Switchin' Things Up a Bit

OLD:

Raleigh’s discovery was a catalogue to sell the land to his audience as a good means to new resources and gain respect to go about on the land. Resources were the number one priority, and one certain discovery was of great importance. The crystal mountain was not only beautiful and of crystal but “it appeared like a white church” (406). The church was extremely important during this time period, and with Raleigh seeing a mountain as a crystal church-like structure, he was using the greed and lust for precious stones and the religious assimilation to sweeten the idea of the actual site. By mentioning a church, Raleigh was having his audience imagine a land worthy for civilization whereas he was imagining an opportunity to riches. Precious stones had an impact because the more stones, the more riches and the more riches led to more authority.

NEW:
Raleigh's discovery was a catalogue, INSIGHTFUL AND PERSUASIVE, to sell the land to his audience-- INVESTORS AND LANDOWNERS-- as a good means to new resources and gain respect to go about on the land. Resources were the number one priority, and one certain discovery was of great importance, THE VALUE HIGH. BEING NOT ONLY BEAUTIFUL AND OF CRYSTAL, THE CRYSTAL MOUNTAIN "appeared like a white church" (406). The church was extremely important during this time period, and with Raleigh seeing a mountain as a crystal, church-like structure, he USED the greed and lust for precious stones and the religious assimilation to sweeten the idea of the actual site. By mentioning a church, RALEIGH'S AUDIENCE COULD IMAGINE a land worthy for civilization whereas he was imagining an opportunity to riches. THERE WAS AN IMPACT BY THE STONES because the more stones, the more riches and the more riches led to more authority.

Gotta Love It

Before taking this class, I had never been real familiar with passive and active voice. While never having a problem with passive and active voice, I have not been properly introduced to the grammatical idea. Since I have learned now, I look at my writing and noticed that I must have a correct idea of how to have active voice because I have not found a continual issue with passive voice. Although this may be the case, I am not going to become cocky and think I will never write something in passive voice. Once I began to really look at my writing, I was able to find a passage with passive voice.

OLD PASSAGE

Kittredge believes that people’s lives are stories that they create for themselves once they have discovered what their story is. Momaday is able to satisfy Kittredge because Momaday has a story’s beginning, middle, and end. The story evolves along with the lives of the Kiowa Indians from the discovery of their new world, understanding the meaning behind arrows, and appreciating the beauty within their culture. Being able to create a new story after one has finished is what Kittredge is wanting, otherwise the world will find itself in a great wreck (53). Dwelling upon a story that is not going to change can only damage the stories to come. Momaday discovers his story, evolves his story when the times change, and sucks up every potential the Kiowa culture and the world has to offer.

NEW PASSAGE

Kittredge believes that people’s lives are stories that they create for themselves once they have discovered what their story is. Momaday is able to satisfy Kittredge because Momaday has a beginning, middle, and end. Momaday’s story evolves along with the lives of the Kiowa Indians from discovering their new world, understanding the meaning behind arrows, and appreciating beauty within their culture. Creating a new story after one has finished is what Kittredge is wanting, otherwise the world will find itself in a great wreck (53). Dwelling upon a story that is not going to change can only damage the stories to come. Momaday discovers his story, evolves when the times change, and suck up every potential the Kiowa culture and the world has to offer.

AAAWWUBBIS

AAAWWUBBIS is a phrase I had no idea about, UNTIL this grammar class. I would write and not know that I was partaking in AAAWWUBBIS, WHILE going through school. Also, reading through a newspaper, I have noticed that they are used all the time. I find it funny how most people can write and be completely oblivious to what kind of writing they are actually doing, including me. Subordinating clauses have been the easiest for me, and AAAWWUBBIS is easy to remember. There are many different clauses and I seem to get confused on which is which, EVEN AFTER practice. I guess more practice is needed for me!

I have also come to realize that commas have many more use than just a pause in a sentence. Also, I can understand how hard it would be to determine if a comma is to be placed where some are placed. Places that are paused at while reading seems to be natural where the comma is to go. However, I have recently learned that that is not always true. These clauses are also created with using a comma.

Question: While looking at the subordinating words and clauses in our handbook, I noticed that words are used in the phrases list but not the word list. Is the English language trying to confuse everyone on purpose or is there a specific reason why the phrases are different then the words?

I'm Gettin' Ideas!

Last Wednesday was something I very much enjoyed. The “fish bowls” are so much fun! It’s like a friendly debate. I had forgotten about the fish bowls and how helpful they can be. With people who do not speak much, fish bowls allow for them to get a word in. With people who speak a lot, fish bowls allow for them to restrain giving others a chance. I was able to feed off of other people and hear other views on a subject. Although I made not have agreed with what was said, everyone sees things differently and has had different experiences towards their understanding and it was crucial for me to have heard everyone’s point of view. Also, everyone’s mind is getting involved and dissecting the topic at hand. A simple story about Dora was taken to personal experiences, understanding her step by step progress, and coming up with ideas about reasons why things happened with Dora the way they did. I really think fish bowls are a good idea in interacting with peers and using prior knowledge to critically think about the topic of discussion. I am going to remember about fish bowls now and use it in my classroom!

Also, the FANBOYS were a nice insight. I have always stuck myself with “and”. Remembering the meanings behind FANBOYS has given me a better word choice when placing two sentences together. In fact, those posters Barbra put up in the classroom have helped me in remembering certain structures a lot. I forgot how technical sentences can get. However, I have never really practiced putting a comma before “and” when putting two sentences together. I have always thought that the whole point of “and” is what takes the place of a comma; therefore a comma is unnecessary in that situation.

The question I have is I have always been writing where there is no comma before the word “and” regardless of putting two sentences together. In a grammar “test” would I be wrong or marked off for not having a comma before “and” when putting two sentences together?

I have always known about this sentence structure, but I never knew the name “transitive” and “intransitive”. The most important thing I learned through this lesson is the acronyms of the order of a sentence for transitive, intransitive, and linking verbs. For example, S-Vi means subject-verb intransitive, therefore I know which form the verb is when the sentences follows this structure. The transitive verbs still confuse me a bit. The phrase “direct object” throws me off a tad due to the fact that saying noun or pronoun would be easier. Linking verbs, for me are the easiest because an adjective is all that is needed after the verb. Plus I like the example, “this beer smells funny,” it makes me giggle.

Prepositional phrases have been part of my learning since middle school. I can remember sitting in 8^th grade English and being taught prep phrases and not understanding them at all. The airplane example with the cloud helped me a lot. The airplane goes “through” the cloud, “around” the cloud, “at” the cloud, “by” the cloud and although “of” and “will” do not work with the cloud, they are still prepositions.

I am continuing to read newspapers more critically, nit picking each and every sentence. I still tend to stumble when it comes to determining transitive and intransitive, so I believe more practice should be at hand for me.

Pronouns I have not had problems with. Just being able to say the sentence and know which word, “myself,” “himself,” “themselves,” etc. helps me to determine which word is correct. Although spell check on the computer has caught me a few times, I think I have figured it out well for the most part. The chart to help learn what part of speech the words referred to, such as subject case and I, you, he, she, it, objective case and me, you, him, her, it, possessive case and my, mine, your, his, her, hers, its and reflexive case and myself, yourself, himself, herself, itself helped immensely in remember what is what.

One question I do have is, in class we have discussed prepositional phrases, but are there rules and different structures for just prepositions? Or is the understanding basically the same thing?

What I have learned is that nouns, adverbs, verbs, and adjectives are not the same old terms I learned back in elementary school. In fact there is so much more to them. The “test” questions or sentences used to determine if the word is noun, verb, adjective, or adverb are new to me, but have sparked my interest because the “test” questions or sentences will come in handy. I am not sure who was bored enough back in the day to have to name every single word by another word, but at least there are simple ways to crack the code. I have also learned about adverbs being mobile words; how in a sentence the adverb can generally be placed anywhere and the meaning of the sentence is still the same.

The reminder of syntax was a nice refreshment. I can remember getting papers back with that word and I remember knowing what the word meant, but I did not know how to fix it. I know I will probably always have a problem when it comes to sentence perfection, but I am working on it!

Also, ever since looking at the newspaper and picking out the parts of speech, I have caught myself doing it on a regular basis. In fact, I’ve caught myself getting the newspaper in general. I think dissecting a piece of writing to find particular errors or demonstrations of particular grammar has helped me to retain the things we have learned so far.

A question that I do have is do the “test” questions or sentences always work when trying to figure out what part of speech a particular word is?

Pertaining to grammar and punctuation I have learned many of the basic things: comma use, contractions, conjunctions, nouns, verbs, adjectives and so on. In fact, I have known these basic terms since grade school. Getting into middle school and high school, I began to learn more complicated grammar and punctuation such as, citation, quotes, headers, footnotes and correct structure for an essay paper. I believe I have gotten those imbedded into my head pretty well and can even say I enjoying doing the technical grammar and punctuation within a paper.

In a most recent lesson, I learned about the new way to use apostrophes. For example, having a name end in “S” and instead of using “ ‘s”, just an apostrophe is used. I had no idea there is an old way and a new way to begin with. I can understand why this is coming into affect because today words are becoming less complicated and pronouncing words need to be quicker. Technology like texting, I am sure has had help in this transformation. Also, one thing I have learned that I will never forget is writing in past, present, or future tense. I have written papers that bounced from past to present and my tenth grade English teacher sat me down and gave me a personal lesson in doing that and I have never forgotten that to this day.

In middle school, my English teacher had the class each day start out by grammatically correcting a sentence that was incorrect on the board. From continually correcting the sentences, grammar has become a pet peeve of mine. Peer reviewing or rereading a paper of my own checking sentences for grammatical errors is the first thing I do.

How can a hyphen turn two words to mean something completely different from what they meant in the first place?

Self Eval

For this semester, I am really hoping to accomplish how to properly use a comma. I tend to over use the comma or do not know exactly where to put them. For example, I tend to put “…,however,...” because when I say the sentence, I pause in both places . The two commas I have been told are unnecessary or are necessary. I tend to not understand the semi colon as well. I get confused on exactly what the semi colon is used for. I have been told that it combines two sentences or ideas, but I also have been told otherwise. I am not sure if the semi colon can be replaced by a comma or even if the semi colon is appropriate and a comma can be used instead. For example, “I have seen the movie twice; just enough to understand.” I am not positive if a semi colon is needed or if a comma would suffice.

I do not fully understand the work of a hyphen. For example, “cross section” and “cross-section.” I do not know the difference really between the two. I do know that the hyphen adds a different understanding to the two words that are placed together. Also, I tend to create many short sentences instead of combining them successfully. For example, “I saw Kim. She came over yesterday. We talked about cars.” I am worried that the sentences will become runons and therefore try to shorten them as much as possible. Therefore, I would like to learn how to combine the sentences correctly without being too short and being too long.

Redundancies tend to be a great problem that I have. For example, “a distance of ten yards” or “an actual fact.” I would like to focus on bettering my word choice and excluding the redundancies. Also, clichés tend to lure me in. For example, “busy as a bee” or “crystal clear,” as well as others. I want to be able to be more creative and have a wider variety of word choice so I do not have to use clichés. Furthermore, I tend to catch myself not using the right word in a situation when it comes to “affect” and “effect.” Overall I would like to be able to strengthen my word vocabulary enough to not have the problems that I do with redundancies and clichés.

Lastly, I am not sure as to when to spell out numbers and when to leave them in number form. I have heard many times that spelling them out ends at 100 and anything above that are put into number form. Also, I have heard that numbers above 10 are to be written out in the number form. I would like to finally learn which is actually correct.