"More Sleep, Less Fat." Scientific American 298.4 (Apr. 2008): 34-34. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. [Library name], [City], [State abbreviation]. 29 Sep. 2008.
Scientific American, April 2008, claims that Lack of shut-eye contributes to the risk of obesity. This article presents a study of children and the increase in odds of being overweight if child sleeps less than recommended time. This article was intended to educate people and was published in book, Volume 298, so it could be in a textbook for college students. This article purpose’s is to inform readers, so that their children do not fall into the problem. The content of this article will help enhance my essay because it has a real study with results, showing the effects, and answering my question.
Yoo, Seung-Schik, et al. "The human emotional brain without sleep — a prefrontal amygdala disconnect." Current Biology 17.20 (23 Oct. 2007): R877-R878. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. [Library name], [City], [State abbreviation]. 29 Sep. 2008
The human emotional brain without sleep — a prefrontal amygdala disconnect, by Yoo, Seung-Schik, 23 Oct. 2007, states that Sleep deprivation is known to impair a range of functions. This article presents information over topics such as how immune regulation and metabolic control are effected by lack of sleep. This article is intended for education and is published in a science book, so again it could be for college students. The purpose of this article is to inform readers, making them aware of the negative effects sleep deprivation has on the body. This article is definitely relevant to my question and the facts stated in it will help answer it.
Hillard, Kate. “The Effects of Sleep Deprivation.” PageWise. 2002. 28 Sep 2008
Kate Hillard’s article “The Effects of Sleep Deprivation” from 2002 states that sleep deprivation is a huge problem all over the world. The author talks about the effects on the individual’s mind, body, and emotions, presenting facts backing each one. This article is intended for education of the general population and a person of any age. This article’s purpose is to inform readers of all ages of the negative effects sleep deprivation has on an individual. The information will add to me essay because not only does it talk about the effects, but it brings up the problem, why it is occurring, and what will happen in the future.
Sunday, September 28, 2008
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Reading Response #2 (over the correct essay this time)
Both of the essays, Why Do People Tan? by Amy Garrett-Brown and An Experience in Acronyms by Jay Holmquist, were both discovery essays. They were very interesting for me to read and kept me wanting to read on throughout the entire essay in both cases.
The essay, Why Do People Tan? by Garrett-Brown, is a discovery essay. The author definitely has an initial question which creates the essay’s topic and she builds on it from there. There were a few lines in particular that stuck out that really proved the essay to be a discovery essay. “It struck me as I read the last lines of this sardonic critique of society that I don’t necessarily wonder why people tan, but why they completely gyp themselves of the pleasures of the sun to be rewarded with a battle with cancer at worst and saggy skin at best.” This shows how the author finds a new question after doing her research and it begins to answer it, showing her discovering information. Also, ‘it struck me’ relays the message of discovery perfectly. “So maybe that’s it, people just like the way it looks to be tan.” Here, the author is making conclusions from the information she has read and the research she has put forth. The last paragraph of the writing also indicates discovery because she states her final thoughts, even though the essay seems to suddenly cut off.
Although the essay, An Experience of Acronyms by Jay Holmquist, is about as completely different of a topic as possible, it too is a discovery essay. The author of this writing is more informative, giving the readers facts and information pertaining to the subject of drugs as well as personal experiences to back it up and giving it the discovery factor. Also, the lines that show ‘discovery’ in this essay are not as obvious, but there are still examples that lead you to easily classify the essay. Holmquist speaks of different occasions when he had done drugs and the experiences that came along with it. He then goes on to say, “I personally stopped my drug use about a year and a half ago. I was pretty much scared into it after I had to call an ambulance for Eric.” In the paragraph prior, the author admits, “The fact that these drugs are so dangerous, yet a lot of my friends do them, scares me.” A combination of these two examples shows that, even after doing these drugs, he now realizes the danger in them and has stopped his drug abuse because of it.
The overall controlling idea for Why Do People Tan? would be that Amy Garrett-Brown had an initial question, and through research, she came up with a few conclusions. Although the ending of the essay was fairly up in the air, she was able to come up with her own opinion as well as stated the views of a few others of why people really do tan, or ‘gyp themselves of the pleasures of the sun.’
The controlling idea of the essay, An Experience of Acronyms, is quite different. After taking hardcore drugs in his life, the author realized the harmful effects and truths about them and therefore stopped abusing drugs. The same lines that I used above would help support this idea, especially, “I personally stopped my drug use about a year and a half ago. I was pretty much scared into it after I had to call an ambulance for Eric.”
Both of these authors use research in their essays. In the first essay, there is not as much factual information presented as there is in the second one. The author relays the information in a more stating facts method but since there is not a lot of researched information, it does not get boring or lose sight of the main question of the essay.
The second essay is a very factual and informative essay, but still was very interesting for me to read. It was filled with statistics and explanations of three drugs, including LSD, MDMA, and GHB, that I never knew about them. Although this information was presented in a different way - he just stated the information because there was so much of it, I still think the author was successful in doing so because it did not seem like he just rambled one fact after another, but relayed pertinent information.
The two essays’ hold a few of the features of the form of research papers that Ballenger talks about on page 432. First of all, the research is driven by questions, especially the essay, Why Do People Tan? Also, the facts and researched information that are in both clearly relate to the initial topic and discovery item for both essays. There is not extra or irrelevant information. The sources for both essays are clearly given credit because there is a Works Cited or References at each of the ends. These writings do not meet all the features of the form criteria because they are not full research papers, but discovery essays instead.
After reading through Ballenger’s features of the form, it helped me pick out ways that I can write a discovery essay but still add factual and research information in order to enhance it. I realized that research needs to be driven by questions, to help get away from the stating facts which is boring and uninteresting to readers. Also, relating questions to what has been said is another important element to successful research. I have not decided yet what to write my essay on, but after reading both of these essays as well as Ballenger’s features of the form for research papers, hopefully I can successfully write my essay.
1) How does lack of sleep affect a person? (performance ability)
2) Why do people favor English/reading or math/sciences?
3) How good for you are taking daily naps?
The essay, Why Do People Tan? by Garrett-Brown, is a discovery essay. The author definitely has an initial question which creates the essay’s topic and she builds on it from there. There were a few lines in particular that stuck out that really proved the essay to be a discovery essay. “It struck me as I read the last lines of this sardonic critique of society that I don’t necessarily wonder why people tan, but why they completely gyp themselves of the pleasures of the sun to be rewarded with a battle with cancer at worst and saggy skin at best.” This shows how the author finds a new question after doing her research and it begins to answer it, showing her discovering information. Also, ‘it struck me’ relays the message of discovery perfectly. “So maybe that’s it, people just like the way it looks to be tan.” Here, the author is making conclusions from the information she has read and the research she has put forth. The last paragraph of the writing also indicates discovery because she states her final thoughts, even though the essay seems to suddenly cut off.
Although the essay, An Experience of Acronyms by Jay Holmquist, is about as completely different of a topic as possible, it too is a discovery essay. The author of this writing is more informative, giving the readers facts and information pertaining to the subject of drugs as well as personal experiences to back it up and giving it the discovery factor. Also, the lines that show ‘discovery’ in this essay are not as obvious, but there are still examples that lead you to easily classify the essay. Holmquist speaks of different occasions when he had done drugs and the experiences that came along with it. He then goes on to say, “I personally stopped my drug use about a year and a half ago. I was pretty much scared into it after I had to call an ambulance for Eric.” In the paragraph prior, the author admits, “The fact that these drugs are so dangerous, yet a lot of my friends do them, scares me.” A combination of these two examples shows that, even after doing these drugs, he now realizes the danger in them and has stopped his drug abuse because of it.
The overall controlling idea for Why Do People Tan? would be that Amy Garrett-Brown had an initial question, and through research, she came up with a few conclusions. Although the ending of the essay was fairly up in the air, she was able to come up with her own opinion as well as stated the views of a few others of why people really do tan, or ‘gyp themselves of the pleasures of the sun.’
The controlling idea of the essay, An Experience of Acronyms, is quite different. After taking hardcore drugs in his life, the author realized the harmful effects and truths about them and therefore stopped abusing drugs. The same lines that I used above would help support this idea, especially, “I personally stopped my drug use about a year and a half ago. I was pretty much scared into it after I had to call an ambulance for Eric.”
Both of these authors use research in their essays. In the first essay, there is not as much factual information presented as there is in the second one. The author relays the information in a more stating facts method but since there is not a lot of researched information, it does not get boring or lose sight of the main question of the essay.
The second essay is a very factual and informative essay, but still was very interesting for me to read. It was filled with statistics and explanations of three drugs, including LSD, MDMA, and GHB, that I never knew about them. Although this information was presented in a different way - he just stated the information because there was so much of it, I still think the author was successful in doing so because it did not seem like he just rambled one fact after another, but relayed pertinent information.
The two essays’ hold a few of the features of the form of research papers that Ballenger talks about on page 432. First of all, the research is driven by questions, especially the essay, Why Do People Tan? Also, the facts and researched information that are in both clearly relate to the initial topic and discovery item for both essays. There is not extra or irrelevant information. The sources for both essays are clearly given credit because there is a Works Cited or References at each of the ends. These writings do not meet all the features of the form criteria because they are not full research papers, but discovery essays instead.
After reading through Ballenger’s features of the form, it helped me pick out ways that I can write a discovery essay but still add factual and research information in order to enhance it. I realized that research needs to be driven by questions, to help get away from the stating facts which is boring and uninteresting to readers. Also, relating questions to what has been said is another important element to successful research. I have not decided yet what to write my essay on, but after reading both of these essays as well as Ballenger’s features of the form for research papers, hopefully I can successfully write my essay.
1) How does lack of sleep affect a person? (performance ability)
2) Why do people favor English/reading or math/sciences?
3) How good for you are taking daily naps?
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Reading Response #1
In the essays, ‘I’m A Believer’ by Charlotte Hogg and ‘The Joy of Mud’ by Catherine Black, both authors demonstrate many of the features of the form that Bruce Ballenger wrote about on pg. 94 of the textbook. Both of these personal essays are written in the first person and from the authors’ point of views. Because of this, their voice and personality show through their writing with great intensity. Ballenger makes a point about tension existing between the subject and the writer and in both of these essays, the tension is apparent. In Hogg’s experience, she recalls her obsessiveness with Davy Jones and how it lasts throughout her life. She felt like she knew him without ever meeting or speaking with him. Charlotte Hogg made a comment that stuck out to me, ‘the man was so familiar and foreign,’ which goes along with this feature. Although this seems like a hypocritical statement, I can relate to her.
Another feature that both essays’ possess is that the experiences in the writing are relied mostly on memory and observation. Both narratives speak about experiences that happened in the past. They are told so vividly and detailed that, as a reader, the effect the experience had on each author is apparent. There are not interviews in the essays, but the authors are telling about their past experiences pertaining to the main topic. Charlotte Hogg goes into great detail of her life as a fifteen year old, which was over twelve years prior to the time she wrote the document. She remembers listening the Monkees and being a ‘Daydream Believer.’ Catherine Black recalls being ‘dirty, sweating, and sunburned, [she] felt solid and more connected to the living, breathing world around [her] than [she] could remember.’ From this statement, it is very obvious that every such detail still sticks in her mind to this day of that point in her life of revelation and understanding.
Although much of both essays are written about experiences in the past, they both, at some point, begin writing about the ‘present,’ or the time that the essay was composed. A third feature that both essays posses is the shifting back and forth between the past and the present. By doing so, I think that this really adds to the tension between subject and writer, because it shows that not only did this experience affect them around the time it actually occurred, but they still have emotions attached. By going back and forth between then and now, it connects their past with the present and even the future, which helps readers connect to them and understand their strong passion. Also, before the actual story of ‘The Joy of Mud,’ Catherine Black gives us a brief summary of background information, which helps readers connect to the story by knowing more about the author as well as the topic.
Both of these essays display many of the features of the form, but there are a few aspects that do not follow Ballenger’s points presented in his book. For example, Davy Jones and the working the lo’i are not topics of everyday life. Neither topic, especially Catherine Black’s experiences, are not commonplace for I do not believe that many people have picked taro before, or that it is was not something that she did in her everyday life but a single experience that touched her life. As far as Charlotte Hogg’s love for Davy Jones, a person she completely does not know, is something that is more common in our society, her travels took it to more extent than most. She attended his concerts and ended up staying in the hotel room directly across from his.
Although both of these essays may be speaking of experiences in their life, I believe there is more to these stories than just telling readers about their personal experiences. There is a deeper meaning that I took to be: things were not always what they appeared or what you want them to be. Davy Jones was a person whom Charlotte Hogg idolized for a large part of her life. When a time came that she finally had the opportunity to meet the man of her dreams, she did not seem interested any longer. To her, Davy Jones no longer had the significance in her life as he once did and she seemed satisfied with the way she parted from him. Catherine Black, on the other hand, completely changed her outlook of a place, or subject, in a more positive manner. At the beginning, she had no interest in Hawaii and it seemed to hold her back more than anything. After the working in the lo’i experience, her thoughts changed in the complete opposite direction. She appreciated Hawaii in a much different sense and even plans to return for good, making it her home; before, it was only the place she lived in which she took little interest in. In both of these cases, ‘Things were not always what they seemed.’
Another feature that both essays’ possess is that the experiences in the writing are relied mostly on memory and observation. Both narratives speak about experiences that happened in the past. They are told so vividly and detailed that, as a reader, the effect the experience had on each author is apparent. There are not interviews in the essays, but the authors are telling about their past experiences pertaining to the main topic. Charlotte Hogg goes into great detail of her life as a fifteen year old, which was over twelve years prior to the time she wrote the document. She remembers listening the Monkees and being a ‘Daydream Believer.’ Catherine Black recalls being ‘dirty, sweating, and sunburned, [she] felt solid and more connected to the living, breathing world around [her] than [she] could remember.’ From this statement, it is very obvious that every such detail still sticks in her mind to this day of that point in her life of revelation and understanding.
Although much of both essays are written about experiences in the past, they both, at some point, begin writing about the ‘present,’ or the time that the essay was composed. A third feature that both essays posses is the shifting back and forth between the past and the present. By doing so, I think that this really adds to the tension between subject and writer, because it shows that not only did this experience affect them around the time it actually occurred, but they still have emotions attached. By going back and forth between then and now, it connects their past with the present and even the future, which helps readers connect to them and understand their strong passion. Also, before the actual story of ‘The Joy of Mud,’ Catherine Black gives us a brief summary of background information, which helps readers connect to the story by knowing more about the author as well as the topic.
Both of these essays display many of the features of the form, but there are a few aspects that do not follow Ballenger’s points presented in his book. For example, Davy Jones and the working the lo’i are not topics of everyday life. Neither topic, especially Catherine Black’s experiences, are not commonplace for I do not believe that many people have picked taro before, or that it is was not something that she did in her everyday life but a single experience that touched her life. As far as Charlotte Hogg’s love for Davy Jones, a person she completely does not know, is something that is more common in our society, her travels took it to more extent than most. She attended his concerts and ended up staying in the hotel room directly across from his.
Although both of these essays may be speaking of experiences in their life, I believe there is more to these stories than just telling readers about their personal experiences. There is a deeper meaning that I took to be: things were not always what they appeared or what you want them to be. Davy Jones was a person whom Charlotte Hogg idolized for a large part of her life. When a time came that she finally had the opportunity to meet the man of her dreams, she did not seem interested any longer. To her, Davy Jones no longer had the significance in her life as he once did and she seemed satisfied with the way she parted from him. Catherine Black, on the other hand, completely changed her outlook of a place, or subject, in a more positive manner. At the beginning, she had no interest in Hawaii and it seemed to hold her back more than anything. After the working in the lo’i experience, her thoughts changed in the complete opposite direction. She appreciated Hawaii in a much different sense and even plans to return for good, making it her home; before, it was only the place she lived in which she took little interest in. In both of these cases, ‘Things were not always what they seemed.’
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