Blog #9

    The first article that I am chosing to close read is “Beyond the Wall of Separation”, which is about the separation of church and state in America.  In the first paragraph McCarthy tells the reader that public schools hae been the setting for many disputes over separation of church and state.  Next she writes about the history of the separation of church and state in America and about the constitutional amendments.  In the next paragraph she raises the example of a specific legal case between an Amish family and Wisconsin public schools.  Next she writes about how prayer and devotional time was taken out of public schools in 1960 because it went against the first amendment.  McCarthy presents the metaphor of a wall separating church and state and uses more examples to support her claim.

    In the lit review, she writes about the case study of Lee vs. Weisman.  In the next paragraph McCarthy writes about student’s right to express themselves, and how that conflicts with the separation of church and state.  In the next paragraph McCarthy gives credit for the metaphor to Thomas Jefferson.  In the next paragraph, McCarthy raises the idea of allowing students to vote for their right lead prayers in schools, however she concludes the paragraph by saying that such an idea wouldn’t work.  McCarthy writes that since the government protects our right to free speech, students should be able to speak their minds on religion. 

    McCarthy writes that school children are can be captivated easily and lead to believe things that their teacher believes, so it is particularly important to recognize that when dealing with matters of religious expression in school atmosphere.  Next she writes that many believe that any time spent in silent meditation could be conceived as time for prayer, but no law has been created to stop it because educators say that silent meditation is a good way to manage students.  In the next paragraph she writes about the pledge of allegiance, and how it is controversial in schools.  Then she writes about how parents have suggested that parts of the curriculum degrade christianity and promote atheistic ideas.  She brings up the idea of the origin of humanity, and writes about how there are different styles to teach.  Then McCarthy writes about how student’s work is sometimes censored so that the school is not endorsing a particular religion.  Then she writes about the issue of students opposing religious belief and their right to express themselves regardless of the conflict that may be created.

    In the next section, McCarthy writes about the need for certain protocols to be set in place for challenging curriculum before everything goes to hell when a parent gets mad.  In the next paragraphy, McCarthy argues for the need for instructors to discuss the issues that go along with the first amendment, rather than shy away from them.  Next she suggests that students be let out of school early once a week so that they can all practice religious activities in their own ways without discriminating against anyone.  She concludes by writing that a students religious life should not be shut out, and that religion is an important part of most student’s lives.

McCarthy, Martha. “Beyond the Wall of Separation: Church-State Concerns in Public Schools.” Phi Delta Kappan 90.10 (2009): 714-19.

    The second article that I close read was Teaching religion in America’s public schools.  Passe and Willox start the paper by hooking in the reader.  Next they write that being educated about religion is essential to understanding social issues.  Next they write that the problem isn’t getting religion into the curriculum, but getting to the teachers to teach it.  Furthermore they write that Christianity is already everywhere in the classroom, as made evident by christmas decorations and things like that.  Next they write that it is important to teach religion, without proselytizing the students.

    In the next section of the paper they write about the clear distinction between church and state.  They write that students should be taught not only about their own religion, but the religion of others.  They dedicate the next paragraph to suggesting that not nly religion should be taught but also other elements of other cultures.  They write that 9/11 made everyone a little bit more aware of the fact that they know nothing of Islam for example.  Despite steps toward fixing the problem, they write that little is being done in schools.

    In the first paragraph of the next section the authors write about the policies that need to be changed to teach American’s about other cultures and religions.  The next paragraph is about the need for the American people to want to change and learn about other religions.  The next paragraph tells about how teachers lack an informational foundation to teach religion.  The next paragraph is an addition to the preceeding one, and it states that teacher also lack the teaching techniques to teach that material.  Next they write about how teachers shouldn’t be teaching religion right now, because it wouldn’t be possible.  In the following paragraph, the authors address the need for teachers, the administration, and the community to work in unison to change.  To conclude the section, the authors write that there are already all the necessary supplies to accomplish the change, just not the necessary demand. 

   In the first paragraph of the conclusion the authors write that with a campaign to raise awareness for religious studies in school, American students could be more globally competitive.

Passe, Jeff, and Lara Willox. “Teaching Religion in America’s Public Schools: A Necessary Disruption.” Social Studies 100.3 (2009): 102-06.

    The introduction and the lit review are different because the introduction makes an attempt to hook the reader in and let them know what the paper is about and a lit review is about the information that the author gathered during his or her research.  Both authors attempted to hook the reader with an appeal to logic.  They both started off with ideas that seemed so common sense.  McCarthy’s article aimed to define the idea of separation of church and state and give a suspicious look at it.  It’s significant because the constitution states that there is to be a separation of church and state and if there is research to prove that there isn’t one than that would be important.  The methods used to find the results are found in the second paragraph of my outline, under the lit. review section.  Passe and Willox’s article aimed to defend the idea that religion should be taught in public schools.  It’s significant because if the papers assumption that learning other religions would benefit students then that is something that educators should investigate.

Blog #8

    Grace Flemming writes that first impressions are a big part or a reader’s lasting opinion of the work.  There man different ways to hook the reader in with an introduction, like using humor, a suprising fact, or a quotation for example.    Another important part of the paper that is found in the introduction is the thesis.  The thesis is the backbone to the entire paper, and should be clearly found in the introduction.

    Whitesmoke.com states that an introduction should serve two main purposes.  It should let the reader know exactly what the paper is about, and it should hook the reader in and make him or her read more.  Also, the introduction is a way for an author to give a reader confidence in a paper.  There should be no technical or stylistic errors in the introduction and the author should use strong specific vocabulary (Whitesmoke.com).

    I know that introductions are important.  I think for my paper I would like to use humor as a hook, because I like to joke around.  However, I could see how humor wouldn’t always be the best way to pique reader’s interest so I would also consider using a powerful quote to kick my research party off right!

Works Cited

                      ”How to Write an Introduction”. WhiteSmoke, inc. 2010. Feb. 17, 2010. http://www.whitesmoke.com/how-to-write-an-introduction

Blog #7

    Texas A&M libraries and Cornell University library break the process of critically analyzing information sources into a several step process.  Both documents begin the process by looking at the article’s author, date of publication, publisher, and where the journal was published, as opposed to looking at the content of the article.  By doing these things, researchers are able to get a better idea about how resource will be able to help with their research, if at all.  The second step is to analyze the content of the document.  Before reading the entire article, both documents that I read suggested that the reader scan the article and read the preface and conclusion.  By doing this, a researcher is able to get a better understanding of the author’s direction and purpose in the article.  When reading an article, a researcher should also be looking for the intended audience of the article.  If the article is intended for a more advanced or a less advanced audience, for example, it may not be a useful resource.  Another thing that needs to be addressed by a reader is whether or not the author is objective or biased.  If the author is biased and writes based on opinions as opposed to facts, the article may not make a good resource (texas a&m).  

    I think critically analyzing an information source is important, because it would take forever to read every single source cover to cover to see if it’s worth using.  Writing a huge research paper is a huge assignment in and of itself.  It take a long time to carefully chose the sources that will be used.  The whole process would become almost impossible if a researcher took the time to read every single potential source that they came across. 

Works cited  

“CRITICALLY ANALYZING INFORMATION SOURCES”. Texas A&M University Libraries. 2006. Texas A&M University. Feb 14, 2010. http://www-english.tamu.edu/pers/fac/may/analyzingsources.pdf

  

 

Blog #6

    Dennis G. Jerz’s webblog explains exactly what MLA format is, and gives step by step directions to follow for writers who are writing in MLA.  Jerz’s webblog covered; Heading, title block, saving files, formatting work cited pages, and indenting long quotations.  Jerz goes into great detail about how to apply all the formatting rules to writing.

    Formatting is important to writers and readers alike.  The entire idea of reading critically would fail without documentation and formatting.  How are readers going to be able to read a text and come to a conclusion about it without being able to know how credible the author is?  Formatting is a fundamental part of writing that backs up an authors work, and makes it easier for readers to deal with the text.

    Many of my problems with formatting have been with citation and in text citation.  I feel like every single time I try to cite a resource in my works cited page I never have all the information about the document that I need to format the citation correctly.  I went back to many of my old blogs and saw that I didn’t use any in text citation at all!  I threw in some of those bad boys where they needed to be,  and got all my blogs up to par!  I went back and checked all of my work cited sections of my other blogs as well.  I really think that they are right, but I wouldn’t be surprised at all if I have them all screwed up.  So, as of now, I think my blogs are all done and formatted appropriately.

Blog #5

    Deborah Knott’s article on critical reading and writing really stresses the connection between reading and writing.  She says that to write critically, the writer must first do research and critically read other author’s work.  Knotts also describes the specific way that an author should write critically.  She also goes on to offer tips to writers that new writers would benefit from reading.

    Dan Kurkland’s CriticalReading.com suggest the differences between a critical reader and a non critical reader.  Kurkland writes that a non-critical reader reads a text for facts, and memorizes the contents of a text for information.  Kurkland describes a critical reader, however, as a reader who takes the contents of a text to be a perspective of one author, and don’t necessarily take the contents for fact.  Kurkland summarizes that critical reading is more than just very attentive reading, it is an active process of examination and analysis (CriticalReading).

    I think that critical reading is actually an important part of being a good writer, and I’m not just admitting that to get in good with the teacher.  I think that critical reading gives the reader a deeper look at different texts  The critical reader can examine the content on the text and the stylistic techniques used by the author.  I know when I try to read critically it always gives me ideas for my work.

    Flower’s work focuses on the connection between an author and a reader.  She believes that an author must establish a “common ground” that the reader and the writer can share.  She thinks that if the writer can create a “common ground” it will decrease the differences in their lives.  According to Flower, differences in knowledge, attitude, and needs to be addressed to create a connection for the reader.

    My article that was related to Flower’s was about the importance of finding a specific audience.  The article stated that it is important to remember that while your instructors will be grading your assignments, they are not necessarily your audience.  The article covered a few ways to identify with an audience, and to select an audience.

    I believe that people hear what they want to hear.  If an audience isn’t interested in a topic, it won’t stick with them and they won’t learn anything.  It is important to select an audience and write to their needs to have them relate to the text.  I remember learning about how important audience is to art in my english 122 class with Mike Sell.  We used Susan Glaspell’s trifles to examine her use of audience.  She held the preformed the play in a theater that sat 100 people.  She wanted her audience to be small so that they could pick up on the subtleties of the character’s interactions.   It all makes perfect sense to me.  Audience is important for a ton of reasons.

Works Cited

Kurland, Dan. “What is critical reading?” CriticalReading. 2000.  2-10-10. http://www.criticalreading.com/critical_reading.htm

Blog #4

    My major research question is, “What effect do religious values have on what type of literature is taught in public high schools?”  That question also invokes a look at what isn’t taught in public high school literature courses, and why it isn’t taught.  I am an atheist, and I am argumentative.  I love to get in debates with friends about the most meaningless topics.  I am interested in this topic because it hits home for me.  Religion is a widely debated topic, and being an atheist and a literature teacher in training, I would like to learn more about the religious  messages and values represented in literature that is taught in public high schools.  The thing that led me to this topic, and will hopefully keep me interested in it for the rest of the semester, is the fact that every single person has a personal opinion about religion.  Everyone has wrestled with the conflicting ideas on the subject, and almost everyone cares about it.  I wouldn’t like to pick a topic that readers are unable to related to and nobody cares about, so why not chose a topic that everyone has some say on?  In addition, I’m interested in the topic I chose because it is tied into what I will continue to learn at IUP, and take into my classroom as an english teacher.

   My first assumption about my research topic is that adolescent students learn about social norms and values from interactions with peers.  Students begin to develope their own personal identity at that stage of life, and school is a place where interactions with others shape their identities daily.  I assume that what students are exposed to in their literature classes will effect how they relate to the world outside of their high school, and that the literature will in some way, shape, or form have an effect on a students identity.  My research question for this assumption would be, “what effect does the literature that public high school students are exposed to have on the identity of the students?”.

    My next assumption is that religious values influence what literature is taught in public high school english classes.  Parents of adolescent students may impose their values on to what literature is in the curriculum.  There is an obvious connection between this assumption and my last assumption, which would be interesting to investigate.  My research question for this assumption would be, “Do the religious values of adults in the community or parents of students influence what is taught in school?”. 

    Another assumption I have about my topic is that in a predominantly christian society, atheist values will not be promoted in public high school literature curriculum.  I hate how pushy christians are about being christians!  I feel like christians are always up in arms about some issue, and most certainly wouldn’t stand a non-christian message being available in a public high school.  My research question would be, “Do non-christian values get silenced in english classrooms, in areas that are statistically predominantly christian?”.

    I also assume that exposing students to atheist/non-christian literature would be beneficial to the growth and developement of the students.  I think that American youth, myself included, doesn’t know how to relate to the rest of the world because they are so totally suffocated by American society that they just don’t care.  I think that reading literature from different points of view would give students more self-awareness.  So, does exposing public high school students to literature that is either non-religious or non-christian make them more well-rounded and self-aware human beings?

    I think it is safe to assume that most public high school students come from Christian backgrounds, and claim some denomination of Christianity.  I also assume that parents have a huge role in their children’s religious affiliation.  This idea brings about a million questions to my mind.  Are the majority of high school students actually Christian?  Do their parents bring them up that way, or do they discover it on their own?  Do high school students actually benefit from literature courses?  I mean, even if high school english classes were packed with non-christian literature, would the students engage with it enough to take the author’s message to heart?  Is literature lost on high school students?

    When I went out to find solid journals to use as references, I was able to see what  many other researchers had written.  Of course I didn’t read most of the articles that I bumped into during my search, but I was able to read a ton of abstracts and see what type of research is available.  I totally underestimated the assignment.  I spent all of “District 9″  just searching different phrases and seeing what came up.  I found rough 3 billion articles that were almost helpful, but the ones that I will use as resources come few and far between.  I searched topics like religion in high school english classes, high school students religious affiliations, and the influence that parents extend over what is taught in their children’s english classroom.  I was torn about the articles I was able to find for resources.  I was happy that I didn’t stumble on a ton of articles on my topic, because our research has to be original.  On the other hand, it’s so much harder to do research on my own as opposed to just stealing other folk’s ideas.

    The method that I’m going to use to get my research done is faculty member interviews at IUP.  I wish i could say that this was my brilliant idea, but the fact of the matter is that Marlen suggested this winner to me.  I thought about looking at high school english reading lists around the country, but I think Marlen’s idea is way better than mine!  So, I’m just gong to run with his idea and interview english professors on campus.  I suppose I will have written down some questions to ask them about religions influence on literature taught in high schools.

    http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/authors_journals_submit, http://www.teenink.com/submit, http://tclj.toasted-cheese.com/submit.htm, http://allrightsreserved.ca/submissions/, and http://www.wetinkmagazine.com/submit.htm are five different sites that I could consider submitting my research to.

Blog #3

    There are many different ways to write, and different genres to use to convey your point.  Tammy Miklebost on writing, published on the George Mason University web site, writes that persuasive essays, poems, expository writing, stories, and journals are all different genres that can be used by a writer to convey a point.  Miklebost provides explanations and examples of each genre, and suggest classroom applications, which were applicable to me as an education major (mason.gmu.edu).

    I narrowed my list down to atheism and moshing.  Those were to two topics that I found myself most drawn to.  I know I can relate most easily to those two topics, and I think that will give me an advantage when I do the research project.  I think that a fair hypothesis for my research question on moshing is that getting up and moshing serves as a release for working to middle class white youth.  They use it to work out the stress and problems of their average ass lives!  I think that a good hypothesis for my research question, “why do people go to church?”, would be; I believe people go to church out of habit and obligation and don’t enjoy it.  I think that people don’t enjoy church, and I think that they go out of obligation and fear!  Doing research on this could be difficult, but I still think I want to check it out.  The interesting thing is that I probably could have guessed that these are the two topics I would end up writing about from the very beginning.

    I think I am naturally more inclined to write a research journal style paper, purely by the process of elimination.  I am not artistic at all so setting up a visualy, arty presentation wasn’t going to happen.  Also, the idea of writing a fourty page short story is terrifying to me!  That seems like such a long assignment!  The most appealing option is to write the 15 page research journal style report.  However, if I did write a short story, I would most definitely write it on the church issue.  I think it would be pretty easy to build a story with that type of story line already decided ahead of time.  Also, it may be fun to try to write a 40 page short story.  I also like to argue and debate with people, so I always liked writing persuasive essays.  I like to research and defend a point, so I think I would also enjoy writing a research journal style report.

Works Cited

                             Miklebost, Tammy. “Writing; Genres of writing”. “Literacy at School at Home”. George Mason University. http://mason.gmu.edu~cwallac7/TAP/TEST/writing/3.html

Blog #2

    The list of the topics I am interested in writing about is; moshing, girls, atheism, swimming/sports, and texting.  I started the process of chosing a good research topic with a list of more like ten or twelve.  After I trimmed the fat off my larger list of ideas, I came up with the preceding list, which will contain the last five possibilities for my research assignment.

    Moshing is first on my list.  I have always liked to go to hardcore shows, and almost every single time I end up getting moshed, hard.  Moshing is more than just push pits, it’s a style of dancing kids do to hardcore music.  They swing their fists, and kick, and spin around swinging and looking crazy!  To most people it looks borderline ridiculous, but the kids who go to Forward Hall in Erie, pa on friday nights, still show off their mosh skills and beat the hell out of each other.  However, even in the hostile environment of the hardcore scene, the kids who go to shows end up forming a community of kids.  But whats with the anger?  Whats with the violence?  I watch a kid get his teeth knocked out, then being held in place only by his busted ass braces.  Another observation that I have made from being at shows is that the majority of the kids in attendance  are white kids from the middle to working class.  I would like to do research on the topic, and see why kids mosh.  More specifically, what about moshing is satisfying for kids, and why are the majority of kids who most middle to working class white kids.  I think it really is an important issue because hardcore is growing around the world.  More cities are getting hardcore scenes and more kids are tuning into the music and the message.  My research will be different because I and going to look into what is satisfying about such an apparently violent and aggressive is satisfying to many white youth these days.  My research question would most likely be; what about moshing is satisfying for a working to middle class white youth.  I think for this topic, and my style of writing, I would most likely write the 15 page research journal.

    Girls was probably the last additions my list of finals.  Girls just make no sense to me.  I would like to know about how women and men process the same situations differently.  This is a tremendously important topic!  I if figure the answers to this topic I guarantee my paper get published and I will be hailed as the genius who figured it all out.  I’ll bring something new to this subject by looking at how women and men handle the same situation differently, not just how they interact.  My research project would be a 15 page research paper for this topic.  This topic would  most likely have the most scientific information in it, and writing in a research paper form would just be more straight forward about the results of the research.

    Atheism is probably my second favorite topic.  I’m and atheist, and I have that weakness where the sufferer compulsively tries to get people to see everything his way.  I would like to know more about why people who go to church, go to church.  I think this is a hugely important topic if your interested in whether or not to believe in God or not.  Do people thee days go to church out of habit or obligation?  Or do they really love going to church?  My research question would be; Why do people who go to church, go to church?  For this topic, I could see it being a little bit more sensible for a short story.  I’m not sure if I’m up for that long of a project, but who knows!? 

  Swimming is still on my list simply because I have swam my whole life, including a year here at IUP.  I was always told by my swimming buddies that it was scientifically proven that swimmers are the best in bed.  I would like to know whether thats true.  My research question would be; Are swimmers actually the best in bed?  For this project I think I wold have to take a much more scientific approach, and type of research lends itself more to a research paper I think.

    My last topic is texting.  I have always heard from teachers that texting is going to ruin children’s social skills and make everyone weird.  I would like to know more about the effect of texting instead of having real personal interaction.  I could bring something new to the topic, by looking into kids who owned cell phones at an earlier age, and see if it effected them developmentally.  My research question would be; What is the effect of children texting more and more instead of having personal interaction.  I would most likely write a research paper for this topic.