Blog Paper

In the beginning of this semester I started off being at the text-stage out of the three reading development stages. Through out the years and especially at Stritch, I have had to do a lot of “reflection” papers on things that I have had to read. Many teachers at Stritch are constantly assigning reflection papers, which basically consist of the students’ thoughts about what they have read. The “common addressed questions” in stage one are the questions they want you to answer as you are reflecting on what you have read, “Do I like this text,” “Does this text remind me of an experience from my life,” “Is this text good or bad?” One class this happened frequently in was my Faith Development class, every time we read, we had to write a reflection paper answering those questions almost verbatim. Also a lot of my first Education classes dealt with many reflection papers on things we had to read and on myself. Again the reflections in these classes were to be written answering those questions, and when it was about reflecting on ourselves it was progress we have made and how far we have come. All of these things are centered on the idea of “I think this,” or “I believe this.” None of these questions gave the opportunity to bring in the chance of comparing what we have read to other text or to what is going on in the world. I think these papers are what influenced my writing style and are why I write a lot of “I –centered” ideas.
I also do a lot of reading on my own, at least when I have the chance to. As I am reading these books, I notice that I tend to base a lot of my ideas about on whether or not I like it, relate things I read to experiences in my life, and at the end was the book good or bad. I also relate the books that I read to ones that I have read either on my own or for school. If I find myself relating the book I am reading to one I have had to read for school, I tend to look at the same way we did to the book I had to read in my class. I also find myself relating a lot of what I have read to movies I have seen, which helps me to understand what I am reading better.
I believe that I now am in between two stages of reading development, stage one and two. I am trying to get used to bringing in ideas from other things that I have read and relate it to things that are going on in the world. In a lot of my English classes this is what my teachers want me to do and use to expand my work, but for some reason it is a challenge for me to include these things. Although it comes as a challenge I really try hard to be conscious of bringing in the ideas as I am writing.
The first example that I have is from my very first blog I wrote, the blog was about the movie Bride and Prejudice. “I found the movie to be very comical, but at the same time I was surprised that I found it somewhat enjoyable,” this quote is a perfect example of the text-self stage. I was only saying what I thought, I didn’t compare it to how it related to our story, or how the characters were depicted. The next example that I have is from my fourth blog, “I didn’t bring it up in class because I hate bringing up my accident but, since it was such a big part of my life it is hard not to relate things to it once in a while,” this quote is also a perfect example of the text-self stage. I am relating the text to and experience from my life , I could have related it to a different text I have read, or to something that is happening in the world, instead it was related to my life. An example of text-other texts is from my blog entry about relating Huron and the Sea of Stories, to Alice in Wonderland. “The next thing was how the Gups’ army or “Library” was made up of actual Pages like in a book. That reminded me of the Queen of Hearts people who were made up of playing cards,” here I am relating the text to another text that I have read. This shows that I am capable of relating our readings to other text and I don’t have to be so “I-centered” while analyzing our readings. Finally my last quote is from my fifth blog entry, “One movie that kept running through my mind that shows so many stereotypes, Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay, and most have been brought on from the political aspect. It isn’t the best movie, but there is a ridiculously large amount of stereotypes,” this quote is also an example of text-other texts. This quote really makes me realize that if I take the time I can come up with more than what I think of a text and relate it to other stories, movies, or politics.
It should be easy for me to move more into stages two and three of the stages of reading development. I have already begun to do this in my blogs in small ways, and if I just take the time to think about things I should be able to do it in bigger ways. One way I will begin to do this is not just sit down and do my blog about what I feel or think, but really take the time to try to find something to relate the reading to such as another book or the world. Another way I will do this is jot down my ideas in class when I have them. Many thoughts go through my head in class about how the text relates to something I am reading in another class or something I heard on the news, but when I go to write my bog this ideas aren’t there anymore. Finally, I think the easiest way for me to improve my blogs is not only to relate what we have talked about in class to the text, but also to show that I understand what we have talked about through other text, movies, and world issues.
These blogs have been really helpful to make sense of our readings, and I think that if it weren’t for them I would be having many difficulties getting through this class.