I'm Baaack

Hello people.

I finished my online English class, you will still see the posts before this. I was required to have a blog, in which I posted stuff about my assignments. Passed that class (barely), now I will convert this blog to a real life blog.

I am going to work at Hartland Summer Camp for 9 whole weeks! I worked there last summer so I am uber excited. I will be cooking meat, (dead cow mostly), serving freaky high schoolers and chilling with the wildlife.

I will try to update this here blog. Here is my piece of advice for the night: Breathe.

~Laurel May~

Reserach Project and Class Summary

This research project has been very momentous. I learned so much through this assignment and I rather enjoyed it. The one major thing that I really learned is that you have to give a lot of time for any research project. There are endless research sources in this big wide world and, in order to do a just job of finding the facts, you must give it your all plus more.
I realized that Americans are passionate about morality when it comes to their children. We want the best for our kids. But when it comes to redesigning some of our attitudes and means to getting things, we have a bit of a harder time. American culture has become very money and material orientated. Morality does have major effects on the American Dream and I centered around some of the changes in our society that have brought on those effects. These changes include attitudes about money, feminism, convenience and laziness in America. Changes in how we view life and individual American dreams have abounded in our Country and we see these changes reflected in our future generations.
My two main types of resources have been books and the internet. I also talked to people about how they viewed the American Dream. I liked presenting my research in a website format. I thought it was very interesting and practical. It was practical because people can actually use it and read the information in a familiar website arrangement.
This English class has taught me a lot. It challenged my discipline because it was a strictly online course. I learned that I may do better in face to face classes because I tend to forget about my online assignments! I really enjoyed reading some of the books though, and learning how to research an in depth project.
Thanks to Ms. Joni Jordan for a class well-taught. I had a great time. 
Danke…
~Laurel May~

Chunking Assignment

My chunking assignment came together quite nicely. I created an introduction chunk, a body chunk (composed of sub chunks) and a conclusion chunk. The sub chunks included:

“The Productivity Nation and the Lazy Attitude”
“The Feminist Attitude”
“The Money Center Attitude”
“The Convenience Attitude”

Each of these sub chunks do not depend on the others in order to flow nicely, so I did not put them in any sort of very specific order.
My plan worked very nicely. I started to build up each of the 4 moral attitudes that I have researched have changed the American Dream. It came about relatively easy because of all the research that I have done.
I found the chunking assignment to help my writing immensely. It is easier on the brain to view a paper in chunks, and it almost makes more sense to us.
~Laurel May~

Details on Progress of Research

My research project has been coming along okay. I have just completed the website evaluation review, and that was very interesting. I learned a lot about evaluating website through that project and the information will be very useful as I research my subject. One lowlight for me is that I haven’t gotten as much done on my project as I would have liked. I will try not to procrastinate because, not only is this a class assignment, but it is something that I am very interested in myself.
I went to the library today and researched some books related to morals in America. I have found it a bit hard to find sources that fit the vision I was thinking of. But I know that there is so much information out there and I must be persistent. I have always been a an watcher of society, so the subject will come naturally to me.
The annotated bibliography is coming along okay, and I plan on finishing that within a few days. This project will help me a lot on my research. I have realized that many of these assignments and sources we are given are helping us a lot on this project.
I think that my subject will include a lot of opinion, so I know that I will have to be careful of this because too much opinion and not enough fact will not make for a very good research project!
I constantly hear different things about the American Dream and the morals of America and I plan on conducting an interview or two for some personal view points of this.
~Laurel May~

My Research Project Research. =)

My research question is this: “How does the American Dream affect our morality?” This question interested me very much because I have always been interested in figuring problems out that exist in today’s society. And often it comes back to morality. We are on a moral decline and I would like to pinpoint how this affects our morality and vise versa. I am very interested in the moral aspect of the American Dream.
I am not one hundred percent sure what I will find in my research. I know that the pursuit of the American Dream has led to a decline in American’s values, but I do not want to be too biased going into this project. I want to have an open mind, as any good researcher would.
I will probably start my research online, honestly. I will check out websites like http://www.bls.gov/ and http://news.cnet.com/American-workers-Lazy-or-creative/2008-1082_3-5847422.html . I will then continue on into the library and interviews.
I do not have a backup plan because I am confident that this one will pan out. This will not backfire because I am very interested in the subject. I have always been a flaneur and this topic is one that I have observed steadily.
~Laurel May~

My Research Project

I am very excited to start this research project. I think it will be an educational paper to research and write. I will write about the moral aspect of the changes in the American Dream. Attitudes that circle around money, people with lazy attitudes, the selfishness of our society today, those who feel victimized by society, the changes in women in the workforce. These things will be some of the moral viewpoints that influence the AD that I will write about. I would like to touch on how America likes to push our perfect American Dream down on other countries, wishing to change cultures worldwide. I think that this will be of interest because the moral downgrade of our society is something that affects everyone.
Since this is a research project, I am becoming aware that I will learn most by doing a variety of research. I plan on spending time at the city library researching stories. I will use the internet to find statistics and recent news stories. I hope to conduct a few interviews as well, with some different age groups.
I would think that any good research project will give both views of the topic. I hope to erase any bias I have by talking with those who oppose my views, and researching the opposite topic online. I know that I must substantiate my points with different sources, because this gives the point much more credibility.
I am extremely excited to start this project. I will try to take on an attitude of a detective working on his most recent case. I have concern because I do not have a whole lot of experience writing a research paper, but I know I can, and will, get over it.
~Laurel May~

The Writings of the Paper

I got a late start on the paper assignment for this week. The paper was based on "The Working Poor". David Shipler is a very interesting person, and thus, an engaging author. I enjoyed writing the paper and tried to use previous constructive criticism to better my paper.
I had fun researching Mr. Shipler. I sort of felt like a detective, trying to discover what I can about the author. I did not have time to go to the library and research the author, even though it was part of the assignment. But I found plenty of information online, cross referencing the information for credibility. I used a lot of internet resources to write my paper.
I wrote the three sections together, trying to make them flow as I wrote them. I thought this approach would be more ideal, rather than writing each section separately, and trying to make them flow afterward.
When writing papers and the like, I tend to write too many words. If there is a minimum of 1,000 words, I will often write more like 1,600 words. Not in this case. I had trouble filling the 2 pages of the middle content! I thought this was interesting.
All in all, it was a good assignment. I like how Ms. Jordan graduates each assignment with more words and more thought processes.
~Laurel May~