Reading and Writing Journal

126 Reading, writing and thinking journal

You may not repeat prompts. You need to do ten prompts over the course of the semester.

Each prompt is worth 20 points. Generally, each response should be at least 350 words if not more. Make sure you provide citations for all sources.

Try to view these exercises as exploratory. This is a time to encourage your creativity and curiosity to wander where it will.

Please include the FULL prompt with each response.

1.  Curiosity
1. Locate a reference to someone in something we’ve read that doesn’t give much information about that person. Go look that person up and write a brief, biography of her/him of at least 3 paragraphs. While facts are okay in the biography, speculate a bit as well. Who is this person? Why is the person referenced in our readings? Wikipedia cannot be your source. You must use at least three sources. Write a fourth paragraph explaining how this person might relate to something else we are doing in class.
2. Do some research and find out something that bell labs invented between 1910-1960. Search old news reports from the time period it was invented and find out what others thought of the invention then. Find out if the invention is still being used. Did it do what the original reviewers thought it would? What did it change? What is its current usage? Write 350 words explaining your process of discovery and include citations for all sources that you use (make sure to use three and dictionaries and wikipedia do not count).
2. Attentiveness
1. Read the essay, “Argument at work”, p. 130 in Habits. Track down an analogy made about some aspect of technology and examine it for validity. Spend at least two or three paragraphs explaining the analogy, its meaning and whether or not the analogy is accurate.
2. Read the essay “On Seeing as a Writer”, p. 178-182. Go to a public place--a store, a downtown area, somewhere where you can walk around comfortably. Put away your technology! And walk around for at least ten minutes on your own observing everything around you. Notice off the beaten path areas, look from up close and observe from far away. Look at the environment itself, the people, the places, the sky, listen to the sounds, smells. Try to immediately write down your impressions after the ten minutes are up. Describe what it was you saw. What surprised you? What did you notice that you don’t usually notice? What did you hear? Smell, see? Make sure you write at least 350 words about your observations and that you employ all of your senses.
3. Openness or Open-mindedness
1. Find an article that is completely at odds with your own opinion about one of the ideas from our reading. List the idea from our reading that you disagree with and then write down all the reasons that the other article gives for why you are wrong. Did anything the other person say change your mind? Why or why not? Make sure you write at least 350 words. Be sure to cite both articles.
2. Social media can be a source for increasing tolerance or increasing hatred or intolerance. Find an example of each on social media websites and cite the websites. Look up the policy of the website on posting: what is the website’s policy on discriminatory or hate speech? Do you agree with the policy? Why or why not? Speculate on whether social media seems to be increasing our tolerance for difference. Use some examples to support your speculation. Use at least 350 words.
4. Engagement
1. Select a topic that is related to an essay you are working on. Write ten questions about that topic. Now, select five of the questions and write five more questions that relate to and explore the first question. Select two of the questions and write two more questions that further explore those questions. Pick the most interesting of all the questions you’ve generated and go interview someone for response to the question. Make sure you also get them to generate at least two more questions that relate to the question you asked them! Make sure you write down their response.
2. Find a Ted talk on innovation that is at least 20 minutes long. Watch the talk and write a 250 word review that strongly encourages your peers to watch the review. Make sure to cite at least two examples from the talk in your review. Now write a respectful 100 word review that argues that the talk is not worth watching. Use two different examples in this second review. You are REVIEWING not summarizing.
3. Find three pictures on the internet that show capitalism. Then, start at “Place the images before you” on p. 105 under Reflecting and follow the process listed here for those three pictures. Make sure to write at least 350 words. What did you learn from this process?
4. Go to this website: http://www.cmsimpact.org/. Explore. What is the purpose of this website? Select one article on the website that has links AND is at least 250 words or more. Read the article and write a one paragraph summary of it. Follow at least two of the links. Skim or read where the links take you. Write down the main ideas you got from both the links and how those relate to the original article.  Cite your sources! What did you learn from this process?
5.  Creativity
1. Find a song that makes an argument.  Explain the argument that the song makes, using examples from the song that support your explanation. Now, evaluate the quality of the argument. What makes the argument strong? Weak? How is an argument in a song different from one in writing? Do you agree with the argument the song makes? Why or why not? Use at least 350 words and include the song lyrics with your response.
2. Look up artwork online and find a piece of artwork (it can be a painting, sculpture,  or other artwork) that metaphorically captures an idea from class. Explain what you see in the art and how it relates to the idea in 350 words or more.  Cite your source. What did you learn from this process.
3. Do the exercise under Practice Session Four, p. 265
6. Persistence
1. Find a 16-19th century philosopher’s essay that is related to the topics we are reading (think of the underlying values and issues raised--obviously they will not be talking about the internet). Read the essay and write a thoughtful couple paragraphs on how this philosopher would address the idea you have selected if he were to encounter it. Use the philosopher’s values and views from the essay to influence your writing (Some philosophers you might chose: Spinoza, Nietzsche, Hume, Spencer, Montaigne). Make sure to use at least 350 words. What did you learn from this process?
2. Select one of the authors from our textbook and find an essay they’ve written in 2015-2016 that is on the same or mostly the same topic. In at least 350 words, compare and contrast the two essays, looking at where the ideas might have changed and where they’ve stayed the same. Cite your sources. What did you learn from this process?
3. Select something you’ve written for class that was a formal piece of writing. It should be at least 3 paragraphs long. Select a middle paragraph and revise it at least three times, doing a thorough job of revision. The paragraph should look quite different. Now, select the one of the three drafts that you like best and rewrite the paragraph before and after that one in the original draft so they now connect with the rewritten paragraph. Turn in all five paragraphs. Describe your learning process.
7. Responsibility
1. Think of a topic or idea that we are working with this week that you know little about. Take the responsibility for finding out more about it. Do some research and cite at least three sources explaining at least three facets of the topic or idea you discovered making sure to use at least 350 words.
2. Select one of the essays from the Technology collection and refer to the sources cited. Go to at least two of the sources cited and find where the cited part is in the original source. Online, this is easy to do. Find the article online and do a “control F” (command F on macs) on the computer, putting in a word or phrase from the Technology collection essay to find where the phrase is in the original source. Read around the citation and explain why the citation was a good one to pick and also what was left out in the technology essay. Did the technology essay author make a good decision in using this source? Why? Make sure to use at least 350 words.
8. Responsiveness to the criticism of others
1. Read http://theessayexperiencefall2013.qwriting.qc.cuny.edu/files/2013/08/%E2%80%9CWhy-I-Write%E2%80%9D-by-Joan-Didion.pdf When you finish the essay, explore this question: Didion states that she writes to find out what she is thinking. How do you find out what you are thinking? Explain what Didion means in this essay by “white space”. When you finish exploring, select a passage from an essay you’ve written and make it more aggressive. Try to rewrite the passage in a way that literally imposes your ideas onto a reader.  Give the passage to someone else to read and record their responses to the passage.  Which passage did you like better? The original or the more aggressive one and why? Make sure to use at least 350 words.
2. Write down one of your most deeply held controversial beliefs. Go find at least two people you respect who disagree with you. Get each of them to tell you at least three reasons you are wrong (alternatively, find two articles on the web through the library portal that disagree with you and write down at least three reasons from each that you are wrong). Write down all six reasons and then select which two are the best of these in providing reasonable evidence that your claim is not the best justified belief on the topic.  Explain why these two are the best. Did you change your idea? If so, explain specifically which claims convinced you and why. If not, explain why you did NOT find the arguments convincing focusing on the two you thought were best. Be very specific. Your explanation should be at least 250 words.
9. Flexibility
1. Go to http://content.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1897093,00.html, time magazines gallery of photos taken by blind people. The exhibit states that it “raises extraordinary questions about the nature of sight”. What questions can you think that this exhibit raises? List at least five. Think about what it means “to see”. How would you define “seeing” given these photos? Try to imagine why someone might want to take pictures who couldn’t see the pictures. Generate some ideas about this. Select one photo and describe what you see (be sure to tell me which photo you selected). Now, go back to the questions you generated at the beginning of this prompt. Explore possible answers to one of the questions. Make sure to use at least 350 words
2. Listen to this radiolab episode: http://www.radiolab.org/story/trust-engineers/. (it’s 30 minutes). What questions are raised in this episode? List at least five open-ended questions. Now write two compare and contrast paragraphs that relate the ideas raised in this episode with two pieces you’ve read in/for class. Explore one of the questions you listed at the beginning of this prompt. Comment on what purpose the sounds in the background serve throughout the show.  Do some research: how does facebook currently deal with “reported” photos. Use at least 350 words in your response.
10. Self reflectiveness
1. (Do this after you’ve watched radiolab in the flexibility section). If you were to design a 30 minute radio or audio show to put on radiolab, what question would you want to explore? Imagine how the episode would go. Draw a mind map that emerges from the central question you would explore, at least three levels and with at least 18 nodes. What does your map reveal about the question you raised? What does it reveal about you? Use at least 350 words.
2. Skim through the Habits of the Creative Mind book and find three questions that the author raise in the text (not in any of the assignment sections). Explore what purpose the question serves in the section it is in. How is it useful? Why are the author’s raising it there? Then expend at least one paragraph exploring the question. Finally, add two questions appropriately to an essay of yours and turn that in with this prompt. Explain why you added those questions and how they change the essay.
11. Metacognition
1. After a session on your computer for at least 20-30 minutes. Move away from the computer and draw your brain on the computer. There is no right way to do this, just draw what you imagine is going on in your brain while you were working on the computer. After you’ve completed your drawing, narrate what the drawing shows and explain how you think your brain works on the computer. Use at least 350 words. What did you learn in this process?