Reflection D#5 HW#9

I posted to Summer's "English 102 Blog" and Andres Cox's blog. This weeks topic, conducting research, has really helped prepare me for my paper. It had nice tips, like decide what data to collect, that really helped me out. This week I learned how to better organize my research and I also learned how to peer edit, something I haven't really done much before. I also got peer edited which will help me make my paper better to :)

D#5HW#8 Grammer assignment #2

This week I chose to focus on staying in the right tense. I have a tendency of useing past tense when i should be using present, and vise versa.I checked out the grammer girl website because I find the tricks there very easy to understand and use. Here is the original paragraph from the research proposal:


What does this have to do with a research paper? Well, I have been researching for a while the reasons behind why farm animals are abuses. Mostly it is because large dairies and farms just don’t care about the animals, they care about the money they make. Because of this selfish attitude, we have many humans getting sick due to meat and animal product illnesses. One of the most well known diseases is known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy, commonly known as mad cow disease.

Here is the revised paragraph:
What does this have to do with a research paper? Well, I had been researching the topic of farm animal abuse before i decided to write a research paper. I found that most of the abuse was because large dairies and farms just didn't care about the animals, they cared only for the money they made off of them. Because of this selfish attitude, we have had many humans get sick due to meat and animal product illness. One of the most well known of these diseases is the bovine spongiform encephalopathy, commonly known as mad cow disease.

One of the tricks I learned is just to say the sentence out loud. This way you can hear what it sounds like and its easier to hear the mistakes. Another trick is to use the finder to find all the haves and hads in the paragraph and change it all to one tense.

annotated bib D#5HW#7

Madcow Disease and US Beef Industry. Korean National Broadcasting. Google Video. Web. 25 Sept. 2009. .
This video was all about Mad Cow Disease and the scare of it. It was a documentary that depicted abuse of cows and many other horrific pictures. Korea dosnt let just anything on TV. This is a respectable source because it is a news compant and they show a lot of evidence and the facts they state correspond to facts known and researched. This will help me show how these cows are abused and it could be because of this problem that mad cow even exists.
"Undercover Video of Mistrested Cows Released." Dailymotion. Tech & Science. Dailymotion. 30 Nov. 2007. Web. 25 Sept. 2009. .
This site also shows mistreatment of dairy cows. This is a short clip showing brutal things that the ranchers do to these animals. I will use this to show my bias and make people understand where i am coming from.

Decide what data to collect D#5HW#6

The activities pertaining to my research is eating beef and cattle abuse. Observing a sick cow or human infected with the disease would help me with my research. I couldn't participate in getting the disease nor would I want to, I do however eat beef all the time so I can relate that experience. Talking to experts would help, because they know about the disease first hand. However, I could probably gain just as much information surfing the net as i could talking to people, because people don't always tell the truth, and plus, people that have this disease are already dead. The only survey i could think of would be one about meat eaters. This survey was already done and i plan on using it in my paper already.

Peer reviews D#5 HW#4

This is the first paper i peer reviewed:
http://klindenberg.blogspot.com/2009/09/d4-hw9-rough-draft-wp1.html?showComment=1253927277736#c3874602272790746836
and the second
http://andrescox.blogspot.com/2009/09/d4-hw9-wp1-draft.html?showComment=1253929894542#c1319497494626068216
After reading other peoples drafts and reviewing them, I learned that the easiest way to review is to write notes as you go along, and not to look at just mistakes, but to look at the content as well. For my own draft, I need to add how i am going to conduct research as well as to add descrpitive words to my paper. I also learned that it is important to tell the author when you are confused about something and give comments on how they might make their paper better. If we only said good things about each others paper, we wouldn't know what needs to be fixed. Summer reviewed my paper and had alot of questions. The only problem is that i planned on answering her questions in the research paper itself, but i think i might state this in my paper, just so everyone will want to read it. SHe id however, give me some more ideas of what to write about in my paper, with what she wanted to know more about. My report was only a 1% match. This is because it is a common virus and a lot of people have to explain what it is after they put in a name people wont recognize. However, i do have some editing to do before i turn my paper in. I will probably add some more to it to clear up questions people might have.

Paragraph analysis D#5 HW#3

What is the point of the paragraph?
1.It is the introduction to the paper.
2 &3. It is the background behind why i want to focus on this topic.
4.This paragraph is used to state mt topic.
5. This paragraph is used to show how it relates to all of us.
6.The point of this paragraph is to propose what issue I am going to write about, what my opinion is on the subject and also what questions I plan to research about.
How does the paragraph function in the argument?
Paragraphs 1-4 are used to set up my argument. Paragraph five is used to reaffirm why said argument is important.Paragraph six states my argument and my opinion on the issue.
How does the paragraph function in the paper as a whole?
This is where my thesis statement can be found and it is the conclusion to my paper.
How does the paragraph relate to the paragraph above?How does the paragraph relate to the paragraph above?How does the paragraph relate to the paragraph below? How does the paragraph transition to the paragraph above? How does the paragraph transition to the paragraph below?
Paragraph two is the story I transitioned to from paragraph one. Paragraph three is the ending of the story from paragraph two. Paragraph four explains the reason for the story in paragraph three. Paragraph five explains the subject brought up in paragraph four. Paragraph six reaffirms the explanation in paragraph five. Paragraph one is the opener so in order to have a paper,and that is the introduction for paragraph two. Paragraph two is the first part of the story in paragraph one. Paragraph three is and explanation of paragraph four. Paragraph four shows why the subject from three was important. Paragraph five is the why behind the topic in paragraph six.

Reflection d#4 HW#12

THis week really helped me achieve the goal for module #1. THe ultimate goal is to right a research proposal. Well this week we had to write up a draft so we are most of the way toward that goal. I learn by doing so as i was writing the proposal i learned how to write one. I have never had to write a proposal before and now , with practice, i am confident i will be abe to write them in the future. THe people i comented on are as follows:
K. Lindenberg hw#4-5
Andreas cox hw#4,8
Corey Palmer hw #3
Summer Bretz hw4

Research proposal D#4 HW#9

This is my research proposal peer reviews are welcome and requested thank you to anyone that will review it and i will also be happy to review any of your's:

I have always loved animals. Ever since I was a little girl I have wanted to be a veterinarian. I had this doctor play set that I would use to “fix” my sick stuffed animals. I also used to wander around the neighborhood playing with all of the neighbor’s animals. I have never even thought of a different job I could ever do when I “grow up” besides taking care of animals. However, it wasn’t until high school that I discovered which type I truly loved best.

I was in my junior year of high school when I decided it would be fun to take an animal science class. Not only did it fill a science requirement, it would be a fun class since it was all about animals. In this class, we were given a project. The teacher had saved some baby bulls from a dairy where they were basically thrown away. These bulls were skinny from starvation and sick from who knows what. The farmers refused to give these babies any food since the bulls were of no use to the farmers. The farmers just took them and threw them out back to die. Now since they had a large dairy, no legal action was taken against them. But thankfully for the baby cows my teacher saved them.

Each of the students, including myself, were given one of these calves to take care of and try to nurse back to health. I was excited because this is the kind of thing I wanted to do when I “grew up”. I took care of the bull yo the best of my ability. I went to that farm every day and night to feed that bull ( I even gave it the name of “Little Moo”), I played with it and walked it, and I even gave it shots of antibiotics and had to give it pills to help it get better ( as I explained earlier, these bulls were in bad shape). After about a month, I am sad to say that Little Moo, as well as many of the other baby bulls died, due to the illnesses they received from the dairy. This experience inspired me to pursue a degree in large animal veterinary medicine. And, after earning my degree, I plan to open a rescue center for abused and abandoned farm animals.

What does this have to do with a research paper? Well, I have been researching for a while the reasons behind why farm animals are abuses. Mostly it is because large dairies and farms just don’t care about the animals, they care about the money they make. Because of this selfish attitude, we have many humans getting sick due to meat and animal product illnesses. One of the most well known diseases is known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy, commonly known as mad cow disease.

Since mad cow disease is a food borne illness, it does not affect everyone. Vegans and vegetarians have nothing to worry about since they don’t eat meat. However, it was found that the average American consumes 67lbs of beef per year (Economic research service). Why so much? It is easy to get, very tasty, cheap, and an American classic. When we thing American food what is the first thing we usually think of? Grilled hamburgers and frenchfrys. By serving this tasty American classic, Mc Donald’s has become the number one fast food company in the world with over $23,522.4M in sales, 32,000 restaurants (14,000 of which are in America) in 120 different countries and 400,000 employees (answers.com). There is hardly a kid in America who doesn’t know what the golden arches mean. Parents love it because it is cheap and easy. If they are tired after work and don’t feel like cooking, they just buy their kid a happy meal for three bucks. If you are a college kid on a budget, you can go to Mickey D’s and get a burger for a buck versus the three bucks for a little parfait at the campus cafeteria. And it’s not just Mc Donald’s with cheap beef. There are other fast food restaurants including Arby’s, Taco Bell, burger king, Wendy’s, and Filaburtos just to name a few. There are thousands of people eating at these places every day. Can you imagine if one of these places received beef tainted with mad cow disease?

This issue affects us all. I, like most of my fellow students, am beef eater. I only eat it a couple times a month, but once is all it takes. This is an issue that has an effect on all of us. You might not be a meat eater yourself, but I am sure you have a friend or family member that enjoys beef. We might wonder is beef safe at all? In my opinion, it is safe, depending on where it comes from and what part of the cow is consumed. I also believe that mad cow wouldn’t be a problem if farmers took care of their cows properly and the FDA did their jobs correctly. There wouldn’t be cases of mad cow in humans if the FDA put certain regulations in place and checked ALL meat properly before it was given to consumers. However, it is the belief of others that mad cow is strictly a disease in which cows get naturally and there is no way to prevent them from getting it. I plan to research the subject fully and present the facts and statements for both sides of this argument as well as to answer the following questions:

-What is mad cow disease?

-How do cows get it?

-How is it transmitted to humans?

-How does this disease affect humans and cows alike?

-What, if anything, can be done to prevent this epidemic?

annotated biblography #2 D#4 HW#11

Davis, Debra P. Emerging Animal Diseases : Global Markets, Global Safety: A Workshop Summary. National Academies, 2002. Mesa Community College Library. Web. 19 Sept. 2009. .
Shin, Annys, and Ylan Q. Mui. "Whole Foods Recalls Beef Processed At Plant Long at Odds With USDA." The Washington Post [Washington D.C.] 10 Aug. 2008, Final ed., sec. A: A1. ProQuest. Web. 17 Aug. 2009. .

textbook questions D#4 HW 3-8

I looked for conversations about animal disease a bunch of blogs popped up. Most were talking about mad cow disease, the swine and bird flu, or rabies. There was one blog talking about how animals sped MERSA to humans. Most of them were just talking about how afraid people were of these viruses and what the treatments are and how to prevent yourself from getting them. The only difference they had in common was the fact that they were talking about different viruses. Anyone of those diseases could be a subtopic on its own. It will be hard for me to decide exactly what subtopic i actually want to write about.
I think animal diseases affect us all so we all should know about them so we can prevent ourselves from getting them. I really am interested in this topic since I want to major in veterinary medicine and i have to learn about them anyway, so i might as well start now. I think this topic is very doable because there is a lot of information out there so I will probably have to narrow it down a little.
I didn't like the whole tree idea. Things like that don't help me at all they just make everything mess. I prefer just to write and then I eventually narrow things down after I've been writing for a while.
My research question that I finally came up with was "How do animal diseases effect humans?" ( anyone with pointers on how i can make this better would be much appreciated)
The thing that got me interested in this issue was the fact that it is basically my major, so of course i love things like this. What got me interested in the disease part was my biology class in which we were talking about how viruses and bacteria make us sick. I know a few things, but i really don't know as much as i would like to about my topic so i am excited to learn even more about it. I have found many articles and news stories on this topic so i am sure i will have a lot to write about.
The only controversy i could find is weather or not farmers are the cause and some people also believe that animals and humans are built differently so they think they cant get sick from animals. I believe that some animal diseases can and do make us sick (i.e. rabies, MERSA) because there is scientific evidence that the disease is passed from animals to humans. Also, we use animals for testing drugs so obviously we can get the same things as animals. I also believe that diseases are caused due to farmers not being careful with their cows. There are also many studies done to prove this theory as well.

Refelection D#3 HW#12

This week’s deadline was a little tougher then last weeks. We had to do some research, site our sources, read about MLA (can I say boring? ;) ) and we had a lot more posting to do in our blog. I learned a lot this week. I learned that it is important to narrow the research topic that I chose, to look for karios (by the way that was also a new word I learned), and to figure out the purpose and audience for my research papers. These things are important so as to not bore the reader and to make my paper interesting enough that I will want to write it. I learned to make a topic I’m given manageable and to focus my research into a question. Lorraine Schmidt had a good idea when she posted that she wanted to write about something that pertained to her life. I think that finding something that is personal is a lot more interesting then something that has no relation. For example, I once was assigned to do a research paper about a dead president that I didn’t think was a good president, but had to write about how great he was anyway (JFK). I ended up doing the minimum amount of work and had a really boring paper. I like when teachers leave the topics up to the students. This week’s work will help me write my proposal for WP#1 in that I will be able to choose a topic and I will be able to write a proposal now that I have seen some examples of one.
The people I commented on are :
Lorraine Schmidt HW#4 #3
Summer HW#8 & #7 #3
Andres Cox # 5 &6
My reason for only commenting on three different people is because those were the only students, other than myself that are finished with their homework and I don’t have all day to wait around for the others to finish theirs, as I have work and I don’t want my homework to be late.

Citations D#3 HW# 11

Clark, Charles S. "Northern Ireland Cease-Fire." MCC Library. CQ Researcher, 15 Sept. 1995. Web. 12 Sept. 2005. .
Cooper, Mary H. "Combating Infectious Diseases." MCC Library. CQ Researcher, 9 June 1995. Web. 12 Sept. 2009. .
Our bibliography assignment this week was to look on the CQ researcher in the MCC library database and cited at least two articles we found. I had a lot of trouble finding two. First of all i have a couple of ideas on what i want to research. I either want to do something about infectious diseases and how we, as humans, discovered the different types and how they work ( of course i would just write on a couple but hey I don't have to be 100% sure that is what I want to do, yet) or i want to write about why the Irish people came to America, specifically what drove them here and what they brought with them. I couldn't really find a lot on this particular section of the online library, but I might be able to find more information on different resources. I don't want to pick a "for sure" topic right now. I want to research both and see what i can find and see what i will be able to write about. After all, the book clearly states we should start out with the broad and then narrow as we research. I do however, know this is a reliable source to use because it is on the MCC library database and they are a pretty credible source especially if the teacher wants his students to look for information on this particular site. If he didn't like the site and if he didn't trust it, I;m pretty sure he wouldnt tell his students to look there. :)

Citation and the table D#3HW#8-10

The author(me)and audience (the teacher and all the students)for all three writing projects are the same. They vary however, in the purpose. The purpose for WP#1 is to get us started on what we are going to write about. The purpose for WP#2 is to actually learn how to write and annotated bibliography, and the purpose for WP#3 is to actually write about our chosen topic and to tie WP1 and WP2 together. The topics will also very in that they will be based on what we are assigned to do. For example our topic for WP# 1 is to write about what we plan to do.
The book tells us to use technology to expand on what we already know. We obviously know something about what we want to write about, otherwise we wouldn't be writing it. We also, probably know where to start our search. We can however, come across other links and leads while looking at our starting point. If we start with Google, we all know that a billion sites will pop up. When we click on one site however, ads from different sites, and even suggestions of books that might be helpful in our research will pop up. This will lead to new discoveries and more wonderful information for our topic.
Now, it is important to cite sources so it is a good idea to bookmark sites that are used in research that we are not plagiarizing anything and we can easily add it into our works cited page. One of the tricks the author suggested was to site some of the information with in a sentence in out writing (i.e. the author, or title of the book). I usually do this in most of my papers anyway, it makes siting shorter and it is a nice way to embed the information. When doing a works cited page it is important to know the MLA format, that way everyone does it the same way and it is easy for others to find the research that was used in the paper if they want to look it up themselves. It is also important to look at the current way MLA is done as it changes from year to year. Likewise, it is a good idea to remember that periods separate blocks of important information and commas separate information in the same group. For example, there is a period between the author and the title but there is a comma between the authors last name and first name. This about covers the MLA formatting, to see more information look in the textbook or if you have a 2008 or earlier edition this web site http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/557/01/ or go to this site which i love http://www.easybib.com/.

about the reading D#3 HW#4-7

I think that these tips,identify kairos find out what's important to you, generate topic ideas, consider audience and purpose, will really help in the research writing> These are all things that will make my writing more interesting and these tips will make it easier to focus on the assignment. I also especially liked the section on consider you purpose. My purpose is usually to get an assignment but if I have a alterior motive to writeing it will help me expand my writing.

Essay discussion D#3 HW#3

I really enjoyed reading this proposal and i think i would enjoy reading the essay. I really liked her story on how she came up with the topic she wanted to write about. I think she chose a topic that she could really get into which would make an excellent paper. This was a good example for what we have to do for WP#1. I think after reading this example i have a better idea of what we are supposed to do for WP#1. I wouldn't change this essay because i think she did a really good job. However, if i were to turn it in i would choose a different topic.

Weekly Reflcetion D#2 HW#8

I think the reading really helped me this week. It pointed out things i normally wouldn't pay attention to in my writing. I was however a bit confused with the whole rhetoric writing thing... I also think the part about identifying the type of research to be done will help my papers in the future.

The people i commented on are:
Lorraine Schmidt
corey2458
Summer

Grammer assignment reflection

The reason I chose to focus on spelling is because That is what i have the most trouble with. I learned that is I pay attention and edit my papers I become a better speller especially if i repeat a word. Once i spell it right a couple of times and focus, i get it. When i decided on my major i couldn't even spell the word and my mom gave me the "well you had better learn" phrase. It took me a while and several sessions of memorizing it but now i don't even have to think about it (V_E_T_E_R_I_N_A_R_I_A_N).
Here was the origional paragraph (ie first draft):
"Cetean elements are esscenntial to a plants growth and survivle. There are two different types of nutriants plants need, micro and macronutriants. Macronutriants are the primary nutriants’ required by plants, Carbon, Hydrogen, Oxygen, Nitrogen, Phospherus, and Patassium. The micronutriants are important for plant development and include: Iron, Zinc, Manganeese, Copper, Molybedeum, Boron, and Cobalt. Without these nutriants plants experience abnormal growth, known as deficency symptems. The three most common are nacrosis, a death of tissue, chorosis, a yellow color in the plant, and stunting, a reduction in the overall size of the plant.
Our hypothesis is if plants don’t receive the proper nutriants, then they will experience deficiency symptems. "
Here is the revised copy:
"Certain elements are essential to a plants growth and survival. There are two different types of nutrients plants need, micro and macronutrients. Macronutrients are the primary nutrients’ required by plants, Carbon, Hydrogen, Oxygen, Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium. The micronutrients are important for plant development and include: Iron, Zinc, Manganese, Copper, Molybdenum, Boron, and Cobalt. Without these nutrients plants experience abnormal growth, known as deficiency symptoms. The three most common are necrosis, a death of tissue, chlorosis, a yellow color in the plant, and stunting, a reduction in the overall size of the plant.
Our hypothesis is if plants don’t receive the proper nutrients, then they will experience deficiency symptoms. "
I looked on a couple of sites on spelling I choose http://www.dailywritingtips.com/index.php?s=spelling and http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/660/01/ as my "research" sites. There were several tricks on spelling that I found useful and I know will help me in future writings.

D#2 HW#& grammer assignment

The first thing that comes to my head when I think about my bad grammar is my spelling and my use of punctuation and capitalization. I have always been a terrible speller, something that runs in my family. Now i know that is no excuse, but honestly it is hard for me to spell. I love to reads so it cant be because I don't read. I am a fairly good reader and when I see a word correctly I read it correctly, but if I see it spelled wrong I still read it correctly. But I've been told that most people can do this so I don't have a super power of reading misspelled words. :(
For the punctuation, now that is just laziness. I'm used to the computer just doing that for me. In Microsoft Word, the program automatically adds in all the punctuation necessary so I don't even have to think about it. However, if I am hand writing something out I automatically put in the correct punctuation.
Fo my paper revision i chose the paper that i had the most troube with spelling because of all the technical science words i had to ues. (obviously this is a biology paper)
"Certain elements are essential to a plants growth and survival. There are two different types of nutrients plants need, micro and macronutrients. Macronutrients are the primary nutrients’ required by plants, Carbon, Hydrogen, Oxygen, Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium. The micronutrients are important for plant development and include: Iron, Zinc, Manganese, Copper, Molybdenum, Boron, and Cobalt. Without these nutrients plants experience abnormal growth, known as deficiency symptoms. The three most common are necrosis, a death of tissue, chlorosis, a yellow color in the plant, and stunting, a reduction in the overall size of the plant.
Our hypothesis is if plants don’t receive the proper nutrients, then they will experience deficiency symptoms. "

Deadline#2 HW#3-6

In the past I have done a lot of research. I have done academic as well as personal research. The most recent thing i researched was stem cell research for my biology class. I was so interested in the subject i went on to research. Also, I research everyday in biology lab. Its classroom research (i.e. hands on) but it is still a type of research. Mostly I use the computer to look things up, actually, that's all I use. The computer is so convenient. I just type what i need in Google and the things I'm looking for just pop up. When I do research for school, i usually just answer the questions asked of me and cover the minimum amount. when I'm researching something for my self, say a new tattoo design, I take my time examining and re-reading everything. I go further with my research when I am doing it for myself. I think that is basically true with almost everyone though.
I really didn't understand the part about the rhetoric writing in the text. I mean i know the definition which is a question not meant to be answered, but i don't really understand how to answer the question about how writing is rhetoric. I mean is the question rhetoric itself?
When people have read my writing in the past, they have said that it flows really well and that i have strong voice. I do, however, get criticized by my use of cliches in my first drafts along with switching off between past and present tense in my writing. I thik those are the things i need to watch out for in future papers.