Here is the link for my project “250 Words Is Killing My Story” on YouTube. Thanks for a great semester!

(Feel free to share with anyone)

(Bear with me on this long rant but I really wanted to explain how I came to my idea and the thought that went into it. If you don’t wanna read it, feel free to skip to the second paragraph where my project idea is explained.)

I have a love/hate relationship with open-ended projects like this. The freedom to organize and execute it how I want is something that I absolutely love since I can go in any direction that I want. I have always been artistically driven so the ability to explore a new art avenue while fulfilling a project for a grade is a win-win for me. But because it is open-ended I become my own worst enemy. Too many ideas and pathways creep into my head and I can’t decide which one I want to do. It is a constant battle trying to sift through all of them to find what works best for me, for the project, and for the time I have. I just become really really frustrated with myself and school and life. I did this with this project too. I didn’t write a blog post last week because I couldn’t think of anything and when I read the posts that people had posted with some pretty good concrete ideas I just got even more frustrated with myself that I wasn’t coming up with anything as good. Like what the heck brain when did you stop working? It isn’t even time for break. Sooooo I gave up. For the entirety of this week, I put off addressing or even thinking about this project. I instead concentrated on essays and projects for my other classes. It was around this time that I found out that getting into a Master’s program was going to have to happen for me. I had never before considered getting a Master’s and didn’t really see myself as the type that could but with my future career goals, it’s just a thing that needs to happen. Once I ran out of work for my other classes (and still procrastinating on this classes project), I turned my attention to amassing a list of all the colleges that had Master’s programs that I wanted to get into and delving into all the requirements and procedures to apply. A lot of things were the same to get into the different Master programs like prerequisites and application deadlines and the short application essay prompts. And reading through all the prompt options I got thinking, how can such a detailed questioned be answered in 2 pages or less?! The ridiculousness of the feat! To answer it thoroughly while giving the reader a sense of who you are, what you have gone through, and how that has shaped you as a person as you walk through life while doing it in such a short two pages. To quote some internet slang: “I can’t even”

So my project is doing a multimodal take on answering a typical short application essay prompt. My plan is pretty rough around the edges but I was going to choose a prompt and somehow show my thought process and what life experiences went into answering the prompt along with how I went about choosing what to keep and omit and all that jazz of creating a piece of traditional writing (for a pretty common experience/process we all go through getting into college) but in a multimodal format. I am not quite sure how I am going to show all that but I am kind of leaning towards one of those fast forwarded videos where so much work is squashed down into two minutes or less. Maybe to have a point of interaction with the class I could hand out the prompt and my answer and once they read it maybe just ask a general question of how much time do they think I put into the piece then once I get some answers show the video? I don’t know haha I’m tired…

Anyway here are three prompts that I was considering answering:

1. The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success. Recount a time when you faced a challenge, setback, or failure.  How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience?
2. Reflect on a time when you questioned or challenged a belief or idea. What prompted your thinking? What was the outcome?
3. Discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others.

 

CUTE CAT PHOTOS INCOMING!!!!

Well this time of the semester is always really stressful for me and I would like to say I handle it with grace and dignity but I don’t. At all. Ever. And it’s been especially difficult being away from my cat. So I am adding some extra cat photos at the end of my post for me and you because one it was fun collecting all of them and also because the world just needs more pictures of my cat. Hopefully, this will help someone who is stressing. Enjoy✌

 

 

 

ALRIGHT SO I HAVE NOT SLEPT SINCE LIKE FRIDAY NIGHT and I’m kind of sick of just writing a paragraph SO instead of typing, I have decided to spice things up! I have made for you a flowchart (ta daa) and I am quite proud of it. I’ll attach a link at the bottom in case the picture won’t load or something. ENJOY! (I had a lot of fun with this by the way.) P.S. most of the ‘no’ response boxes are just joke responses; I’m not actually that asshole-ish. P.S.S. I can elaborate on any of this if you need me to.

 

 

Link: https://docs.google.com/drawings/d/1kt1KbE2E_b-FuU3gU5x9LTD2QsySUDsqoEhoilDr7X4/edit?usp=sharing

So I was literally reading to hate this blog post because I could not think of anything in the past year that would qualify as multi-modal. To be honest, I was ready to just skip this post all together. I have never created a film, performed a song, done poetry, or written a blog and used images. After stressing over this since Wednesday’s class, I realized I just did not feel like I would be able to come up with something to write about but in re watching Kress’s videos and especially in “What is multi-modality?”, something he said about what multi-modality is used for really struck with me. It is used to communicate something, to convey a meaning, and the requirement for multi-modal forms to address multiple needs. As I was watching this video, I was actually sketching out some tattoo ideas. This made me wonder if tattoos could be considered a multi-modality and I think it does. I spend a lot of time thinking about what I am trying to convey with my tattoos and the personal meaning that connects with me. All my tattoos are meant to communicate something to myself and others while the meaning is a personal significance to myself. The time needed to finish the sketching and designing a tattoo can also vary depending on if the ideas flow and mesh together. I’ve had drawings that take me multiple years while same take a day or two. I have a multiple sketchbooks filled with drawings. Sometimes I use pencil or ink or watercolor or marker. I also really enjoy sketching out tattoos for friends because I get to be apart of something that means a lot to them and becomes a permanent part of their life. I thought about putting a few pictures with my post to show what I’ve been sketching but I get really self conscious showing people my ideas so verbally, a few of the ones that I am working on right now is a wanderlust globe tattoo since I want to become a foreign English teacher and travel the world and the other idea is a spine tattoo of moon flowers with their leaves. Anyway, hope this makes sense!

( •_•) So it took me a looooonnnnnggggg time to think about how I wanted to go about this paper (and to be honest, I got pretty frustrated thinking about it yesterday and gave up). I thought about going the easy route and defaulting to a “spew back information” paper but I just was not happy with that choice. I’ve done enough of those papers and they bore me at this point. So I was thinking about something more relevant to myself and my future career. ( •_•)>⌐■-■ And I was pondering if it would be really cool (and okay) if I could take the readings and our discussions (which come from the view point of an American school standpoint) and compare that to a Japanese school/writing viewpoint since I want to teach English in Japan and see what can be applied to teaching over there. Not really sure if it would work out as an essay but it was the best idea I could come up with.  (⌐■_■)