Welcome back my friends to the blog that never ends. I’m so glad you could attend Read along! Read along! There inside this class is some prose that’s pretty crass Be careful as you pass. Read along! Read along! Wow! Emerson, Lake and Palmer would be extremely disappointed at my sophomoric attempt at humor to finish our final writing exercise. I must admit that I have struggled to produce original and interesting content for these blogs. Forty-two years ago, I experienced no such dearth of ideas when composing my prose for my freshman English class. At first, I thought, “maybe, it’s my age.” However, at 86 years old, former US Poet Laureate Donald Hall, and author of my freshman writing textbook, claimed he could no longer write poetry. “Not …show more content…
Two are opioids and two, Neurontin and Ambien, affect the brain in other ways, including short term memory loss. He said it’s very possible they are interfering with my writing skills or journalistic acumen. I’m not sure I’m buying that explanation, either. Samuel T. Coleridge produced two poems of considerable renown while addicted to opium. Who has not had to recite parts of the Rime of the Ancient Mariner or does not remember the lines, “In Xanadu did Kubla Khan\A stately pleasure-dome decree:\Where Alph, the sacred river, ran\Through caverns measureless to man\Down to a sunless sea.” Consequently, I have concluded that my lack of originality must have another cause. Perhaps, my profession for the past thirty-one years could be the cause. Although, in the giddy first days of the computer revolution, my colleagues and I were full of invention and inspiration, an appeal that lured me from a Fortune 500 company, Dun and Bradstreet Corp, to pursue a passion. But, I quickly realized to survive in this competitive field, I needed to specialize in one or two specialties. Although specialization allowed me to send my kids to college, shelter my family and hopefully secure our retirement, it did not allow for originality of
When I first entered english composition 1101, I expected this course to be manageable. As an outstanding english student at Clarke Central high school, I believed that I had enough knowledge to excel in this course with no challenges. Dr. Catherine Rogers was able to knock me off of my high horse and make me realize that I has a lot more to learn about reading and writing. She is very comprehensive and analytical, which caused her to give me a c average on my midterm assignments. I put the blame on myself because I believe that I should have been more open to Dr. Rogers’ methods with pre-writing and revision. Now I think highly of reading and writing.
Kim Brooks, we know has been “teaching composition at state universities and liberal art colleges and community colleges as well,” (Brooks 2) however what makes her truly passionate about the situation is her love for literature since she was a teenager. “Like so many, depressive, creative, extremely lazy high-school students, I was saved by english class” (1). Brooks demonstrates through these quotes her credibility, not only because she’s a teacher but because she truly loves writing and believes others should receive the education which she was fortunate enough to get. She was not apart of any clubs or extracurriculars, she wasn’t interested in other academic classes, so she knows how beneficial having the skills to converse, to write and to properly articulate one's self are. Brooks shares this personal anecdote, otherwise known as pathos, to relate to those reading, most specifically high school students like she once was. While focusing this piece mainly on English it can also be associated with other classes in high school as well. She is trying to illustrate how one can use what is learned in high school in their life if given the proper tools and taught skills which can be applied
A poet hopes that people would appreciate their poem in a way that it is not mistreating the work’s value. In the poem “Introduction to poetry” Billy Collins describes his desires on how students should connect with poems. Collins states that students try to force out meanings out of poems instead of diving in to understand its true nature. The author creates a sensitive yet aggressive tone to convey two ways of poetry appreciation through his use of diction, personification and metaphor.
I have the misfortune of being an English instructor. I attempt to instill a bunch of bobby soxers and drug-store Romeos with reverence for Hawthorne and Whitman and Poe! (62).
My English Literature major has helped me to achieve an outstanding level of appreciation, enjoyment, and knowledge of both American and British Literature. As a high school AP English student, I struggled through great works like Hamlet and To the Lighthouse. My teacher’s daily lectures (there was no such thing as class discussion) taught me merely to interpret the works as critics had in the past. I did not enjoy the reading or writing process. As a freshman at Loras, I was enrolled in the Critical Writing: Poetry class. For the first time since grade school, my writing ability was praised and the sharing of my ideas was encouraged by an enthusiastic and nurturing professor. Despite the difficulty of poetry, I enjoyed reading it.
In a society where quantity of work overpowers quality of work, there is no wonder why "neuroenhancing" drugs such as Adderall and Ritalin are on the rise of consumption. As more people adopt the idea that these drugs are cognitively beneficial; the more they secretly use them for non-medical reasons. Margaret Talbot, a writer for The New Yorker, looks more into this problem in her article, "From Brain Gain: The Underground World of "Neuroenhancing" Drugs". Throughout this article Talbot focuses on a new trend of drug use, such as Adderall and Ritalin, for non-medical intentions. She focuses mainly on the increase of drug use by scholars and public intellectuals throughout her article. Talbot successfully proves to her audience that non-medical
“The sharp aches in my head, or what I later came to know as migraines, stopped as my daily activities were replaced with more soldierly things… They [marijuana and cocaine mixed with
In literary education, from childhood to maturity, individuals are taught how to write not to improve themselves as critical thinkers, but to fulfill the requirements given to them in a prompt. Whether to analyze or argue, this form of writing has led to a cease of literary improvement in students today, making many question the effectiveness of writing classes. Mike Bunns, in his article “To Read like a Writer”, explores this topic and stresses the necessity for young readers to critically examine the author’s choices in order to improve their own pieces of work. Bunns effectively argues to his audience of college students that improved comprehension comes from focusing on the rhetorical choices authors decide to make in their compositions by tying personal narratives with repetitive questioning throughout his article.
From the early beginning of the school year to the current day, my writing skills and knowledge have improved and broadened over time. If not drastic, the change is noticeable nevertheless. For almost an entirety of eighth grade, assignments of varying difficulty challenged me to a degree. To be frank, some seemed as though they were beyond my comprehension and ability. However, determination amalgamated with knowledge obtained in advance helped me to overcome my doubts, for I exceeded my expectations; surprisingly good grades and comments are a delight, owing to the fact of that I don’t tend to think of myself as being proficient at writing. Consequently, the assignments given to me this school year shaped me into who I am as a writer.
Welcome back my friends to the blog that never ends. I’m so glad you could attend. Read along! Read along! There in this class is some prose that’s pretty crass. Be careful as you pass. Read along! Read along! Wow! How disappointed Emerson, Lake and Palmer must be in this sophomoric attempt at humor. Certainly, a painful finale to wonderful class. Admittedly, I have struggled to produce original and interesting content for these blogs. It wasn’t always so. In the autumn of 73, I experienced no such struggle. Ideas burst forth freely and often to form exquisite prose delighting my English professors. Indeed, the fact that I now struggle was a compelling argument to register for this class.
I won the Hopwood Award for Poetry (rare for first-years) and the MFA’s Vermont Studio Center fellowship. Nevertheless, my scientific background has left me like a surgeon with dexterous hands but no training—with every poem, I stumble blindly to the operating table. Just as I’ve regretted touching down in a country without knowing its language, I need academic training to do my art justice. MFAs take one graduate-level English course, and in that single semester, examination of the canon expanded my notion of what poetry can do, shifting my attention from single-image poems to ambitious works that centrifuged in a common vial my Southern identity and the persecution of gays abroad. If one seminar can transform my aesthetic, three years of rigorous academic inquiry could work
At 11:15 on Monday, August 17, 2015, my first official college class, English 1101, began. In general, I had no idea what college classes would be like let alone how college English would be. Even though this class taught me a great deal in one semester, it took a large amount of time and effort to make the adjustment from high school. The simplistic writing style of high school was put to rest the moment the first college English class began. As a result, I learned quickly that college writing is complex and less systematic than high school writing. Five paragraph essays with three strict body paragraphs were no longer the norm for writing. Even though my professor helped guide my writing, I was no longer coddled through the whole writing
Gordon B. Hinckley’s words ring true through my mind as I enter this school year: “Without hard work, nothing grows but weeds.” Entering into this AP Language and Composition class marks the beginning of my challenging school year. However, I will treat my assignments as I do my garden. Carefully, I will water the seeds of information that have been planted in my brain. As I remove the aspects of writing and reading that prove to be unbeneficial to me, it will be as if I am picking weeds. Desiring for my writing skills to blossom, I will work to be the best student I can be.
Over the past week I found it hard to write this paper. I’ll start and cross everything out, because it doesn’t sound like me. Everyone helping to put together an outline for me to follow and yet it doesn’t nothing. Four days, I’ve been trying to make sense of myself and I have nothing. Until one evening over my brother’s house, I had the funniest conversations with his wife. Then, ding! Ideas started coming in like Hurricane Harvey. Over a mere conversation with endless questions, I realized who my literacy sponsors, my obstacles were and who I was.
I majored in English in the Humanities and Social Sciences college at Rowan University. At the same time, I studied a number of courses in the discipline of secondary education. I enjoyed studying teaching but early in my undergraduate career I determined that teaching English at the high school level was not my desired life path. Rather, teaching English Literature as a professor was my life's purpose. As an undergraduate, I have taken a deluge of class varying from children's literature to Toni Morrison studies in an attempt to further understand literature. Concentrating on the ways in which modern literature apprehends the American experiences within the written word. At the point of graduation, I accomplished a