During the first quarter, I have written the two necessary blogs posts on weeks where we are required to publish them even though blogging has never been – and still is not – an interest of mine. The main reason why I blog these posts is because of my responsibilities as a student to complete the assignments, not due to motivation. Because of my lack in inspiration, the results between blog posts and academic assignments differ.
When Sutherland first assigned blogging as homework, he only required one response post and another that can be anything I wanted to write about as long as both posts reached the three-hundred and fifty words mark. I thought that this was going to be an easy writing assignment – how hard could it be to write as I pleased as long as I followed the basic instruction? I realized how wrong I was after my first two posts: a response to Shiyun’s “The Rich and The Poor: Part 1” and Being Bored. I began to understand that writing itself was not the challenge – the problem was finding the reason to write. Even though I continuously tell myself that I have to finish the assignment because it is homework, my brain does not cooperate – as though that was not significant enough as a reason. In addition, it was troublesome because I did not know what to write about. Nothing was sparking my interest and I was often simply staring at the computer screen without knowing what I should write about. This was when I decided to give up free write and just do response posts for all of the other blogs because it was more efficient commenting on the ideas of other people than it was to come up with topics that might or might not interest me.
Blogging became easier after I decided to switch from blogging free writes to response posts; however, I still lacked the inspiration to blog and write posts. Moreover, the way I was writing did not help me develop or improve my writing skills. When I re-skimmed over the posts I had written during this quarter, I was able to get a basic understanding of how well I had been writing when I first started to post blogs.
In a sense, I agree with parts of what Shiyun is saying, but I also disagree with her. True, rich people are different from poor people in various ways, and both rich and poor have similarities. However, I do not agree with the areas where Shiyun states that poor people have a "better life," trustful friends, and are nice and independent while rich people have distrustful friends and are mean and dependent. [...] Shiyun does not really define the terms "rich people" and "poor people" so it is hard to determine which individuals she is talking about. The terms she uses can vary depending upon which individuals she is comparing. Millionaires would be considered as "poor" when compared to billionaires; however, these millionaires would also be considered as "rich" when compared to the regular "working class" or those in poverty. In addition, the terms "rich" and "poor" can even be used in areas where there is poverty. For example, someone who is able to make ten dollars a day will be considered "rich" compared to another who makes less than ten dollars a day.
This is a quote from my response the Shiyun’s “The Rich and The Poor: Part 1”. It was the first response post I did during the first quarter and it should underline the level in which I am writing at when I first started blogging because it represents the ability and the extent I was able to achieve at that point in time. In addition, all I had to do was to compare a piece of writing I did at the beginning of the first quarter with a piece I did at the end of the first quarter to see how much progress I made.
Kristine is making a very critical point when she states that America is a place when everyone is suppose to be tolerated because they are suppose to have equal and natural rights. Instead, there are people who are denied their rights because they have a different sexual orientation than the "general population" of people. [...] Although it is understandable that individuals can be uncomfortable around others who are different from themselves, it is not correct to constraint those individuals from being who they really are. For individuals with a different sexual orientation, it is already hard enough for them to even choose to publicize their preferences because of the negativity the general society has towards them.
This quote from my response to Kristine’s “What Has Society Come To?” was the last response post I blogged during the first quarter. Looking at these two quotes, I do not see mush of a difference between the forms of writing and the principles of ideas are basically similar to one another. Therefore, this shows that I have made no improvements through blogging during the first quarter.
On the other hand, I was able to make some improvements between the two academic assignments. When comparing the analysis of Q’s character with the conflict in Night, the analysis between the concrete details is better in the second essay than it was in the first.
However, it is easier to analyze a story than it is to blog free write posts because as essay has s prompt or a question that I can follow as I develop my points and support. Either way, there seems to be more progress in my academic assignments than in the regular blog posts.
For the second quarter, I suppose my goals will be to spend more time on my blogs so that I am not actually procrastinating every week. In addition, I want to be able to find a significant enough of a reason to make me start focusing more on the responses that I am posting. Between the open-ended free write and the structured academic writings, I think I will stick with the more formal academic writing so that I will have more practice for college. This way, I will be able to find a reason to write better.
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