Throughout my blogging this semester, I have picked up on some patterns and describing characteristics of myself as a writer and a learner. First off, I would say in my first blog post that I established a sense of openness to the unorthodox nature of our class and its format. For some people, it is hard to be open and vulnerable which is an essential part to our class structure. The first time I exemplified this sense of openness was when I posted my first science question which was, "Why is it that recyclables are sorted if they're all going to end up recycled anyways?". Although it might not seem like a big deal to post a question like this, it was a little nerve racking putting my thought out for others to view and critique on the g+ community. During the time of my first blog post I had also read Atul Gawandi's Becoming a Positive Deviant. This short piece on 5 simple steps to follow in order to become a positive deviant related heavily to specific situations that affect me as a college student. There were two steps that had a lasting impact on me, what I took from them was that I am going to start creating more depth in my relationships through questioning and I am also going to work on not complaining and staying positive.
As I wrote my second blog post, I began to pick up on a few more aspects of our English class. The first was that I would have never expected that an English class would put grammar and rhetoric on the back-burner and bring creativity and conceptual thinking to its forefront. During this period of the course we began to reflect on ourselves and our history as writers and science learners. This idea transitioned into our make cycle one which aimed at defining ourselves as writers, scientists, and learners. The way I chose to portray myself in this make was through a comedic video poking fun at my downfalls as a maker. To conclude this blog post I summed up my experiences in the class so far as, "thought provoking, unconventional, and fun. The free-flowing environment coupled with intellectual discussion makes it a class I don't mind going to at 8:00 am."
My third blog post was categorized as a reflective blog post for Make Cycle Two. My reflection on my make consisted of a summary of where my inspiration came from and what my reasoning was behind my build. The parts to my make are symbolic of places I have learned or experienced science on the campus of UNC Charlotte. It is in my belief that the learning I gain inside the classroom directly translates to my interactions with the outside world. If it weren't for our discussions in our English 1103 class I would have never viewed things in the scientific context I do now. I used my field experiences as the branching points from the classroom learning. To illustrate this, I first pasted pictures from each of the four field experiences on a map of UNCC's campus to show a general location of where my experiences took place. Next I built a representation of my idea using Legos. I built each of my four field experiences and centered them around a replica of our classroom. Arrows stemmed from the classroom and pointed to each of my field experiences. The reasoning behind choosing science learning locations on the campus of UNC Charlotte versus other locations nationally where I have had experiences is because until my English 1103 class at UNCC I didn't realize how much science and learning there was in every aspect of everything. You can justify science in any medium and any scenario. The make I built for Make Cycle Two was made to pay homage to the valuable thought processes I have inherited as a result of our English 1103 class.
There are many things I have picked up on in my writing and reflecting during our blogging process. Perhaps an overarching theme however that can be used to categorize my blogging would be progression. I am able to see the meaning behind assignments and how they aid our overall course goal.
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