The Lonely, Good Company of Books - Richard Rodriguez

My relationship with books has been on and off, I would read a book and like it for myself but when it's required that i read them i just shut down and don't read anything anymore. I would only read books that came in a series. I remember last year in my senior year of high school, started back reading again for myself because I saw this seies of books that had to do with the inner city and it was about high school also. It talked about everyday life for these kids as far as bullying, family problems, and falling in love for the first time in high school. I believe what had attracted me to these books was that it reflects my life and everything that i had went through in my earlier years of high school. I believe i would read more if more books had to do with my current life because that realloy attracts me. Once i read that first book i had to keep going back to get the next chapter then the next chapter. I don't dislike reading i just perfer reading material that deals with everyday life. Like some of these stories in this college writing book really stands out to me because it deals wwith current issues, opinions that people make like one of my favorite stories, Botstein when he talks about teen-agers try adulthood. I saw that out of all nof the stories this year the class was very opinionated about that topic. Some was for it oters were not, but that's very interesting that books or stories can make you think even more deeper about things than what its said right there in print. They make you think outside of the box.

What story reminds me of education?

The story that i will be talking about is about my past education experiences in high school. I really had a hard time shifing from one school to another. I grew up in an urban community down in Kansas City, MO, it wasn't the best place to live because education wasn't the only thing you had to worry about getting done. At the end of the day we really had alot of family problems which there was having to have somthing to eat for that night. we would somtimes have to miss school because our mother would be sick. And on top of that when we did go to school the educatin was not gooat all. We never had homework or anything, if we was just to show up we would pass the class. All the teachers wanted was for us to be there so they can get the funding that they want. Then my whole life changed so fast. Soon as i moved away from my mothers house i went to go live with my sister. We moved to the northern part of Missouri and had to change schools. We had to move because it had gotten so bad that we didn't have anybody or anything to go to because we lost the house. When it was our first day of school, it was crazy because it was so many students there i was shocked that i couldn't believe that i was here. then when it was class time for class i was so lost by the end of the day. I realized that i didnt know any of this material that they were covering. I felt so far behind in everything, this was going to be a beginning of a long year.

Fredrick Douglas - Qusetions for Reflection and Writing

Fredrick Douglas experience with trying to learn how to read and write were alot worse than what we have to go through now. We should be greatful for what we have now because really if it wasnt for him we would have the things that we have today. Him risking his life and families life just to learn is the best thing that could have happen to any of us. Now and days we have the freedom to learn our material and we just throw it away. People died for our rights and it's like we don't even care about them. We have the privledge to be whatever we want to be and that's a great accomplishment. Just to not only think that he risked his life but he also could have risked the life of the owners wife because she was the one sneeking him around to tecah him how to read and write. So he got him self a little help from a brave white person that knew somthing was wrong but could not do anything about it. but she did what all she could do, and from then on he took it in his own hands to leave and take his people with him. We now have poeple to help us all around and we should take advantage of the situation. We have a great education system compared to him. he only got to learn from just a random person that could only teach him what she knew.

Discuss Experiences with Reading and Writng

Before this Class, what did you anticipate? before i came to Missouri Western I was unsure about how my college life would go. I always thought it would be to hard and I would never get through my process as being a student and I would just fold up and leave because that's all I did in high school. It being hard in high school I didn't think it was the right thing for me to come to a university. I would just start out in community college first. Especially in english because I never really had that much help in that area because of the way my teachers treated me.I was the only black person in my class. He didnt seem to care about my problems because I was less to him than the others in the class. So coming here was a challenge not thinking i was going to do well because of my past experience. I was unsure of me knowing the way to truely format a paper and how to get good ideas to get a good start to a new idea.I knew just knew that was I not going to get a good grade. And from the other college students before me, how they were saying you will not get any help because professors are alot more busy than teachers. There would be no staying after class getting help because professors have a busy schedule just like you do.But after all my process has gotten better because alot of those things people were saying wasn't true. They have time you just have to work around their schedule.

Self Evaluation Task 3

• What is the thesis for your paper?  Now and days students are having trouble with education and Botstein believes that we should stop school for students at a younger age so we can see what the reall world is like.

• List the main points you make in your paper. Botstein thinks that we should cut school at a younger age. I believe that we should stay in because we are already having the problem of not getting the education that we should be getting the education to be out in the real world.

• What was the most helpful advice you received from your peer evaluation? To correct my errors in punctuation and correct some spelling errors.

• What was the most helpful information you received in class for your paper? When she wrote a paper of her own, that helped to show what it can be like.

• How many drafts of this paper do you think you wrote and how/when did you write them? For example, did you compose at the keyboard, did you write lots of notes to yourself, did you pre-write or outline, did you write in small chunks of time or sit down and produce an entire draft at one sitting? I usually write three drafts on all of my papers. The one thing I do is that I write my first paper by hand to just throw out ideas then i go to type it and as i go i I change it around a little. Then i wait til my teacher gives me results to change it again.

• What would you do differently with this paper to make it more effectively, or what did you try to do that you just don’t think you got a good handle on? Go to my teacher for more advice to get things right to get a better grade for the next one.

• What are most pleased with about this paper? It's like the hardest paper because it's more that you have to put towards it.

Citation

Leon Botstein "Let Teen-Agers Try Adulthood." Introduction to College Writing. New York: The McGraw-Hill Companies, 2010: 205-207 print

Analysis - "Praise The F Word" - Mary Sherry

I believe that if students are not performing up to what they are suppose to be performing up to, they should get the grade that they are deserved to get. Now teachers are giving students chances and chances to get work turned in. That's not a good way to teach student's resposibility to get things in on time. That's like showing uo for work late if you are always late you will get fired right? So that should be the same thing for students in school if they don't get wrok turned in then they will get an F. Too many of those you will fail the class. I had to see both wyas because at first I was in a non-creadited school having the easy way out with at-risk students. It was not good because students didn't even want show up for school and lost alot of funding for that also. Then when it was time for testing the students couldn't perform even on the basic skills test. And that lost them there creditation and was on the verge of losing the building and being closed. I was so happy that we didn't get homework I thought we was being let off the hook but really it was hurting us and we didn't know it. Then i went to a suburban school where they didn't play around with students not doing there work. They didn't even get you an extra day at times. if it wasn't on time then it wasn't being excepted. I got bad grades for that because I was so use to not doing anything that I couldnt get in the mode for studying or doing homework Then I had to learn time management to get things done.

Reflection of Task 3

My focus is wanting to talk about how in school most students cannot get the same education as the other students that gets better oppurtunites and how students graduate high school not performing as well as they should be and being left behind in the real world. That's why I disagree with Botstein and his story about letting students gruduate at 16. He also says they should cut out middle school which is 6th and 7th grade and after elementary and go bstraight to high school. I disagree because if you do not let the child mature enough they will be lost in the real world not knowing which way to go. He says let kids try adulthood. There's a reason why it's a childhood and a adulthood it will not work. Right people are not being able to perform in college like they are suppose to because of this new rule that they made up. The NO Child Left Behind rule. This rule was made so that the student would be passed no matter how much they didn't get it. That's the reason why we have alot of student's that's so far behind and now Botstein is talkin about cutting it even lower so we can get out even earlier than what we are already is now it doesn't make any since. We have to extend the school years in high school so we can learn all we can. And get rid of that NCLB rule to protect oue student's better than just throwing them out in the world expecting to make a change.