Socratic Seminar Reflection

I thought that our socratic seminar went really well. A lot of different points that I had never thought of were brought up. A lot of ideas I had were brought up and I got a deeper understanding of them. I thought the discussion about whether or not we should start with education was a very interesting. Ariana thought that we should do more than educate young kids, she believed that we should enforce regulation as well as working with kids and educating them about what they're eating. Lauren thought that we should start with education and as the young people get older, start enforcing regulation.

I think the idea of putting farm animals back on the farm is a good idea, as well as making sure that we reduce the amount of fossil fuels we use.

Weekend Homework

Our homework this weekend was to ask if anyone in our family was a farmer. When John first asked this question, I tried to think about who in my family was a farmer, I couldn't think of anyone. I came home and I asked my mom if anyone in our family was a farmer. She told me that my great grandfather was a farmer, or as she said, a "campasino." My great grandfather lived of his land and he also fed my grandfathers family of 8. My great uncles also became farmers and lived off their land.
Since my father grew up in Morelia, a bigger city in Mexico, he doesn't recall having any farmers in his family.

Space

While talking about space today in class, I couldn't help but think of how lucky we are. We are lucky that we exist. We're on a small planet that we all have the opportunity to make an impact on. We do not know what else or who else is out there, seeing as how there are so many different galaxies and even that many more planets that are unexplored. Like John said, I think it's important to not waste our only opportunity on this earth. We must all try to make a positive impact on it while we can if we want it to be here for an extended amount of time.

I also found if very interesting that everything has a schedule. Stars become either red planets or red supergiants and can either become white dwarfs or black holes. It's amazing to see that we're all just a physics problem.

Curiosity About the Natural World

There are many things that I am curious about concerning the natural world. I would like to learn more about different ecosystems. Such as the difference between oceanic, forest, meadow and agro-ecosystems. I'm also curious about different plants and why there are so many. I know that there are plants that have no real purpose, as they are commonly referred to as weeds. I also have a strong curiosity about how humans can have such a strong effect on the environment even though we only aquire a small amount of the living biomass. I also want to learn what kind of things we can do to lower the negative impact we have on the world.

Reflection

I learned several things during the magazine project process. I learned that I could use several little tricks to make my writing better and to make my writing more substantial. While the critiquing process was going on I realized that I needed to make my article more urgent instead of full of boring facts. I learned a lot about editing too, I learned that I should pace myself and make sure I spend enough time on everyone’s paper so that I could give them well thought out critiques that they could use. I also learned to explain to them what they needed to fix instead of just giving them a paper that’s marked up. I made a lot of different drafts during the whole process.

At first I was going to use my photo essay but then I decided to write a whole new article based on what I learned at internship and how that opened my eyes to a very important topic. I used pictures from my photo essay because I thought that they effectively represented what I was trying to get across. I simply needed to know how to incorporate the pictures into my writing creatively. I believe that my layout put the two components together well. I learned that the publishing process was not an easy one. I’m glad that we had to weigh in different things and we ultimately selected the right choice. We decided to go with the local printer because we would be able to produce a better product and even though it wasn’t in color it gave us a chance to be creative.

After 11th grade I hope to stay with WiLDCOAST and continue my project with them. Our project at WiLDCOAST was bigger than making a chart, it was about changing something in the government and hopefully changing part of the culture in Mexico.

All of these things are important because it made me once again realize how important this topic is and what kind of affect it’s going to have on Mexico. It also helped with my writing. We made the right choice by choosing to make a magazine, I believe that everyone’s article is their best example of work so far.

Blog Reflection Numero Dos

1. Overall, when you think about the big picture of your writing, what improved? How did it get better? Why?

I believe that my writing did get a lot better as the drafts went on. At first I only had a five paragraph essay that had an intro with a thesis and a conclusion. As it went on, I had several concise paragraphs that had a clear meaning. I believe that the big picture of my article was obvious and it was interesting. The big picture of my article is the start of an incentive program in Baja California that would end the pollution found in the Tijuana River Valley. My writing got better because of the tips that were given in Humanities class. The tips helped me with structure of the article, the concerts not pancakes and the loop structure are the tips that helped me the most.

2. Overall, when you think about the big picture of your writing, what still needs work? What do you think will help you improve? Why?

I think that my writing still needs to be more interesting. I had a lot of facts about my writing but I didn't exactly know how to make the facts interesting. I still need help with adding facts and quotes into the writing. I believe that if I could incorporate the facts and the quotes into the writing my article would be a lot more interesting and make more of an impact.

3. Specifically, show us something that improved and describe the path it took to get better. You can quote your article, your drafts, link to evidence, etc.

In my first draft I had a five paragraph essay that tried to do the loop style structure, but it failed. As I started writing more drafts the loop structure started making more sense and there were a lot more paragraphs to work with. It took a lot of drafts and a lot of critiques for my writing to get better. I had to change a lot of sentences so that they would make sense. I also had to make the introduction more interesting.

4. Describe something specific (or a few things!) that you learned about writing.
All of the tips that were talked about in humanities helped me a lot. We learned about sentence structure and how to use words. I learned not to use Sledgehammer words (completely, extremely, really, etc.) and to have concerts instead of pancakes. I also learned the loop structure.

Magazine Reflection

1. What went well for you during the process of creating this magazine?

The process overall was good for me, it made me understand what is done in the professional world as well as understand how to work with others and take their advice. I knew how to work with indesign a little when I started but as time went on, I learned a lot more about indesign. I took a lot of advice from other people and because of it I believe my project looks a lot better and it looks a lot more professional.

2. What challenges did you face as you moved from an early draft or idea to a final product?
I wrote a whole new article, so I went through about 12 drafts before I believed it was ready to be in the magazine, there were a lot of tweaks made everywhere and during the whole experience. I also had to change things like my pictures and I had to make them different because they had to be black and white as well as change in size.

3. What other examples of work—student and professional—stood out as exemplary and served as a good model for your own work?
I really enjoyed Evan's layout and I really liked Sydney's layout, I tried doing something similar to Evan's layout but it didn't quite work out. I used the Atlantic as a professional example. I tried to do similar headline pages and sub-headlines.