Write yourself into history

The link to the assignment is here.

The assignment says to pick a historically significant event and write a journal entry as if I traveled back in time and took place in it.

Dear Journal;

Today is a remarkable day. These past few months I haven’t really been paying much attention to anything else but trying to piece my life together but today, it seems like everyone is on edge. Lately I’ve been seeing political warfare amongst everyone. If you’re not democratic then you can’t go certain places, tension is rising! People that haven’t voted in decades are out voting today and, even though my mother hates to stand in lines, she even stood in line to vote today.
I can’t wait for this to be over. I’ve been having arguments with my friends as if it really mattered but, we seemed to disagree on voting privileges. They aren’t voting because they have been following the politics, hell they barely even understand politics. They were voting for someone because Oprah said to do so! And apparently, anyone that Oprah endorses is gold! Eh, no matter.
I didn’t plan on watching the final results tally but I knew if I didn’t I’d see it all over myspace tomorrow; plus it was on almost every channel. And I may not have been following all the politics, and I may not care much about them, but even I couldn’t help but shed a tear as America voted in the first African American president. Today, was a remarkable day. And someday when I get old, I’ll be able to tell my grandchildren, that I remember that 🙂

Until tomorrow, goodnight 🙂

 

 

Journey to Somewhere

The assignment asks to metaphorically or literally track a journey you or someone else has made. At first I was going to do my life plan but it would have probably included way more slides than necessary for this project, so I did my educational journey to date. Who knows where it will go after graduation? I’m just trying to graduate right?

So, for this project, I chronicled my educational journey from kindergarten to now, ending with a graduation that I hope to be able participate in soon.

 

 

You’re doing it COMPLETELY wrong!

The assignment is to find a picture or something of the sort of someone doing something completely wrong, and basically just raging out on them…which is fine because we all see that everyday. My favorite is the ones who post on facebook or some other social media about how they wish people would do grammar and spell checks, and then the post itself is a complete English FAIL.

Well, in looking for the perfect picture to rip off on, I found this website, which is a blog of this guy that came to Georgia and was met with SO many unfortunate signs. So here I am, taking this opportunity, to rip off on Georgia as a whole.

WHAT!?!?!?!?!

 <—— Obviously you’re not going to just park there because I’m pretty sure it’s illegal to park at the corner where a stop sign in, but according to this sign, you can’t really do anything else! You can’t go forwards, backwards, or to either side…maybe you’re only option is to U-Turn, but I’m pretty sure that counts as going backwards. Either way, you sit there too long and depending on where you are, you’re going to find yourself with a ticket from an officer who won’t even be able to explain to you what you’re doing wrong. Just that you are breaking the law….wait that’s another rip off that has nothing to do with this.

 

I’m pretty sure I’ve seen this on 75 coming from the South. Believable though. Georgia locks you up for everything to where you might as well drive yourself to the prison. In the words of a Georgian native, this is the state where you “come for vacation and leave on probation”. Smh. They always say to pay attention to the warning signs. If these are the signs offered in Georgia, we should all probably not be reading this and start considering other options. Smh. Do better Georgia. Do better.

Shakespearean LOLcat

 

The instructions for this assignment were to take an image of a cat and superimpose a Shakespearean quote over it. I initially wanted to use something from Taming of the Shrew since that play has so many good stand alone quotes, but in the end I decided to stretch the “rules” of the assignment a little by using more than one photo, since when I read this quote I really felt like it fit cats perfectly. I guess I ended up “remixing” the assignment instead of just completing it.

Affinity Space Nancy Tompkins

I chose this topic because I have be riding/working with horses my whole life. Recently I began training a woman’s horse that boards at a Parelli affiliated barn. The atmosphere was completely different. The horses were calmer, more responsive, and all around better competitors than there traditionally trained counter parts. I found this fascinating since it was so different from what I had learned. Needless to say I jumped in with two feet and never looked back. It was amazing to me to see the transformations I have been looking for, for 8 years come in less than 8 months with this training program. It also great to have people surrounding you with one common goal, putting the horse first.

Class Blog Post #10: Digital Teacher Identity

Liabilities: Though I am not a teaching major, digital identity is still relevant to me when I want to consider a professional career or job in the future. I love social media, even though I am not always the best at it. I use it on daily basis probably 2-3 a day. Facebook, Instagram, and applications like SnapChat are my secret addictions. My Facebook account and Instagram account contain personal pictures with friends and family.

Assets: Before being hired, I would definitely remove my Facebook account. I could use my Twitter account after cleaning or “tweaking” it up a little bit to ask questions to future colleagues over the internet. I would never use Instagram for professional reasons because I don’t find it necessary or useful. Ironically, I don’t like when people know my business 24/7 or where I am at or who I am hanging out with, but Facebook keeps me connected with family members from Greece. 

Digital Identity Nancy Tompkins

Liabilities:

I use social media very little. In fact I am almost impossible to get a hold of outside of school. I look at Facebook about 3-4 times a year and I haven’t made an update in probably 5 years. To be honest the appeal of social networking wore off quickly in high school and now I just find it to be a waste of time. When you Google my name you won’t find me, period. Personally I like this but it could be a liability if I needed to be found. I don’t have a twitter(other than for this class that I made and logged into a grand total of once). I am not a education major so not being able to find me isn’t bad or good, I guess it just depends on how you look at it.

 

Assets:

In my opinion it is an asset that I can’t be found. I like that I’m not constantly paranoid about what someone might find if they look me up. I know a few people who have way to much online and have suffered for it. It’s also a bit of an asset that I don’t need to be attached to socail media to function. I could leave it all for weeks at a time and be totally fine. I think by not having all these extra accounts I am able to be present and participate in life. It makes me less stressed and calmer.

My Facebook is extremely locked down. You can’t find me no matter how hard you look. Interestingly I deleted my FB account 3 years ago and found out the FB does not get rid of your page. So I found myself online but had lost access to my account. It was a pain to get it all back but it taught me an important lesson. Once its online its never gone.

Blog Post #9

For the Trajectory assignment, I chose one of my current classes as an example. My professor wants us to read long novels in a two-week span, read random online articles (that are tied to the main ideas of the book), have a panel of people discuss the book in front of the entire class (each of us assigned a specific book), and then write a five-page paper that is basically a reflection on everything. Though it is not too difficult to do, it is a lot of tedious work especially when you are taking five courses so I am guilty of not reading every single book assigned (except the ones I was super interested in, and the one where I had to discuss in front of the class). When talking to the other students, most of them haven’t picked up any of the book and instead read online summaries and then write the paper after the in-class discussion.

Here is a link to my Trajectory Process for this specific class: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1dlwlUA7Iw_oBfpcypqUWO-4NNAN63wrPIoqLAVvEQPA/edit?usp=sharing

 

 

Trajectories

I found that by using the trajectory above I was behind what was expected. It wasn’t the worst thing because I think teachers plan for students to be behind so they tell us to finish early. The map linked above explains it further.

Class Blog Post #8: Transmedia Franchise

For my Transmedia Franchise, I chose Twilight. In 2005, the first Twilight novel was released and it spread like wildfire, especially for middle/high-school girls. By 2008, the four vampire-themed fantasy romance novels had been released and Hollywood caught on to the popularity of the books (she is in the process of writing another one). The Twilight Saga film franchise sales are estimated to be worth $5,736,100,000.

Spreadability vs. Drillability: The content of Twilight began through four novels and then turned into a five-movie series. It is composed of Twilight, New Moon, Eclipse, Breaking Down Part 1 and 2. There is a spinoff currently in the works, but Lionsgate/Summit and writer Stephanie Meyer are not opening up about the details. This information was released during a Comic-Con interview; the spinoff will most likely be focused on Bella and Edward’s daughter, Renesmee. Because she is a very young character, it opens up the door for her character to have a T.V. series and watch her grow. Originally, there was not going to be a spinoff but the fans kept demanding more vampire action.

Continuity vs. Multiplicity: The storyline is consistent in The Twilight Saga. There are things that they changed in the films (in order to make it more ‘Hollywood’, such as certain characters not dying). Also, they had to choose specific parts of the novel that they wanted to include in the films without changing the storyline completely. Overall, they were very consistent with portraying the characters the way the novels depict them. But with that being said, some fans complained that there was not enough ‘meat’ in the movies that was included in the books.

Immersion vs. Extractability: The Twilight Series does not have a way for you to physically enter the world of it (like how Harry Potter has a theme park), but consumers try to immerse themselves in different ways.  Online, you can see people acting out scenes on Youtube or creating blogs about their thoughts and theories on Twilight. There are plenty of Twilight outfits and props available online, as well. For extractability, there are countless things that have been created due to the popularity of the franchise. Barbie dolls, nail polish/makeup, jewelry, clothes, bags, and perfume are just a few popular items sold. I’m a closet Twilight fan after being dragged to watch the first movie, and I still have the vampire-designed cups that were given to us on premier night.

Worldbuilding: Though the series started in the United States, Twilight has a huge fan base outside of the county. After the books became popular here, they started advertising them around the world so when the movies came out they already knew about the series. The entire cast had group interviews and television appearances to promote the films in countries such as Germany, France and Australia.

Seriality: This transmedia has not broken up the narrative arc into multiple discrete chunks. You don’t need to read the books in order to understand the storyline in the movies, but it makes a little more sense if you do read the background story.

Subjectivity: In each of the books and each of the films, the subject is always consistent. The characters stay true to who they are, and the villains of the series remain the bad guys until the end of the story. The main characters go through many challenges, but they don’t change who they are. The story in the book and the story in the film ends the same but there are small alterations that occur.

Performance: Because of the popularity of Twilight, Stephanie Meyer is considering continuing the series. Like I mentioned earlier, there may be a spinoff revolved around the daughter of the main characters. Many fans have complained that there is not enough content (they want parks, t.v. show, more books etc.), but the writer does not want to ‘overdo’ the brand.