Observation

Photograph
Observations
Day time, well lit. large windows

Inferences
Perhaps the group felt it would have the most energy/attention during the day.

Questions
Why did the group choose to do their collaboration during the daytime?

Inferences
Comfortable seating, arranged in semi circular arrangement. (Not sure if group moved the seats or if they were already arranged this way)

Questions
Why did the group choose to work in teh arrangement of seats.

Observation
Two with laptops, one with notebook, person with book.

Inferences
People assigned to do diffrent tasks.

Questions
What's the division of labor, is one person leading the others? Are all three equal. What are they using the laptop for?

Observations
Book bags on the floor, people wearing jeans and flip flops. People are looking at the board, person at the board making eye contact.

Class Discussion: Stasis Theory

A Clarifies a rhetor's understanding of an issue before combining an argument.
-Audience opinions, assumptions, values
-Areas where more research can be done
-Possible proofs to support argument
-Effective arrangements of these proofs.

First article: Murphy
Topic: Voting/Political Participation
Question: Should young adults participate in the political process? (voting)
Theoretical: Abstract ideas- Should youth participate in politics? Is voting the way to decide a community's direction?
Practical: Action/specific activities-Should youth vote in the 2008 election

What is IT?
Conjecture: Is there an act to be considered?
a"Purity" of the democratic process
b Lack of political participation
Questions: Is there a reason young people don't participate? What proof do we have young people don't vote? How can it be changed? Are political parties targeting them? Why do political parties think the young people are important? What kind of ways are they participating in and what are they not doing? What would get them interested and excited about participating?

Definition: What kind of thing is it/ What parts make it up?
Questions: What kind of thing or event is it? To what larger class of things does it belong? What are its parts? How are they related? What kind of thing is "VOTING"? Is voting a luxury, a duty, a right, a privilege, or a responsibility, obligation?
What is "POLITICAL PARTICIPATION"? What are its parts?

Quality: Simple- Is it a good or bad thing? Should it be sought or avoided? Comparative- Is it more desirable than alternatives? Or less desirable? Is it more or less right than something else? Is it more base than something else?
Is it right to vote without knowing the issues and candidates vs. note voting at all? Is it honorable to vote for a candidate whose ideas you support but you know isn't going to win? Is it more base to pay attention to the political process when there's so much negativity or is it more base to tune out it all. Is it a good thing to participate in the political process? Is it better for the youth to participate in the process or should the experienced vote?

Stasis Theory Activity 3

For activity 3, I checked the opinion section of the DA for today for articles. I came across one about Sarah Palin. The piece opens with the line that choosing Sarah Palin for a running mate was the best thing McCain could have done to save his campaign. The article goes on to suggest the ways that Palin will help bring new life to a campaign that people have become disillusioned with. The opinion touches on many of Palin's qualities, all of them good.
I don't believe there is any conjecture in this piece. The article discusses the ways that Palin is the solution to all of these problems. There is no stasis, because no other side is presented. The article only focuses on the good that Palin will bring to the campaign. The author does not include the other side of the argument, probably because that would not agree with the opinion. Should a person stand up to argue against this article, I'm sure there would be plenty for them to choose to refute.

Methods to understand a writer's decisions

Texts:

-Peer Reviews

-Postwrites

-Rhetorical Analysis

-Memo

-Instructor comments on freewrites and rough draft 

Interviews:

-Asking how comments were interpreted and changes were made

Stimulated Elicitation Interviewing "Props"

Discourse based interview

Observations:

Watch the person revising or even drafting. 

Peer reviews. 

Free write on Research methods:

What I'm sure about so far is how to go about researching several documents from one writer. I am now more familiar with what to look for to really understand how a writer creates and revises. I don't really have any questions. I have more of a sense of unease that whomever I choose to research will have documents that I won't be able to research well. So, I can't say I'm absolutely comfortable with it yet. But I have a feeling that as the semester goes on, I'll start to become more accustomed to it. 

Week in Review

I'd have to say, looking back over the week, that I understood the packet that we were analyzing. As a class, we were trying to analyze how the writer came to write, his prompting, and methods. We did this rather than analyze his actual writing, which I thought was interesting. The instructions were a little confusing at first, but by Thursday, I had a better understanding of what we were doing. I do understand how this is going to help us analyze our subject's documents for the final project, although I am a little afraid I may not analyze correctly. I am beginning to get a little worried about our project and all the details of it. Hopefully, that will be explained and cleared up this week.

Exploratory Essay

When I first sat down to try to write the essay, nothing popped into my head. No questions came to mind at all, which was strange as I have a lot of questions that I could have asked. So I tried very hard to think of the fields that I wanted to perhaps pursue. What did these people do? How did they do it? That started to spark more in depth questions. So instead of sitting down at my computer, I grabbed a notebook and started to write down my questions into separate columns. The columns were dedicated to the questions about specific fields, as well as more general questions that could pertain to all fields.
After this was done, I started to go through my columns, checking the questions that I felt were the ones I was most curious about. Some of these questions I felt were more relevant to my immediate interests. I also felt they might be good questions to include in our research paper. But, they were questions I didn't know much about, so I generalized about them as much as I could. Doing this also generated even more questions.
I chose questions mostly on what I was interested in. Since I'm mostly interesting in editing and medical writing, I started with those questions. I truly don't know much about either of these positions, so I was really just posing questions with no answers. I tried to provide what I thought these jobs included, but I couldn't be sure about them. But, I asked questions that I hoped would help me later in the semester, as well as questions I could go back to for my own information later.
My next step was to ask a general question. I felt this was important because it applied more to the pros and cons of a job situation. I wanted to know what were the differences between working for a company of some sorts and freelance writing. What sort of skills does each position need? What are the downfalls? These are some of the questions I wanted to include.
After I had my questions picked out, I needed to actually write it all down into a three page paper. This worried me a little bit. I wasn't sure if I had three pages worth to write about. But, after I started, the questions turned into more questions and I had three pages.
The paper, instead of making me glad it was done, inspired me a little bit. I realized I wanted to know the answers to all my questions, even the ones I didn't choose to write on. Hopefully later on in the semester, I'll find out more about the answers to my questions.

Rhetorical Activities 1 and 4

1) Since I didn't have any magazines in my room, I instead decided to look up an article I had read on MSN a few days ago. The article concerned itself with vaccines and the various reasons why parents choose not to allow their children to be vaccinated. The article draws on kairos due to a survey take 2 years ago, and the rising number of children who aren't being vaccinated due to personal or religious beliefs. But there are also the group of children that due to various reasons, cannot be vaccinated because of a health issue. And because there are children out there that were not vaccinated due to other reasons not related to health, these children are very susceptible to disease. The writer established urgency early on by talking about the possibility of epidemics of very contagious diseases happening again because a certain amount of children were not vaccinated.
Also on the first page of MSN was an article on corn syrup. The short article linked the syrup to the rising obesity in America. The writer uses two sides of the argument. One is that eating more calories than you burn off in a day is the problem with the rising weight. Two is that corn syrup makes the body feel like it is still hungry and thus people consume even more because they still feel hunger pangs.

4) Vaccinations are an important part of the health of young children. While not only preventing the acquisition of life threatening diseases, these vaccines also help to keep the other members of the population safe and healthy. There are some children who can not receive vaccinations due to health issues. Therefore, it should be up to the rest of the community to look into vaccines and consider getting them for their children. Yes, there are faith based reasons as well as personal reasons for choosing not to receive vaccines. But, there are other factors involved in the decision besides the most important factor; the health and well being of your child. There is your health to consider, and the health of those around you.