Journal Blog #5: State your Purpose.

As I noted in class, I have never liked talking about essay topics. There is nothing wrong with the word topic, of course. However, there are so many topics floating around, some of relevance and some of not. And we can just reach out and catch one for the fulfillment of a university essay assignment, write it to moderate satisfaction for all involved, and move on.

Purpose is more poignant. It suggests that we have a reason for writing. We have an objective to meet. With a topic, you can complete an assignment. With a purpose, you can write something meaningful.

But once again, it is often difficult to articulate what our purpose is. You may find yourself wandering through vagaries, trying to be purposeful but finding yourself ultimately purposeless. I don't know about you, but on many occasions, I have been caught trying to tell someone what I'm writing about, only to realize after minutes of babble, that I haven't the slightest clue what it is.

I think Jacob's gives us a nice recipe for cutting out the babble. 4 sentences for a purpose statement. For this journal blog, work to write a brief, precise, and coherent purpose statement.

Remember to include your ID# in your post. Aj. M

Journal Blog #4: Telling a Story.

Now we are passing mid-term, and we are turning to you. You are now asked to observe and think about an issue or event or problem that is happening in the world where you live. This will be the theme that inspires the rest of our writing for the term.

As we have discussed in class, a good story needs to address these six simple questions: the who, the what, the where, the when, the why, and the how. Your readers will be looking for the answers to these questions, so it is your job to supply them.

In this journal blog, there are 2 parts. Firstly, describe an issue of local interest. Think of something that is happening that affects the lives of people living there (which may include you), and help the reader know why this matters. Try to draft a headline for your story. Make this post by Friday, midnight.

Remember that even stories of local interest should have resonance for people who don't live there. A good writer can make something far away have personal appeal.

Secondly, read and respond to 2 of your classmates. Explain what you would expect to learn about in their story, and whether or not this would matter to you. Make this post by before Tuesday's class.

Remember to include your ID# in your post. Aj. M

Journal Blog #3: Introductions.

The hardest thing to do for almost any task is...   to start. Especially when it comes to writing, the first words are the hardest to produce. Maybe this is due to procrastination and other pressures, but often has to do with the pressure of the first sentence. As we discussed in class, the first sentence is the first step of the essay, and it has to be a good one. If the introduction is misleading, it can affect your credibility in the mind of the reader.

We are also trying to remember our lessons about description. The introduction is often when our descriptive tools need to be sharpest. Good description is gripping. It is moving. It can inspire a reader to keep calm and carry on.

In this edition, please post your best attempt at an introduction about Thai food. Those of us who know Thai food understand that the senses are on high alert when seeing and smelling and savouring all that there is to offer. Let's see some of those experiences coming though.

Remember that the thesis statement is:While Thailand has so much to offer any visitor, the one thing no one should miss is the diversity and delight of Thai street food. Don't forget to include your ID# in your post. Aj. M

Journal Blog #2: Description.

We can see that writing has a power that few other mediums do. Television and other visual mediums are powerful to be sure. But they often tell us what to think. In other words, they give us an experience and we receive it. Writing is different. Writing provides us with letters and words and sentences, and we have to take those words and construct them in our mind. That construction--if good--can produce an experience, an emotion, or sensual feeling. Bad writing, on the other hand, can be over descriptive and act like a TV, giving us everything and not allowing us to participate in the making of meaning.

In my view, the essay that we will review by Wong in class is highly effective description. For this journal blog, I would like you to reflect on the learnings we gained from the Adair chapters (summarized in the first blog entry), and apply them to the style and techniques of Wong in his travel essay. I am also open to other observations or experiences you have with the text.

Highlight some examples of description in the Wong essay that give you a vivid experience.

The purpose of this blog is reflect on our learning and see how it is put into practice. This is all in preparation for our own assignment of a descriptive essay.

Remember to include your ID# in your post. Aj. M

Journal Blog #1: Summary.

As we have seen in class, summarizing is a tricky thing. Because we are human beings with different experiences and different perceptions, our stories of what happened can be very different, even if we all witnessed the same thing in the same place at the same time.

Granted... it is a lot trickier when asking different people to summarize an artistic piece like we did in class. But this can still be true for other kinds of text. We have very important decisions to make about what is important and what is not. And for that reason, we are quite powerful in shaping the minds of our readers about what is important and what is not.

For this first journal blog, let's look at our course book. You have been assigned to a chapter from the book by Adair. Because this course will focus a lot on how to think and write creatively (and thereby interestingly), please help us and summarize the key ideas from your chapter. Use your own words, and use your own minds to determine what is key for all of us to know.

Please don't write more than a 100-word paragraph.

Remember to include your ID# in your post, and I will record your participation. Aj. M