That isn’t enough though, is it?
Writing, Research, and Technology opened up my big brown eyes to see the world in a different way. Instead of looking at things as concretely as I did before, I now am able to notice the small, fine details; the ever-so-important branches that are needed to tell the entire story. I can’t leave anything out. Now, go back and read my first paragraph over again. I bet you’ll understand. These projects were work, don’t get me wrong on that aspect, but they were enjoyable work. I put blood, sweat, and tears into these projects because I could use them as a tool to better myself. Just like every other project in this class, the audience understood if I gave them just a little bit of information, just put the paintbrush down on paper, brushed a few lines with the color of feeling, and let them guess the rest. You feel what I feel, you see what I see. When I read a book, the best kind of story is the one that I am a part of.
The Twitterive was the best example of this. I had absolutely no idea what I was going to do for this. As weeks passed on and the haunting words, “you should have an idea of what your place is… 5 genres… 10 genres… rough draft…,” crept up on me, I panicked. Not to mention the fact that it was Jeremy’s anniversary coming up- wait… Jeremy’s anniversary… That’s all it took. I had it. I fought with myself for days over this dilemma. How could I open back up about this? One year ago I shut myself down to the world and kept my life to myself and now I was even considering presenting this much of myself to a room full of people whom half of them I had never met outside of these four walls? “Stupid idea,” I convinced myself until I sat down and opened up Weebly.
I have to admit, Weebly is one of my favorite things about this class; it’s like my own personal artwork. I can create, design, delete, and revise any way I want. This was my playing field, my blank canvas, my opportunity. I was nervous. I knew nothing about creating a website, but after the first week of playing around with it, I created a masterpiece that would consistently grow and become a piece of artwork in a gallery for all to see. I take pride in the work I have produced on this website. It is simple, understanding, caring and open. It became a friend to me over the last fifteen weeks. I wrote both boring and exciting blog posts, projects that made me both pleased and gloomy but most of all; I succeeded.
I wrote in a more organized fashion that ever before. I found a part of myself that I never knew existed. I mean, I have always known that I am organized but not to this extent. Someone told me once, “you are so organized, you lose things.” EYE OPENER but I’m proud of the work I have produced and if I wasn’t as meticulous as I was, I don’t think that project would have been as good. I was thorough in every detail, big or small. I paid attention to the details of my writing to fine out the details and promote the importance of each and every project or topic. My Twitterive spoke for all ages, the importance of keeping hope near and dear to your heart. On the other hand, the only writing I did for the Oral History project was the introduction, which even that, I believe, promoted our project. With the Collaborative Research project, I felt like I was writing only with other's words. I have never been a fan of research projects. Regardless of the interesting topic and spectrum we could abide by, I enjoy writing from a deeper, more imaginable place, one where I can be someone, where I have a voice. My voice for this project was that of a community member; I am small in this aspect and the chance of me changing the world is slim to none, despite the fact that it crosses my mind almost every day.
I researched more than I thought I was going to. Well, no, that’s a lie. I thought we were going to walk into the class, write three or four shitty research papers and leave, gaining nothing from the thousand dollars we spent on this class. I was wrong. I found genres on my own, I produced the best work I ever have, I became somebody. Never before have I wanted to research so badly and find new and exciting things to add to my projects. For example, I found ifaketext.com which enabled me to recreate my text message conversation with Nicole the night I found out about Jeremy’s accident. Then there was Wordle. What a silly word but then again, aren’t they all? Anyway, I was able to use Wordle to express my feelings of a certain date that I used in my Twitterive.
Twitter was another story. I felt forced to tweet. It didn’t take Twitter for me to figure out what my place was; It took reality, a complex form of technology. The shitty part is, I still use Twitter. I’m not sure if I will continue after this, but for now it is okay in my book… just okay. I’m still indifferent but without Twitter, this project wouldn’t be called a Twitterive. I hope in five, even ten years, we all see this project in schools. The use of genres made it interesting and exciting. I used so many new applications. For the first time in my life I uploaded a video to YouTube, a video that I had created, which was also a first. I used YouTube to create my second-ever video, an interview with Derrick Braun, for our Oral History project. In my opinion, and I guess this could be because we took too much time presenting our Twitterives and unifying as a class, but the Oral History aspect could have either been discarded or just solely been a part of the Collaborative Research Project instead of being named individually. It doesn’t deserve a name. The Collaborative Research project was the brunt of all the work. Although, I do appreciate the knowledge I gained from our interview. The use of technology made it interesting and hopeful. I worked side by side with my group mates to research and evaluate our “big question.” It was an enjoyable topic to research because it helped me to better my eating habits and promote the diminishing of industrial farming and supporting of local communities.
Each and every aspect of these projects was written to the best of my ability, researched to the best of my ability, and technology was used to the best of my ability. I can confidently say that I was given an opportunity to gain knowledge, experience and wisdom with only myself to catch, and I did. I used my resources wisely and I came out of this class, a better person than when I walked in. I learned to revise, edit, delete, add, anything to make my work better. I used previous pieces to enhance my point. I did the best I could in this class and I honestly believe that it shows in my work. I am now confident in my abilities. I am no longer Emily Minion, the education senior from Rowan University; I am Emily Minion, the writer, the organizer, the researcher, the technologist, the creator.