Daniel Nester's teaching blog

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Assignment for ENG 251: Preparing for Your Fional Conference.

[draft form; will be editing soon!]

We will have individual Final Conferences in the weeks to come. It’s the time to look back and assess what we’ve done, find out what’s working for you, identify areas where we can improve, and discuss your final grade.

We will meet in my office in Dolan Hall, 442 Western Avenue, 1st Floor. Room #2. A missed conference counts as a missed class (i.e., one absence), and cannot be made up.

These are the items you will need for your conference:

1. All of the books and readings for this class.

2. All of your work, informal and formal. Bring copies of your raw transcripts, final transcripts, and your in-class projects. Email all of the above to me in a single document, with your work in reverse chronological order--newest work in the beginning, oldest in the back, along with your next item, which is

3. A short essay (500-750 words) that discusses how you assess your performance as an active learner in this this semester. Place this in the first page of the document. Think of this is a cover letter addressed to me; you can formal or as informal as you like. Try to answer some or all of these questions:

What have I learned about the issues and craft of interviewing?
What issues did I face in my interview process?
What was worked as I interview, transcribe, and edit my interviews? What has not been working?
What is the current stat of my final project? What is working, and what problems have I run into?
How do I assess my own strengths and weaknesses?
What kind of assignments have worked for me in this class? What have not?
Where would like I like to see this class go in the rest of the semester?
What do I think my final grade should be, and why?

Name this single Word or Rich Text File like this:
FirstnameLastnameFinalConferencePaperEnglish251.doc

Please send this to me at least two hours before your conference meeting. Conference sign-up sheet and times are here.

*You will need to combine your writing into one document for your Final Portfolio anyway, so consider it practice.

Assignment for ENG 315: Preparing for your Final Conference.

We will have individual Final Conferences in the last weeks of the semester. It’s the time to look back and assess what we’ve done, find out what’s working for you, and identify areas where we can improve.We will meet in my office in Dolan Hall, 442 Western Avenue, 1st Floor. Room #2. A missed conference counts as a missed class (i.e., one absence), and cannot be made up.

Conference times are here.

These are the items you will need for your conference:

1. All the books and readings for this class.

2. All your blog posts, edited and sured-up for the conference. I will have your blog up onscreen. Be ready to talk about The State of Your Blog. The same questions from our Midterm Conferences apply:

Have your blog in shape for your conference, and be ready to talk about everything and anything about your.
What is your blog's style?
What features are working?
What is your bloggerly/writerly persona?
How does the look and presentation of your blog correlate with what you are trying to do with your writing?

3. An essay (no fewer than 750 words, no more than 1250) that assesses your performance as and active learner in this class. Think of this is a letter addressed to me, or another "why I write" essay that could eventually turn into a blog post for you. Or: think of this as a reflective essay that is only for this class. You can write as formally or as informally as you like. Try to answer some or all of these questions:

What have I learned about the issues and craft of being a blogger?
What did I think about blogging before this class, and what do I think of it now?
What thoughts do I have about the implications of being a blogger, presenting my writing to the world, and presenting myself as a persona to the world?
What is my blog's voice? Point of view? How does my writing and editing style relate to that?
How do I assess my own strengths and weaknesses?
What kind of assignments have worked for me in this class? What have not?
Where would like I like to see this class go in the rest of the semester?
What do I think my final grade should be, and why?

Email this essay :
FirstnameLastnameFinalEssayEnglish315.doc

Please send this to me at least two hours before your conference meeting. Conference times are here.

Final Conference Times, Fall 2009

It's the final countdown.

What do you need to do for your conference?

If you are in my English 315: Professional Writing: First-Person Journalism and Blogging class, go here.

If you are in my English 251: Prose Topics: Interviews and Oral Histories, go here.

Wednesday, December 2

11:00 Mary Catherine O [315]
11:30
12:00
12:30
1:00
1:30

4:00
4:30

Monday, December 7

9:00
9:30
10:00
10:30
11:00
11:30
12:00
12:30
1:00 Lyndsay M
1:30
2:00

4:00
4:30
5:00

Tuesday, December 8
10:00
10:30

1:00
1:30
2:00
2:30

Wednesday, December 9

1:00
1:30
2:00
2:30
3:00
3:30
4:00
4:30

Monday, December 14

11:00
11:30
12:00
12:30
1:00 Michelle C
2:00
2:30
3:00 Courtney J
3:30

Thursday, November 19, 2009

The Liveblogging an Event Assignment.

Due Dates for Fall 2009.
Discussed in class: November19
Proposal: Emailed to instructor November 20, 5:00pm (plain text email is fine; all should have subject line "Liveblogging Topic").
Due: Posted to your blog by December 3, 4:15pm.

Background
One classic blog post variety is liveblogging--sometimes spelled live blogging or as one word. Either way, we define liveblogging as posting to a blog in real time from or during a live event, game, show, meeting, etc. A post or series of posts at a live event such as a conference, TV broadcast, political rally, or concert.

When a blogger liveblogs, he or she may be at the event or watching coverage (radio, internet, TV) in real time. "Live blogging is basically taking notes, photos, or recordings at lectures, conferences, and presentations of what was said and posting it to your blog," Ruth Kanter writes in her post "The Art of Live Blogging." "I ended up doing live blogging because I think through fingers anyway, so why not share it with others on my blog?"

Your assignment is to live blog an event that is at least one hour long. What live event? You will have to propose that to me. This event has to be something others could possible share experiencing--a television show, a live concert, a press conference, a meeting of some sort.

Specifications:
Produce at least 15-20 timestamped updates throughout a live event. This can either be on a single blog post or on 15-20 Twitter posts, provided it is hashtagged (see explanation below).

Parts of a single posts are updated often indicated by a dateline-style timestamp; see this New York Times loveblog of a town meeting in Montana with President Obama. A typical liveblogging post will look like this:

A reader of this type of liveblogging post would hit the "refresh" or "reload" button on her browser, and read the most recent updates.

Microblogging services such as Twitter allow for a form of liveblogging in multiple posts. Following agreed-upon conventions, Twitter users often include a hashtag, usually at the end of each Tweet or post. Like a tag or label in regular blogs, hashtags--which are key words or terms preceded by a # sign--allows other users to sort and search Tweets according to the indicating what he or she is liveblogging.

A Twitter liveblog post covering this Montana town hall meeting, for example, would read like this:

NRA man on the floor, asks Obama questions #MNtownhall

Followers of that person's Tweets will know that she is talking about the Montana Town Hall Meeting by the hashtag #MNtownhall; users of Twitter will have a live link from that hashtag to other posts/Tweets labeled the same way.

Your professor, for example, attemped to liveblog--or live Tweet--episodes of So You Think You Can Dance? To do this, he appended each of his post with what seemed to be the most popular hashtag, an abbreviation of the show's name, #sytycd. People are Tweeting about So You Think... even now; click this link to see Tweets with the #sytycd tag.

Often what bloggers might do to accommodate liveblogging events is set up a feed of one's Twitter posts to appear inside their blog, often in a side column. This is one way to ensure there is dynamic (i.e., updated regularly) content (i.e., posts) on one's site.

Here's the website of Richard Eoin Nash, my old editor and publisher. He posts in many different ways--full-on blog posts, a Tumblr blog to share links, and also Twitter. Like many professionals, he has integrated his Tweets into the front page in his site. He did it all customized and pretty, which makes your instructor jealous!

The Twitter widget is in the red box to your left. The next image is the close-up.

Essential Reading
Read "Tips for Conference Bloggers," which offers advice on how (and what) to blog during a live event such as conference [link] [PDF]

Other Recommended Reading

"Live Blogging for Dummies: 4 Tips for a Successful Live Blog"
"Liveblogging Best Practives"
"Live Blogging Tips"

see Galleycat's liveblog of the National Book Awards
see this New York Times loveblog of a town meeting in Montana with President Obama

Post varieties

-Commenting on videos shot by shot
-Index of people who keep coming up in your posts
-Posts inspired by a quote or picture
-A degrees of separation post where you show how a seemingly unrelated topic relates to your blog--Becca F

Cake post: a multimedia blog post that utilizes links to images/video/audio that embellishes or redefines the linked word. As a cake has multiple layers, cake posts begin with a visible form through something like a poem, only to have the theme of the text reworked and re-envisioned through link use.
--Frank C

1. Post of two voices/minds: Argue with yourself about a topic using different voices with different writing styles for each opinion.

2. Procedural Post: A how-to post explaining something that isn't ordinarily explained, and doing so in a novel way.

3. Take the topic you normally write about and reinterpret it against an established philosophy or theory.

4. Write a post as if your topic never existed, in other words, include in the post all other things you typically reference in your life and in the world, minus that one little detail.

5. Reimagine your topic in a different form. Write about your concept as if it is a person, or the object you blog about as if it is a concept.

--Dana C

Things I did today that matter

find inspiration for a quote and write about it

turn the ordinary into extraordinary

simple things make the world go round: moments to take note of

--HeatherD

A day in the life of someone you admire.

This post would have the blogger go up to a person that they admire, and just spend a day seeing what that person does. Then after observing what that person does, the blogger will actually switch place's with the person that they admire for a day. During the "switch day," the blogger will fill the shoes of the person they admire, and do what they do. After the "switch day" is over the blogger will write a post about what they did, and experienced while switching place's with the person that they admire.

--Mary H

Dream Analysis: providing a summary of a strange/noteworthy dream, usually soon after its occurrence, and analyzing how figures, situations, or locations in the dream connect to one's real life.

--Mary Catherine O

1.) The "My First Time" Post
Do something you've never done before. Blog about it after. Why have you never done this? How does it feel to finally do it? Take pictures!

2.) The "Perfect Sentence" Post
Post one poignant sentence with a link on every word pertaining to the subject of the sentence. It's harder than it sounds.

3.) "Overheard in Albany" Post
Post about a conversation (or two) that you overheard that day somewhere in Albany. Include where and when and perhaps an inconspicuous who.

--Kali Z

Invitational Posts: posts asking non-rhetorical questions of the readers.
Existential Crisis Posts: lament your existence in relation to your blog.

--Lizzie M

1) write a post in flash fiction. no conflict.

100 words or less.

2) respond to an article in poem format. 20 words or less.

3) Write a post backwards.

4) Write a post that forms a shape. ( perhaps handwritten and then take picture if formatting is an issue)

5) Take on the role of a character and try to write from their perspective. ex. Jimi Hendrix, Marilynn Monroe
--Brenda G

Picture Narrative Post
Instead of writing, use pictures to create a story or blog post. [i.e. a trip. a restaurant review. costumes.]

Interpretation of an Instructional Post
Take someone else's "how-to" blog post and then try to replicate it step by step. Post your results [i.e. that Julia Child's cooking blog]

Lazy Person's Flashback Sitcom Blog Post
Think about one of those sitcom episodes that rehash the older episodes. Think of the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air episodes that're like, "Remember when Carlton did his goofy dance..."

Reuse old material! Bring it back to the forefront.

Butting Heads: Confrontational Posts
Make it your intention to argue with someone, have them see it, then have them respond to your post. It would be like having an argument in a comment box, but it's the main story.

--Tony G

Transcription of a text message, AIM convo, etc
Stream-Of Consciousness (freewrite)
Blogging while under the influence of drugs, alcohol or household cleaning products
Confessional
Tell a story, a relevant anecdote
“Let Me Make My Point”: uninterrupted voicing of an argument
--Teresa F

dreams

letters

wishes

advice

videos

five senses

pictures

scenarios

New dictionary

evil twin

what would mom say?

Academic

poems

before and after

--Kristine M

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

The Final Blog Post Workshops.

A good way to wrap up this class, after all the conceptualizing, class guests, writing prompts, and editing clinics, is to look at our writing in a concentrated way. And that means a writing workshop.

Choose which post or group of posts you would like to have covered in workshop. As a rough guide, submit no fewer than 1000 words and no more than 2,000 words--about 5-9 pages of text double-spaced. Email the specific URL addresses of each post. Each student will then print out their fellow students' post, edit and mark up, and have written comments.

Which posts should you choose for the Final Workshop? That's up to you, and we can talk about it in class or we can set up a conference. You might pick one longer post, a series of related posts, a bunch of short posts. Select a post that you think is finished and want some final editing advice, or select a group of posts that you think need improvement. Writing Workshops are not show-and-tell; rather, it's a way for us to talk about each other's writing in a helpful, rigorous way.

We will begin our workshops on Tuesday, November 24, and continue December 1 and December 8.

Tuesday, November 24: Brenda G, Mary H, Kristine M, Andrew N, Teresa F

Brenda G

http://deliverindata.blogspot.com/2009_10_26_archive.html

http://deliverindata.blogspot.com/2009_11_02_archive.html

http://deliverindata.blogspot.com/2009_10_27_archive.html

http://deliverindata.blogspot.com/2009_10_29_archive.html

Mary H

http://abbysweb.blogspot.com/2009/11/ncis-power-outage.html

http://abbysweb.blogspot.com/2009/11/director-leon-vance-not-so-heartless.html

http://abbysweb.blogspot.com/2009/11/fimiliar-faces.html

http://abbysweb.blogspot.com/2009/11/top-12-set-secrets-every-ncis-fan.html

Saturday, November 14, 2009

The Contradictory Post Blogging Assignment.

Do I contradict myself?
Very well, then, I contradict myself.
(I am large--I contain multitudes.)
--Walt Whiman, "Song of Myself"

We talked about the essay, what an essay is; how it offers, in Graham Good’s words, “knowledge of the moment, nothing more.”

We talked about how one signature trait of an essay is that it questions itself. An essay writer might bring up a point somewhere in his or her writing, and then question it, interrogate it, take it back, or amplify it later on.

Sometimes, the essay writer questions what their point really is, what he or she is really writing about or thinking about, realizes that what has been written before adds up to another point entirely, or has revealed something about the writer he or she did not expect.

Still other times, the essay writer switches topics entirely, moves on to another point, perhaps in the hope that wherever the writing may go will relate to or otherwise enlighten what has been previously essayed. The the sequence of observations, stories, and points might add up to something collectively. Maybe the writer will try to sum it all up, tie it up in a bow; maybe the writer won't. Either way, the questionings, the ruptures, the segmentations themselves, have an effect on the reader.

The idea behind all this is that, rather than quashing any or all of this questioning or these realizations, true essayistic writing amplifies these points of contradiction; it tries to discover new thoughts in between, and then points them out to the reader.

These are true essayistic moments, beautiful, humanistic points of tentativeness. It endears essayist and essay to the reader.

+++
Your assignment, then, before the beginning of class next Tuesday, is to write a post that links to a previous post of yours, and then “contradicts” it in the terms I describe above. Do it on your own blog, after you return from guesting. You can refer to a post you wrote somewhere else, or one on your own blog. It can just be one observation about yourself or anything else, one theory about life, one barstool rant. In this post, you might take it all back, explain why, amplify or update a point you had previously made. Word count-wise, let's make this no fewer than 300 words, no more than 1,000.

We’ll go over these on Tuesday. I'll expect you to talk and present this post. I am going to ask you questions about this post, as well as the process of your going about this assignment. I will expect others in the class to ask questions and comment as well. If you write several posts between now and then, and your Contradictory Post is not obvious, please email me and tell me which post it is.0

+++
Here's a passage from William Zinsser's classic Writing Well, that talks about nonfiction writers' "definitiveness complex."

A quote from Phillip Lopate's “Writing Personal Essays: One the Necessity of Turning Oneself Into a Character”:

in order to turn ourselves into characters we need to dramatize ourselves” (italics his); and as part of that process we “maximize that pitiful set of quirks, those small differences that seem to set us apart from others, and project them theatrically, the way actors work with singularities in their physical appearances or voice textures.

And finally, here's a passage from Ulric Neisser's "The Five Kinds of Self-Knowledge" (Philosophical Psychology (1)1988; 35-59):

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Assignment for ENG 251: Preparing for Your Fional Conference.

Assignment for ENG 315: Preparing for your Final Conference.

Final Conference Times, Fall 2009

Thursday, November 19, 2009

The Liveblogging an Event Assignment.

Post varieties

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

The Final Blog Post Workshops.

Saturday, November 14, 2009

The Contradictory Post Blogging Assignment.

Resources and Links

Instructor contact information

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