Freestyle

I wasn't quite sure what I wanted to write about until I started reading everyone elses blogposts. I like that a couple of people wrote about christmas and what it means to them.

I love christmas. It brings friends and families together and is a time of giving. This year will be a little bit harder. Ever since I was a little girl, I have always spent christmas with my whole family. We have little traditions that we do every year and this year it won't be the same. My little brother is in Iraq and my older brother is in a monastery in Olympia preparing to become a monk. I love that they are both working to help protect and love the community, but it is definitely going to be a hard Christmas.

Since I do work in retail, I would like to say that in that aspect it is also my favorite time of year to work. I love walking into the mall with all the Christmas decorations and Christmas songs playing. Granted, there are the "mean" customers every once in a while, but everyone is just so nice. They are all shopping for their loved ones and I get to help them do that. Many customers don't care too much about the sales, it's just an added bonus. Many companies are also asking customers to donate a dollar or round up their sale to donate to charities. My company is taking dollar donations or more to donate to the St. Judes Children's research hospital. I think it is such a great oppportunity for people to donate to the community. I think that if it wasn't for all the marketing and advertisements then it wouldn't feel completely like Christmas.

Response to Inna

I also agree that we did learn a variety of materials from this class. Even though we skimmed over some areas, I feel like I learned a lot. I also like that we covered other areas of writing such as journalism and freelance. I have never had any interest in these areas so I didn't really know anything about freelance and journalism. I liked that this class went over such areas and that we learned so much about professional writing.

What I've learned

So I guess this is the part where we all comment about how great this class is and how awesome our teacher is to get some browny points. The truth is, I really did learn a lot of beneficial things from this class that will help me in my future. This class improved my writing skills, thanks to Kats amazing purple pen, taught me to always write to my target reader(s), and a lot of little pointers along the way.

I liked that Kat put example papers up on the board. This helped me learn what she was looking for and what made a good memo/paper. It helped us all learn from eachother. Also, as much as I dislike reading textbooks, the textbook from this class did have a lot of good information and the guidelines were very clear and organized. This textbook is probably one that I will keep for future reference. I also liked that it reiterated the same message throughout the book, to always write for you intended reader or audience. I have been trying to apply this skill when writing my final papers for this semester and I feel that it has been helping.

I am glad that this is one of the first classes I have taken at this university because it will help me throughout my education as well as my future career.

Peer Response

Most of the class seems to have a little fear or nervousness about public speaking. What can help overcome this fear is getting to know the audience, being prepared, and of course practise practise practise. Public speaking does seem to get easier the more you do it.

I feel that group presentations are little easier because there is not so much pressure on you and the group can work together to help ease each others nerves. I feel that tonight when presenting our group projects, my anxiety will be low. However, I will have to overcome the nervousness of our research paper presentations coming up in December.

Chapter 17

Like most people, I do not like giving oral presentations. I get nervous and usually psych myself out. Chapter 17 listed some guidelines of how to give an effective oral presentation. I found several points that were very interesting and may be helpful for our upcoming presentations. The first was to plan the verbal and visual parts as a single package, which includes using graphics. I like using graphics because they help take the focus off me and they really do help the speaker be more professional, persuasive, and interesting. However, make sure that you talk to the audience and not your graphic. This is something that I have trouble with. My most preferred form of using a graphic of visual aid is power point or and an overhead. I like power point because the slides act like notes and using key words or points helps me explain my information more thoroughly.

The book also pointed out three different kinds of speeches; scripted talk, outlined talk, and impromptu. I have never liked scripted talk or impromptu. I feel that scripted talk can make a person sound monotone and boring. On the other hand, impromptu can be unorganized and very stressful because there is no preparation. My favorite and the only way I have ever done an oral presentation is by an outlined talk. This prepares you and makes it easier to add or take away certain parts of your presentation based on the reactions the of the audience. It also enables a speaker to be flexible and deliver in a natural speaking voice.

Anther tip the book gives is to try to speak in a natural conversation style, which is not the same as informal. It means to speak directly to your listeners while keeping it simple and natural. It also helps to speak with enthusiasm and use gestures. I have the hardest time with this because I get so nervous. It is hard for me to act natural. It has helped in the past when I have been passionate about my subject because it keeps your audience interested. However, it's easier said than done to accept the nervousness and work with it. I have heard this advice before and it has never helped. I think more than anything, public speaking becomes easier and less nerve wrecking the more you do it.

"The Persuaders"

The one thing that really surprised me was the company that had all the records of what we buy and some of our personal information that we give out when we buy something. It is crazy that company's can buy that information to get certain information about potential consumers. But if you think about it, we are all walking advertisements. Almost anything you buy has a certain logo on it. The shoes and clothes you wear, the phone you carry around, the drinks we buy, etc. And what we buys says a lot about ourselves. The Starbucks I drink every morning shows that I am a coffee drinker. The clothes I wear are mostly from the store that I work at. What kind of phone, whether it be simple and not to many gadgets, or has everything from playing songs to the Internet. What you buy can even interpret which stage of life you are in. A typical college student usually purchases a new lab top or computer, books from the school they attend, student loans, or maybe be too frivolous with their money. Either way, what you buy says a lot about you and what you are doing in life which is definitely something to think about the next time you make a purchase.

Chapter 2 response

I have not written a resume for myself since high school. I never enjoyed writing them but I think that was because I didn't have any true qualifications for the jobs I was applying for. Chapter 2 gave some interesting insights on writing resumes and some things that I will include in my next resume. I like that resumes are short and to the point. You must write concisely and be specific. I also think the organization is important because most employers scan through resumes. The important parts of your resume must stick out and the more visually appealing the better. One thing I did not know was that it is improper to use "I" which is probably because this leads to proper sentences and not straight and to the point fragments. I also thought it was interesting that references are to be included in resumes. I was always taught that references should be available upon request. However, I think that references should be included because they tell the employer a lot about you. One fear I have is that someday one of my resumes will be scanned by a computer which is more than likely to happen. I liked that the book gave suggestions for keywords to be included in resumes and that it is appropriate to have a keyword section. This may come in handy for future resumes. I think writing a resume now would be more enjoyable because I could refer to this chapter which gives excellent guidelines and examples and I actually have some good qualifications to put on a resume.

Response to Jeff Schafer

You brought up a good point about peer reviews. Assigned peer reviews can be tricky because your fellow peers may not want to hurt you feelings. They may tend to say more positive things about your paper than actually critiquing it, which is worse in the long run. However, I feel that if my dad or a close friend critiqued my paper they would be more honest and know that I would take the constructive criticism. Your fellow students may also not be your target audience so it is best to find people who stay in the guidelines of your target reader.

Revising and testing drafts

If you have been in any type of any English class, then odds are that your teacher will assign some form of peer editing or reviewing. Not only must you edit and revise your own paper but it does help to have another person review your work. I have never been as thorough as the guidelines in the book suggest, but I think that it had some interesting and useful tips. To read your draft from the perspective of your reader and identify if your work is usable and persuastive (an underlying concept in the book). I also think it is helpful to step away from your draft for a specified time and read your draft out loud and very slow. This helps to pick up on any confusing sentences or organizational problems. One more tip that I thought to be helpful was to review your draft once for substantive errors and once for mechanical errors. It's hard to read through a paper one time and fix all areas of error. Reading through your draft at least five times and concentrating on five different aspects could help to eliminate different kinds of errors.

Something that I have never done is testing drafts. It seems like it would be very helpful in the workplace whether it be a document explaining a step by step procedure or for sharing information across departments. I thought it was interesting to read the different ways that you can test for usability. The performance test can actually test the reader on whether they can perform the procedure after reading the document. If the reader is close to your target reader this can help you decide to have more specified details in a step or eliminate unnecessary steps. I like the location step because it tests whether your work is organized in an effective way. And last, the understanding test which is asking questions to see if your target reader comprehends the information. I will take into consideration the steps from chapters 14 and 15 the next time I have to edit a paper.

Response to Amela

I liked that you brough up ethics and bias in journalism. I agree that it would be hard for journalists to put their opinions and strong beliefs aside to create an objective story. However, I do feel that some broadcasts are better than others at hiding their opinions than others. Jesse pointed out that sometimes he is tries to hide his opinoin so much that it seems that he is bias toward his own opinion. I think that it is good that he has someone check his work to be as objective as possible and I would like to think that all journalists take that extra step.

Ethics is a tough one. There are probably a lot of stories that the public may think are ethically wrong to report. However, is it the journalists and reporters job to report the news. It also makes sense to attribute a lot of their work. As long at they are reporting what the police or detectives have told them, then the public has a right to know. The blame is almost put more on the reporters rather then the police who are making the judements of the case.

Journalism

When I watched the news I always thought that the reporters did most of the research and script writing for themselves. It's almost misleading because the broadcast journalists, like Jesse, do all the script writing but it seems like they don't get the credit for it. The public watches the reporters and assumes that they use their own words and not someone elses. It doesn't seem fair that the reporters get the credit and the broadcast journalists do not.

It was also interesting that broadcast journalists write several different stories/scripts everyday by a deadline. Other journalists that write everyday are for the daily newspaper. Most other journalist write in a weekly newspaper or monthly magazine and have more time to make changes or do editing. It seem like a lot of pressure to do several stories in a day and may also take from the quality of the story. Where as journalists who write a story every week or several stories a month may have more quality, creativity, and thorough reseach or information. This may be why monthly magazines and the Sunday newspapers may be more appealing than the everyday news.

Resonse to Tayler

I feel the same way about watching the news, it can be so depressing! The only time I will watch it is if I am over at my parents house during dinner time. Sometimes the news does catch my interest but for the most part it's negative information that is irrelevant to me. The news I do watch is MSNBC because it is important to me to know about the economy and the current presidential election. These are important factors that I think effect me more directly, especially right now. If regular news programs included these subjects then I think more people would watch, including me.

Koin 6 News

The first thing I noticed was that the new station has to determine how much time each story is going to use of the alloted time. The first couple of stories were longer and seemed to have the most importance. Each report there on after were shorter and shorter. Another thing I noticed was the first stories were the horrible stories such as domestic violence and a death investigation. People want to hear all about the bad news right? The good stories were toward the end such as comic books or "Joe the plumber." The good stories seemed to be a little irrelevant, but I think it's good that they include positive stories in the news.

They also worked on keeping the viewers tuned in. I know a lot of people who watch the news only for the weather. A tactic they used was to talk a little bit about the weather towards the beginning and then viewers had to stay tuned to watch the rest of the weather segment later in the program. They also kept the good information for last. When I watch the weather, I want to see the seven day forecast. They saved that until the very end of the weather segment. Another tactic they used was before commercial brake they told you the stories that were coming up next, just like a regular television show. They even showed the next program that was on after the news to help advertise channel 6 network as a whole.

The rhetoric they use was logos to persuade you to keep watching their news, Koin 6. After every story the reporter/journalist repeated who they were and what show they represent, channel Koin 6 news. They used logos because they were objective and stuck to the facts.

Response to Inna

I was also surprised that a lot of magazines use freelance writers. I always assumed that magazines had all their writers on their payroll. However, with the Internets easy access to an array of articles on line its seems that its leaving magazines in the dust. Freelance writers cut costs for magazines and makes more sense to use them. They only pay them one time and they receive a lot of articles to choose from.

I also think it's cool that a lot of the students in the class would consider pitching an article for publication. I am not the best writer so that is not something that I would consider. I do think it would take some guts and tough skin to take rejection like that. However, if the article would be accepted it would be such an honor and something that you would always be proud of.

Freelance Writing

To tell the truth, I have never even considered what a freelance writer does. However, if people enjoy writing then it sounds like a good career. You don't have a boss, you can work on your own time, and work at home if you like. However, you would have to have tough skin to take all the critism. Some people wouldn't consider it a career but a way to get your foot in the door at another job. Freelance writers could be offered a career instead. Either way, I would love a job that I could stay at home and work in my pajamas at the same time.

Response to Melissa Dawson

I agree with Melissa that I tend to write as I would speak. Sometimes I forget that I have to be more formal when I am writing and there are certain rules that must be followed. It also depends how formal the writing is. Writing these class blogs is informal and we can write as we would talk, compared to an essay or memo where we must be more formal.
I also thought it was interesting that you brought up how the client/customer must always be right. This can be very frustrating. I work in customer service and it is very true. However, I feel like in these situations if people are understanding then a negotiation can be met. You are working for them for a reason and hopefully the client should acknowledge that. This is even more the reason for written agreements and thorough communication.

Ch. 8 & 19

Chapter 8

Chapter 8 discusses several ways that create an effective writing style. Things to consider would be to find out what is expected, the roles being portrayed, your attitude, being able to say things in your own words, and adapting to other cultures. I feel that as long as you have respect for your reader, along with a positive attitude, that all of these considerations will all come into play. Chapter 8 also discusses how to construct an effective sentence. I feel like the guidelines in Chapter 8 can help especially when proofreading. If a sentence doesn’t sound right then these guidelines could help figure out what needs to be changed, whether it be simplifying the sentence or using an active voice. Just by learning how to construct an effective sentence can influence your reader and improve your writing style.

Chapter 19

Chapter 19 focuses on how to manage clients. There needs to be a lot of communication and mutual understandings from each side and there are several ways to do this. The first is to determine what your client wants and why. How can you know what is expected of you if you don’t know what your client wants? Next is to develop your own assessment of the situation and determine a management plan. Once you have a plan, you can create a schedule and then write a proposal to make sure that you and your client have a mutual understanding. I feel that a written response from your client is appropriate so there is a written agreement if anything does go wrong. It can act as a contract. Good communication can prevent errors and keep everyone on the same page. Communication is the key.

Respond to Amela

I liked how you compared reader-centered research to how we research in school. Who you are writing for depends on how you will research. In school we are writing for a professor to show what we have learned. In the work place we are writing for superiors or co-workers to inform, share, or persuade them. There has been one exception to this when I took my speech class. Of course this is orally communicating our research instead of written communication. The teacher was more concerned about how we were delivering, but the students/readers were more concerned with the information we were communicating to them. The research was more centered to the reader/listener than for ourselves and it does seem to make a difference.

Chapter 6 and 7

Chapter 6
Chapter six is all about how to research effeciently and effectively. The beginning of the chapter reinforces that we must consider our readers needs and what information will be valuable to them. Then we must make a plan by taking our reader's questions and find possible sources to answer them. Also, it's a good idea to assess each source and know when to consult the source. The book makes a good suggestion to check each source for other sources. I have done this in the past and found it very useful. Sometimes the sources I accidentally found were better than the original source. It is also a good idea to have a credible source, otherwise how are your readers going to believe you. If they have any doubt about the source, then it could prove a lot more difficult to persuade your readers.

Chapter 7
Chapter 7 touches on five research methods. When I think of researching methods, I think of researching books and the Internet. However, I never considered brainstorming and taking what I already know as researching. After reading this chapter, I realized that brainstorming is something I always do before I start researching other sources. My favorite way to brainstorm is cluster sketches. A lot of my classes in the past have used this technique as class exercises and I have found it very useful. It tells you what you already know and what you want or need to find out. Searching the Internet is the source that I usually go to first. You can do it in the comforts or your own home and find a lot of useful information. I find a useful tip for searching online is using boolean operators. I have used them before, I just didn't know what they were called.
The library can also be very useful. My experience in the past is that I have found more in depth information at the library.I have never interviewed or conducted a survey. I think both would be very interesting to do and probably more useful when conducting research for on the job.

Rhetoric

Rhetoric is something that we use everyday without even realizing it. I always considered rhetoric as something we use only when we write. However, everyday we are using persuasion in our conversations to express ourselves or our thoughts. There are three types of rhetoric: ethos, pathos, and logos. I will use examples of the the three rhetorical devices that I use at my work in a clothing store.

Ethos is the identity of the self and how we define ourselves to other people. We are doing this everyday whether it's someone that we just met or someone that we have known our entire lives, we are always defining ourselves to other people. Work, personality, interests and hobbies, etc. are all things that define us and persuade people of our identities. In retail, we can use ethos by expressing ourselves through our clothing styles.

Pathos is the emotional aspect of rhetoric. We use emotion to let others know what we are feeling. Our values and beliefs influence our feelings and how we react to everyday situations. If I feel strongly about one of my values then I can use pathos to persuade someone to do the right thing, whether it be recycling or treating people with respect at work. In retail, I use pathos by letting customers know what clothes are the trendiest and what I feel looks the best on them.

Logos uses logic and factual evidence to persuade others. Logical evidence can be very persuasive because it uses the cold hard facts. I use logos to tell customers that we are an easier store to shop at because we do convenient returns compared to other stores in the mall.

Chapter 4

I felt like chapter 4 is very useful information for workplace writing. How to organize your document is very essential and can either make or brake you. Organizing hierarchically, group together the items your readers will use together and putting your bottom line first are all important strategies. I feel like giving the bottom line first, especially in the work place is very important to do because people don't have time to sit around and read long documents all day. Getting straight to the point will enable your reader to know what you want without all the nitty gritty details. However, whenever the point is negative or if you are trying to persuade someone then it is probably best to save your main point until the end. Otherwise, your reader can become defensive and not really consider what you have to say/write. I also think that adding modular designs or graphs are very effective ways to get information across. They will grab your reader’s attention better than a paragraph explaining the information, especially for visual learners.

I also find outlines to be very useful. However, they do not seem as useful in the workplace. I think of most workplace documents as short pieces 1-2 pages long. If the document is going to be any longer than I think it is very essential to write an outline to organize your thoughts and information. I was unaware that there were computer programs to help outline your paper and move certain parts around easier. I thought it was really cool and something that would be very useful to students and workers.

Respond to Chris Marshel

I thought you brought up a good question at the end of your blog. Is ethos, pathos, or logos the most rhetoric in the work place? I really think that it depends on the profession. For example, grade teachers or social workers probably focus more on emotion and how the other is feeling so they would use pathos. They would really take into consideration how other people would react in certain situations.
On the other hand, scientists or engineers would probably take the more logical approach and focus on logos as their rhetorical device. They use step by step procedures and hypothesis to come up with certain results.
I couldn't quite think of a profession that would have more ethos for persuasion in their writing. Maybe advertising companies or businesses that are trying to identify themselves to the public or stakeholders. Either way, I think they all play important roles in the business world and some rhetorical device may be used more just depending on the profession.

Ch. 3

Geez! There are so many different things that you must take into consideration about your reader to write an effective document. First, you must figure out why the reader is reading your document, what they want from that document and how they will use the information. Then, you must define your reader's attitudes and learn their personal characteristics. When reading this part, I was skeptical because how do you really know what you reader is thinking and their personal characteristics? Yes, you can sit down and interview them. However, I don't think that that really happens in the business world. In this section, the book also pointed out that each reader is unique and the writer must try to take into consideration each and every reader without abandoning the others. This almost seems impossible to me to cater to each of your readers attitudes. The best writers must have the ability to do this and/or they are experienced writers who have gone through a lot of trial and error.

I agreed with the book that understanding your reader's culture is something that should be taken into consideration. I also feel that this is a more possible obstacle to overcome. The book had some really good examples between American culture and Asian culture and this is information that you can learn before writing to different to people of different cultures. It's information about whole group of people, not just certain characteristics that can be so specific and hard to obtain.

Other things to take into consideration were to learn who all your readers are such as phantom readers, who may be hidden from you but are still important. Also, future readers and having a complex audience are considered. Ethics also play a part including considering stakeholders who are very necessary to consider in the business world.

There are so many things that come into play when writing for your reader. I did not realize that it was so complex and that you really must break down you objectives and who your readers are before you can persuade them. The next time I write an important document or even give a speech I will take into consideration these guidelines and see how they effect my writing and my readers/listeners.

Melissa Bonneville

Free style on writing

English was never my strong subject. I am the student who always excelled at math instead. However, I do like to write for myself and I have been known to keep a journal every so often. Grammar is where I seem to struggle the most in English because there are so many different rules and exceptions to the rules. Hopefully this class will help me perfect my grammar and really concrete the grammar rules that I have learned before.

Research papers can also be interesting to do because you learn so much while you are researching. It also helps to retain the information you are reading by putting it into your own words even though that can be difficult at times.

At the work place, the only writing that I do is emailing my district manager. I am an Assistant manager at a retail store and that is the most common way we communicate to one another outside the store. The major way I communicate with my management team is orally. Otherwise we will write informal notes to one another. Communicating through email with my district manager is also very informal, but I would like show him through my writing that I am more professional. I think that even though it is informal, my writing style could still make a statement about me and could make me look better in the long run.

Melissa Bonneville

Ch. 1

There were a couple of different points from chapter one that really stuck out to me. The first is that when we write at work, we act. That wasn't something that I really thought about until I read it. Writing a proposal, memo, etc. is delegating or somehow driving change to make a difference. It's a social action.

The other point that I really took into consideration from chapter one is that when we write we need to constantly think about our readers. Sometimes we are so interested in thinking about what we want to say rather than actually focusing on how others will interpret it. If we take into consideration the readers and why we are writing for them then the results could be more effective.

Melissa Bonneville