Critical Thinking, Reading, and Writing
Use writing and reading for inquiry, learning, thinking, and communicating. Understand a writing assignment as a series of tasks, including finding, evaluating, analyzing, and synthesizing appropriate primary and secondary sources
In the beginning of the course, we had several reading materials. I learned a lot from learning others' perspectives and got to know certain issues that I had never thought about in my life. While doing the ethnography, film, and activism projects, I was again motivated to search on websites, reading others views of the issues. For example, in my ethnography, I wrote about disability and media. This was an unfamiliar topic to me. But after I did my research on this project, I learned so much about disabled people and the importance of accessibility. In my film project, I decided to do the topic of international students and media. This involved a lot of critical thinkings as well. I came up with many questions to ask my interviewees. I hope the audience can get some valuable information from the questions; at the same time, I hope each interview can bring in some unique perspectives from their own experiences. Therefore, these projects taught me to think and learn in a very practical way.
Integrate their own ideas with those of others
Ideas are always the most important ones in any project. I like how in the class we always discussed in a group. I think it was very helpful to listen to others perspectives and understandings of the topic I am writing about. Sometimes other people's words or suggestions gave me a fresh perspective about my work. In the same manner, I also give suggestions to other people when they talk about their projects. For example, one of my classmates was writing about the standard of beauty and media. I thought about the article I read about a person created new barbie girls based on the average American's real sizes. I think example could be helpful for people to think about our standards of beauty and what is in general wildly accepted in the society. And I hope that my suggestion did help her project .
Use electronic environments for drafting, reviewing, revising, editing, and sharing texts
We used a lot of electronic techniques during the course. One of the best things we did was creating a video. I really loved the process creating the video. It was fun thinking about the position of camera, what questions to ask, and the way to edit an unforgettable video. I also enjoyed watching others videos in class. They all gave me different perspectives about topics that I was not familiar with. I think this is a very effective way of communicating and learning. Of course, we are also using the WEEBLY! This is such a good forum for us to read others' articles and learn about each other's thoughts. It is easy to draft, edit and revise on the blog. With others classmates' links appearing on the homepage, it is always convenient to see their posts. So absolutely, using media to study is a huge plus!
Overall, this has been a great semester. And I think my English writing definitely improved a lot, especially in expressing my opinions and developing my thoughts. I will definitely recommend the class to my friends!
Use writing and reading for inquiry, learning, thinking, and communicating. Understand a writing assignment as a series of tasks, including finding, evaluating, analyzing, and synthesizing appropriate primary and secondary sources
In the beginning of the course, we had several reading materials. I learned a lot from learning others' perspectives and got to know certain issues that I had never thought about in my life. While doing the ethnography, film, and activism projects, I was again motivated to search on websites, reading others views of the issues. For example, in my ethnography, I wrote about disability and media. This was an unfamiliar topic to me. But after I did my research on this project, I learned so much about disabled people and the importance of accessibility. In my film project, I decided to do the topic of international students and media. This involved a lot of critical thinkings as well. I came up with many questions to ask my interviewees. I hope the audience can get some valuable information from the questions; at the same time, I hope each interview can bring in some unique perspectives from their own experiences. Therefore, these projects taught me to think and learn in a very practical way.
Integrate their own ideas with those of others
Ideas are always the most important ones in any project. I like how in the class we always discussed in a group. I think it was very helpful to listen to others perspectives and understandings of the topic I am writing about. Sometimes other people's words or suggestions gave me a fresh perspective about my work. In the same manner, I also give suggestions to other people when they talk about their projects. For example, one of my classmates was writing about the standard of beauty and media. I thought about the article I read about a person created new barbie girls based on the average American's real sizes. I think example could be helpful for people to think about our standards of beauty and what is in general wildly accepted in the society. And I hope that my suggestion did help her project .
Use electronic environments for drafting, reviewing, revising, editing, and sharing texts
We used a lot of electronic techniques during the course. One of the best things we did was creating a video. I really loved the process creating the video. It was fun thinking about the position of camera, what questions to ask, and the way to edit an unforgettable video. I also enjoyed watching others videos in class. They all gave me different perspectives about topics that I was not familiar with. I think this is a very effective way of communicating and learning. Of course, we are also using the WEEBLY! This is such a good forum for us to read others' articles and learn about each other's thoughts. It is easy to draft, edit and revise on the blog. With others classmates' links appearing on the homepage, it is always convenient to see their posts. So absolutely, using media to study is a huge plus!
Overall, this has been a great semester. And I think my English writing definitely improved a lot, especially in expressing my opinions and developing my thoughts. I will definitely recommend the class to my friends!