Final Journal: Goodbye! Congratulations!

Achievements should always be celebrated! And you, dear students, have reached a milestone. Living in another country whose language you have yet to master can be a real challenge. But not only have you taken on this challenge, you have also made progress on your way to reaching your dreams. Congratulations!

I hope the American Language Program has helped you on this journey. I especially hope that our few weeks together in Composition class have helped to strengthen your English voice, making you a better student and a better citizen of the world.

Good luck in all your future endeavors!

Prompt: In what ways do you feel you have progressed these last few months? What challenges still await you? Write a good-bye letter to your classmates. This is your chance to show your appreciation and wish them good luck.

Due: Wednesday, Dec. 7 by 10PM.

Your teacher for a semester, but friend for a lifetime,

Journal 16: Reaction to Film

I hope you enjoyed the film Baraka, which is the Sufi word for 'blessing', and were touched by its beauty and intensity. For your penultimate journal entry, you will write a reaction essay on the scene or sequence that you chose during class.

Prompt: Write a reaction to the scene(s) you chose. Be sure to use all the organization and vocabulary we've discussed. You can re-watch parts of the video on-line here.

Hint: Since this is essentially an audio-visual stimulus, you will need to describe it as your background (see BluePrints p. 147).

Due: Mon, Dec. 5. 10PM.

Blessings,

Journal 15: Anticipating Your Parents' Objections

A good argument includes concessions and anticipation of objections from the other side. Who is better to argue with than our parents!?

Prompt: Write a letter to your parent arguing one of the positions we discussed. You must concede one point and counter-argue two points. Be sure to use the correct persuasive language that we have talked about to anticipate and concede to objections from your parents.

Due: Monday, November 21st by 5PM

Never telling his mother to "chill",

Journal 14: Summarize/Paraphrase Practice

A good writer has to be able to paraphrase, summarize, and synthesize the ideas of others. Remember what we talked about in class and re-read Unit 8 in your textbook if you need help.

Prompt: Choose an article from this website on any topic you want. Try to use an article from a real print newspaper (e.g. New York Times, LA Times) Summarize/Paraphrase the article in one amazing paragraph or two. Use APA style when you cite the reporter. At the bottom of your entry include a link to the article and write the reference. Your summary should be 1-2 paragraphs. For example,

Pham, Alex. (2009, Mar 20). Video game revenue jumps 9% in February.Los Angeles Times. Retrieved March 26, 2009, from
http://www.latimes.com

It seems that despite the recession in America, the video game industry is doing OK. Pham (2009) reports in this article from the LA Times that the industry grew approximately $733 million dollars (par. 2). In particular, Pham reports that console gaming - like Nintendo or Xbox - have done really well. Some examples given include including Sony's playstation and Nintendo's Wii, which sold 753,00 units (par. 9). While these numbers sound impressive, Pham mentions that consoles sales acutally "carry very slim profit margins for their manufacturers" (par. 10). Let's hope that new video games are received well or else maybe the government will have to bail them out, too!

Due Wednesday, Nov. 16 by 10PM.

Happy reading,

Journal 13: Analyzing an Argument

Arguments are around us all the time. We make and hear them whenever we try to persuade someone we're right or whenever someone wants to convince us to buy their product. To be a critical thinker and an effective academic writer, we need to understand how arguments are put together.

Prompt: Choose an opinion article (or letter to the editor) from a magazine or newspaper. In the journal first give the reference (APA style!) and then analyze the argument being made.

• What is the THESIS?
• What is the CLAIM (Definition, Cause, Value, Policy)?
• To what is the argument appealing - to reason (logos), to emotion (pathos), or to trust and values (ethos)?
  
• What is the evidence or premises the author uses to reach his conclusion?
• Finally - What do you think?
  

Here are some on-line versions of opinion articles.

Daily Titan Opinion Articles

Orange County Register Opinion Articles

Los Angeles Times Opinion Articles

New York Times Opinion Articles

For example, here's a response to an article from the immaculate Daily Titan:

Landsman, A. (2008, October 27). I'll have some breast milk with my Ben and Jerry's please. Daily Titan, p. 4.

In this article Landsman pokes fun at the argument by PETA that the famous ice cream company, Ben & Jerry's, should use human breast milk instead of cow milk (par. 3). PETA's argument that we shouldn't use animal milk for nourishment (par. 8) is a claim of policy which appeals to emotion: disgust, in particular. Landsman seems to think this tactic is really strange. She admits that she doesn't have any scientific evidence on how hard it would be to do this (par. 15), but then PETA also offers weak evidence, too. They argue that it is stranger to use another creature's milk than our own (par. 8).

Due Wednesday, Nov. 9

Your very appealing teacher who claims to know it all,

Journal 12: Your First Source

I hope that you learned a lot from Mr. John Hickok. As you can see, the CSUF librarians are very busy, but they love to help students work on their research projects. You will have to write many important research papers during your time at an American university. The more you learn now, the less you'll have to worry later!

Prompt: In the university, professors often require you to submit an "Annotated Bibliography" before you start working on your research paper. This bibliography helps the professor know whether or not you are going in the right direction for your research.

Step 1) Use one of the databases that we learned about in the library with Mr. Hickok. You may use a popular (newspaper/magazine) OR scholarly database. Find at least ONE article.

Step 2) Read or skim through the article.

Step 3) In your Journal 12 entry, give the APA citation. The databases should give it to you (look for "Cite" or "Cite This"). If not, you can use the back of John's handout he gave you to write it yourself.

Step 4) Give me a paragraph summary of how you might use this source. This is sometimes called an annotated bibliography. You should include the following information: Who is the author? Will this help you answer your research question or give you a background on your topic? How?

For example, here is a annotation from the annotated bibliography I wrote for a research paper I wrote on place names in English.

Angus, D. (2005). Place name morphology and the people of Los Angeles. California Linguistic Notes. 30 (2). Retrieved from http://hss.fullerton.edu/linguistics/cln

Duncan Angus is a linguistics professor at CSUF. He noticed that while many people used the word Angeleno to refer to people from Los Angeles, not everyone did. It made him wonder what the most common form was. In this article Angus discusses the results of his survey. This was useful for me because this is what made me interested in the topic of place name morphology in English. I will conduct my own survey and compared my answers with Angus's. I want to find out if most people who live here in Orange County use Angeleno or something else.

Due: Friday, Oct. 28th.

Get ready for research!

Journal 11: Research Question

Prompt: What did you learn about your topic today in class on Wikipedia? What areas seem interesting to you? Have you already started to think about some possible research questions? Remember that a good research topic is one that you already know a little about but about which you are interested in learning more. What did you already know about this topic? In what area do you want to learn more?


Question Due: Today
Journal Entry Due:  Monday, Oct 24 by 10 PM.

Note: Don't forget to stay on schedule or else you'll look like this guy!

Let the intellectual adventure begin!