6) Supporting
-People’s Comments on my essays, either from the Stv. 250 folder or the blog.
-Picking out the comments should be interesting, just finding quotes that have affected how my writing turned out.

7) Grade Memo
-1 page single spaced, and it needs to be printed and turned into 201 J
-This is my writing on what grade I think I deserve and how much I have worked on my texts this semester.
Survey
-emailed
- This is what I thought about the class and my opinions on what should change and shouldn’t change.

2) Synthesis Revision of Pr 1 & 2
-A combination of essays 1 and 2.
-This is what I had work shopped on and I think it turned out well. I have begun to write the synthesis and so far I think it is going well and I have an idea of what I am going to write.

3) Remix Pr 1,2,3,4 (either 1 &2 or Synthesized Revision of 1 & 2)
-Major Projects/ Minor “texts”, revised, arrangement
-Part three is simply picking out which minor texts I want to revise and place in the Portfolio. Also revising the projects shouldn’t be too hard and should even make the essays better.

4) Forum
-Electronic: Word Document in Stv. 250 or blog
- I have decided I am going to place the texts in an order that I think works best maybe chronological maybe not. This massive word document will then be placed into the Stv. 250 folder.

Inspirations

“Mommy, I want to grow up and be a doctor.” “Dad when I’m older, I’m going to be a police officer.” When children are little they see the fast trucks or the shiny lights on the cars and get excited. When they figure out who is inside the cars or trucks they say, “That’s what I want to be”. Then for a while they think that is what I’m going to be and tell everyone they know. Well, when everyone grows up they realize that is not what they want to be anymore and that what they want to be is something different. When I reached my sophomore year I realized I did not want to be that policewoman anymore I wanted to be a high school math teacher.
My mother sat me down one day and asked me what I wanted to be. I said I did not know yet and that I would eventually figure it out. That was not going to fly with her; she wanted to figure out at least an idea of what I wanted to be. She knew I got along with kids and asked me if I liked working with them. I replied that I loved kids and that if I could work with them could be a great opportunity. We also both knew that the subject I was best at was definitely math. So the first idea that popped into both of our heads was being a math teacher. The next step was to figure out if I should teach at the middle school or at the high school level. I came to realize that it would be easier for me to teach more complicated math than multiplying and decided that it would be high school math. I then began to look into what it takes to be a high school math teacher. I looked at what degree I needed, what tests I needed to take, and how much money they made. After that, I decided that being a math teacher is what I could do for the rest of my life.
So I got past the step of deciding what to do with my future, now I wanted to test if that is what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. My junior year I decided to take an Internship class through my high school. My teacher placed us at the different job sites to fit what we were looking for and prepared us for what we needed to know before actually going to the job site. He taught us the correct way to shake hands, how to dress properly, and what was confidential and what was not. I was paired up with Westfield Middle School and my mentor was Ms. Mueller, a science and math teacher. I spent every Tuesday and Thursday with her in her math class for second semester. I began to understand her student’s minds when it came to math, how to respond to their questions, and how to teach them in the best way possible. She even let me teach a few lessons on my own and how to find the best method of which to teach them. I fell in love with teaching and I knew from that semester on that that is what I wanted to do for the rest of my life.
The last positive hint to teaching for me would be my senior year Pre-Calculus Teacher, Mr. Anticevich. He really showed me that I could connect to students and make them want to pay attention to my lessons and really understand what I was teaching. He did this by first saying that we could call him by a much easier name and a name we would all remember, Mr. A. The second thing is he had fun with his lessons, he was not afraid to make fun of himself or to joke around with his students and use them as examples for mathematical equations to help his students remember how to solve them better. Also, he made sure we understood the material and that we would be able to do it on our own without his help. He taught well and showed me what it looked like to actually enjoy teaching and how to love your job. I want to teach just like him and love my job when I start teaching.
Through out my life I saw how many different jobs affected many different people. My mom is a school photographer, but it is not her passion. My dad is a lawyer, but spends way too much time at the office or on cases. Then I saw my teachers juggling their lives and loving it and knew that is what I want for my future. I know I will love influencing minds and teaching them all I know to make it easier for them to understand math better. I found my passion in a few different ways but I know that is what I will want to do for the rest of my life.

Hi Brenda,

This narrative moves from generalized statements and becomes more specific toward the end. The form you have chosen resembles the five paragraph essay model.

In the opening, the narrative begins with dialogue that explains how children want to be firefighters or police officers, attracted by the vehicles and flashy lights. The line “Well, when everyone grows up they realize that is not what they want to be anymore and that what they want to be is something different” makes it seem as though everyone wants have these service jobs, when it really seems to be what you were interested in. It’s really an elongated way of saying that what we want to be changes as we get older because we know neither enough about ourselves or the world to make a sound decision.

The opening and second paragraph use the phrase “want to be” or “wanted to be” quite a few times. The second paragraph narrates a discussion you had with your mother about possible future career choices, but the narration follows the generalizations made in the first paragraph as your mother and you have this conversation without any real context. It doesn’t seem as realistic as the anecdotes that follow. Why is it “one day” and not another? What prompted your mother to talk to you about your future job choices?

The third and fourth paragraphs include quite a bit more narrative detail as you outline your internship in a middle school math classroom and gain confidence from your interactions with students there. The discussion of Mr. A also includes a lot of detail about what practices he used that you can see yourself using as a teacher, including having “fun with his lessons, he was not afraid to make fun of himself or to joke around with his students and use them as examples for mathematical equations to help his students remember how to solve them better.”

The final paragraph explains your reactions to your parents’ careers, which seem to have major drawbacks for you, whereas teachers seem to be “juggling their lives and loving it.”

Overall, your writing is clear and achieves its purpose. The opening two paragraphs, however, do not achieve distinction for you because they are generalized and rely on typical five-paragraph essay opening tactics. What if you began the paper with a more detailed narrative about your perception of your parents’ careers instead of putting them as small details at the end?

Best,
Steve Halle

Essay 2 with instructor comments

Theories and Practicality
The Perfectionist.
The perfect student is always prompt and well prepared. They never miss a homework deadline or turn a project in late. They understand every class and often try to help other students understand the class as well. Comprehending class information comes from reviewing and studying the class materials everyday for every class. Tests are a piece of cake with an icing of perfection or so they make it seem. Then at graduation, they walk across the stage with a 5.0 and every honor imaginable.
The Worst Student.
The worst student has the case of senioritis all four years of high school. He or she comes to class everyday a few minutes after the bell rang and has no excuse except that they were talking to their buddies or taking their sweet time. In class he or she is a disruption to the teacher and their fellow students. They flunk classes and end up having to retake them just to fail again. Eventually they flunk enough classes to never make honor roll and are not allowed to graduate and end up being stuck at high school for another year or two as being the super senior.
The Class Clown.
They interrupt the teacher and distract their peers by being loud and being the class clown. In class, they are never prepared for schoolwork and enjoy being laughed with. What they do not understand is the half the time they are being laughed with by their peers and half the time they are being laughed at by their peers. They act like they don’t care about their schoolwork or how their teachers and peers view them. In the end, they end up passing enough classes to graduate but walk across the stage with out honors.
The Cheater.
Sometimes they complete the homework. During tests they lift out of their seats and strain their necks to see their peer’s papers all while trying not to get caught by the teachers. Eventually they get caught by their teachers and get in trouble and punished for their cheating by getting an F on the test. They graduate with passing grades and just breezed through high school never really learning everything.
The Student with challenges.
In every class they pay attention to detail and scribble down every note possible. They study for days before tests and quizzes. They get the test and completely forget all the information. They try hard and fill out the questions to the best of their knowledge. They receive the test back and are unhappy to find out they did not receive a B or an A and wonder why they did not. They studied hard but it had not come through. They graduate with C’s and B’s but always hoped and tried to get all A’s.
Where do I fit?
Can you imagine cramming right before class for a test about to be given or completing homework the night before? That was my everyday life. I would take notes in every class and usually not forget my books, but occasionally I would have to run to my locker to grab them. I listened well except for the boring classes where I tried not to daydream or doodle. Usually for Anatomy tests I would study, not cram, a couple days before the test to try to get the best grade possible. Those are the tests I really cared about doing well on. Pre-Calculus tests I knew I was going to pass. So I paid more attention to the bigger, more important tests, and the tests that the information did not come easily to me. In some classes I found the material to be easy, I would just glance over the study material a few minutes before my next class and go into my test feeling like I just forced twenty concepts that I kind of remember into a jumbled brain. I’m not saying I failed those tests or any classes, but what I am saying is I could have done better. In my high school education, I passed every class with a B or an A and every semester on the honor roll. If I would have studied a little more here or there or did not whisper to my friends as much, I believe I could have graduated with all A’s. My parents would always tell me that I could bump my grade up to an A, and I tried for them but I do not think they believed it was really good enough to just get a B, which I believe is a good grade. At graduation I walked across the stage with a 4.58 and the Presidential Academic Achievement Award.
Hi Brenda,
This final certainly changed a great deal from your early draft and has improved, if you ask me. I like the inclusion of the different types, but you need to be careful to make good use of the types and not stereotype.

The section about you as a student is good, but I’m not sure you ever really answer the question “Where you fit in?” Should this section try to fit your way of being a student into a certain type? Should you talk about how you fit into all the types and how, in that case, stereotyping students doesn’t really work?

The first part of the section on you makes it sound like you consider yourself an average student, but the accolades you mention tend to portray you as otherwise. Where do you fit in?

I apologize for looking at the wrong draft and taking so long to comment on this one. I’m looking forward to reading your portfolio version soon.

Best,
Steve Halle