Bloging this semester, I have to say was interesting for a couple of different reasons, I never really was asked to respond via the internet to pieces of literature.
Well first let’s start there… The reading which I am asked to respond to in my mojor classes, are always researched, and reviewed readings.
They usually have to do with a theory about and individual and their involvement in the social world.
The authors, although bias at times in there writing, never have ‘hidden’ meaning which the reader has to look for.
There fore the types of reading and the type of responding was different.
NOT that different is bad.
I enjoyed the class, and understand it’s importance when working in the classroom. The class taught me that as a teacher there will be literary symbolism, and that critiquing the material will be important to teach the students. Not to mention the one student who will find a passion for critiquing literary materials, and as a teacher, you have to nourish that.
Seeing as how I am, well, I guess we could say a beginner at bloging and reacting to material, it was a little unnerving to know that my work was going to be posted for others to access. The thought was bazaar for me due to the fact that I was giving my opinion, and in a way, posting (publishing) my thoughts and ideas for anyone really to view.
I understand that people blog on live journals all the time, and that the fact that people can post their opinions on line is ‘normal’; however I found it quite abnormal to have my opinions out there.
I had two different reactions to the bloging assignments
One, as a student as I mentioned before it is not only unnerving to have your material posted on the internet, however once you have posted, your committed to your post. As a student in the social sciences field, my first reaction is to say any emotion and response that one would have to a piece of literature is pertinent, and valid. Therefore what ever would be posted, coming from a therapeutic argument, would be appropriate.
However, seeing as how the class progressed, there were defiantly some posts which I felt were totally off the subject of what the majority of the class extracted from the readings. For example, The Half Skinned Steer was a post that I was not very proud of. I really didn’t understand the short story, and it wasn’t until listening and participating in the class discussion that I felt a little more comfortable with the short story
Second, I understand the value of the blogs. I think that I may have touched on this in my last Bloging Protfolio 1. In essence though, to have a discussion going on about class material prior to the class enables us as students to critically think about the piece, and come to class possibly with research, weather via Google, or other in Reeves… (which sadly at times Google is the better of the two resources… but we won’t go there now… )
Bloging provided me to interact with some of the other classmates, and to read what they were saying about the readings. For example, one of the readings, a Streetcar Named Desire, I posted what I thought the scene was about, however after reading a peer’s bolg Holly I felt the need to blog again and explain my first blog a little more so, there was More on the Desire.
There were some short stories which I was able to at least pull out a major theme in the story, even though at times, the theme may have seen relatively obvious. This can be seen in my blogs in reaction to two short stories, Greenleaf and The Best Girlfriend You Never Had.
My favorite blogs, are the Miracle blogs. James McBride’s novel Miracle at St. Anna was by far my favorite novel for the semester. I guess that is why I chose to do my presentation on this work.
When McBride came to SHU it was such a pleasure to have such a down to earth person come and talk to us, and his mother’s memor The Color of Water only aided in his presentations.
Miracle at St. Anna was a pleasure to blog about, so much that I felt that the Miracle Could Continue and I blogged some more about that.
I have to say that through the art of blogging I was able to become more comfortable with sharing my ideas with other people. And I was even able to relate one of the stories to a Social Work theory. I Want to Live, was an emotional story, and in it the character when through a grieving process which I bloged about.
That is the extent of my bloging for the last half of the semester. It was an interesting, new task, that I will always remember, and even possibly some how re-create and use in my own classroom later on down the road.
Hope everyone has a Great Summer, and although I won’t be blogging all that much I look forward to jumping on some of the BLOG-ON-ATORS sites and seeing, what in the blogging world is going on!