Thoughts on Course Blogging

             This is the first class I've taken that has attempted to use blogging in the course ciriculum. However I have taken classes where other online tools were used for assignments such as forums, surveys, and other such things. My experience with those and the blogging in this class has led me to believe that online tools for classes should only be used in certain subjects, english writing is not one of them. For me, I don't like sharing my writings in public so posting stuff on a blog for the whole world to potentially see doesn't really appeal to me. It really forces me to change my writing style and makes me more self-consious about what I'm writing so I might not be able to express what I really want to say. Also, the technical difficulties of online tools can sometimes have a negative impact on completing assignments such as the website being down, browser crashing in the middle of posting, or the computer your using telling you that every word you type is spelled wrong (the computer I'm currently typing on is doing just that) which can make proof reading rather difficult. There are some advantages to doing online writing for assignments though. One is it the easy access to input from other students or the teacher. With paper writing, the only input you get is from the teacher and that often only comes a week or so after turning in the paper, with online tools, this input can be instantaneous. But overall I feel like blogs are not a good thing to include in a college level writing course. Blogs are often seen as casual places to talk about things you enjoy and are not usually seen as formal writings. In many cases, people would classify them as something along the same lines as facebook. I undersand that there are several perfectly respected and formal blogs out there, but the genreal public still sees them as casual social writings and doesn't take them seriously. Another things about this course blog is that the audience we are writing to is limited to the people in our class. Well the blog is public, the chances of anyone outside of our classes viewing the blog is rather low. Because of this, the writings on our course blog are limited to simple posts depending on the topic we've been asked to write about. We don't really think of it as expressing our views or thoughts and really just see it as an assignment, which I feel like isn't what a blog should be used for. If I were to start a blog of my own I certainly wouldn't use Rhetoric or my PSA as the main topic. I would choose something I really enjoy like video games, programming, or computers. With these topic I would really get into to making new posts and the posts would actually sond more genuine and thought out, they would be something that I would want to be proud of. If I were to give advice for changing how the course blog is done, I would say the student should be allowed to pick the topic of their blog and simply have them write a new post every week or so. This way they would actually enjoy making posts and would see the assingment in a more positive light and the blog would still fill up with several posts, the student might even continue to blog after finishing with the class.

Logo of a well known Video Game Blog

In class Assignment

For my primary source I am using a gameplay trailer for the video game "The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim". It is a short 3 minute trailer that quickly shows the world of the game, the creatures in it, and gives the viewer a brief look at the game's main story.

For my secondary sources I plan on using the following (not sure on the specifics yet):
-Video game reviews of the game from critics and game journalists
-Peer reviewed journal on video game violence
-Article on the immersion level of games today and how this effects one's view of them (more than a game)
-Article on video game addiction
-Possibly an article onVideo game piracy and modification

With these sources I plan on centering around a couple different things. Skyrim does contain a good amount of mature content including blood and gore, swearing, alcohol and drug references, as well as the oppurtunity for rude and in some cases immoral behavior. The peer reviewed article would help take a look as this area to analyze how the trailer might show this off as a good thing, or how it might try to downplay it. Also, video game addiction has become a serious problem in our time and Skyrim is known as one of the most immersive games on the market today. A look into how the trailer shows the immersion of the game as well as tries to give the player the sense of the game being more like a second life rather that just a action packed experience. This is supported by the trailer showing clips of both action scenes as well as domestic activities being done by the player. A simle video game review of the game will also be useful for the obvious reason to see how people responded to the game and what people thought about it. As for the article on piracy and mods for games, Elder Scrolls games have long been known for their ability to have user made mods installed by the player to give the game an unlimited amount of content. Unlike most other games, the maker of Skyrim, Bethesda, actually encourages this behavior by supplying a tool for this and it might be interesting to see why this do this and if other games should implement it.

Quiz

Claims and evidence are related because they are both pieces of information used to analyze a piece of writing or work. Claims are pieces of information that the analyzer comes up with themselves based on the analyzing they have already done, and they're own logic and problem sovling skills. Evidence information comes from peer reviewed writings or published works that are associated with the work being analyzed. Both claims and evidense are important in an analysis because they both provide points that reveal are attempt to reveal what the work is trying to say or do. Claims and evidence can easily be applied to our own academic writing because we are often required to come up with claims and evidence to support an idea or theory. In some cases it is required to find evidence to back up a claim that we as the analyzer has  made.