reading with pen in hand: mark up the readings for today with
- words to look up
- questions about what you don’t understand
- follow-up questions to ask the author
- things you agreed with
- things you disagreed with
- what you understood
Category: Class Notes
Class Notes 10/10
- Cover letters for Project #2
- 2 readings for Project #3
- Colson Whitehead, “The Way We Live Now: 11-11-01; Lost and Found”; , Patrick Sisson, “How better photos can help you document, and shape, your neighborhood”
- Focused Freewrite: Think about a time when you noticed something changed in your neighborhood or a neighborhood you spend time in. What did you see? what was your initial reaction? what do you think about it now?
- building renovation
- nationalities in the neighborhood
- stores–openings, closings, etc
- construction projects–public space
- changes in public transit
- seasonally/holidays
- paper in the windows
- construction workers, materials
- moving in and out
- hear new languages, music, smells
- anger for being displaced, change in routine
- emphasizes priorities that we might not like
- convenience
- For homework, continue reading the two pieces we started today. Mark them up: vocabulary, what you agree with, what you want to question or challenge, what makes sense or what you need to understand better, what stands out, what you want to try, what you already do, etc.
Final review of Project #2
How can you organize Project #2?
Introduction
Question 1
Question 2
Question 3
Question 4
Question 5
Images/media throughout
Do not center the text for all of your answers!
What to include in the introduction? Whose voice are you using when writing it?
Remember, the introduction to the interview is an introduction to the interview! It’s less of a bio than a synthesis of what the interview will reveal about you.
The introduction should include a thesis statement. What is a thesis statement? It’s a sentence (or two) that relates to (but is not the same as) your topic sentence; it’s the main idea of your writing; it’s the point you’re trying to get across; it’s a claim; it guides the rest of the writing, maybe even suggesting the order of the piece of writing.
Write a thesis statement that can fit in your introduction to the interview.
For example: Samson is a creative-minded person whose artistic point of view shapes his academic interests in raster and vector graphics and can lead him on his path to a career in graphic design.
Remember, though, that this is usually the last sentence of the i introduction, so it might not begin this way if an earlier sentence already included this information.
- why?
- how does he look at things?
- details help to move from general to specific
- and how can you have one in this type of writing, since it’s not argument driven?
- how does this fit into the whole paragraph?
For the assignment as a whole:
What order should your questions and answers go in?
Where should the avatar question go?
What if you have more than 5 questions?
You can revise a question, not just an answer!
For example, if you want to revise “What is your avatar, and how does it represent you” to “What is your avatar, and how does it represent your design skills?” you can do that.
Remember to show things in a positive light!
What is the purpose of this writing, both for our course and within the fiction of the assignment?
why? to better serve 1st year students; as a first record of goals to reevaluate later in the college career; as a showcase of the work students in the department can do; a celebration of the work you’re already able to do.
Project #2 peer review and assignment clarification
Revising our interviews:
- find a new partner to work with
- ask questions and follow-up questions to get them to include details or explain things you don’t understand from their drafts, and TAKE NOTES
- encourage opportunity-oriented language (eg change “not good at drawing” to “COMD will help me build my drawing skills”
- about the avatar: use the question to express what it is, how it represents you, and how it the logo of your brand, what impact it has.
- If you want to write about your ePortfolio avatar instead, do.
Some ideas: do these interviews rather than fake interviews. Have the interviewer recommend an avatar to the interviewee.
You’ll post your draft with framing intro paragraph draft by Tuesday, end of day. Homework instructions in greater detail will follow.
Class Notes : working on Project #2 Drafts
Write one or two paragraphs in which you describe your avatar well enough that your readers need not look at it to know what it looks like, call attention to specific details in the image, and explain how the image represents you, specifically the you you’re representing in the interview.
About your partner’s draft:
what do you understand?
What do you want to know more about?
What would you add? remove?
What would you mod/steal/use for yourself?
Class Notes: Reading Avatars
In your group, review the reading about choosing an avatar. What advice can we take from it to develop a list of criteria for choosing an avatar?
Read it on your own, and then come together to mark up the printed copy to highlight the advice you want to share with the class.
Avatar shouldn’t be anything controversial or offensive (The Workplace)
(think about who else is a member, who the audience is, to determine what might be offensive or controversial)
It should relate to you–it should be identifiable as you–and could be your picture, your initials, or something that is totally not you but something people associate with you.
it’s how you want to be perceived, how others see you–is it in the context of knowing you, or absent of that context?
Class Notes 9/17: Writing and revising processes
What is your writing process?
Think about when you write something that you want to share with other people, or that you want to do a good job with. What do you do? What are your methods? How do you start? How do you know when to end? Other thoughts?
What did we write about for Project #2’s first draft? what felt comfortable, and what did we avoid?
In addition to the questions you already answered, try one of these:
- what is your motivation in design/to be a design student?
- who is your role model in design?
- what do you plan to do with your area of design? (internship/after graduating/next steps beyond your first job)
- what is your design sensibility/personal aesthetic?
For homework, answer one more: how does your avatar represent you as a design student with the interests, motivations, aspirations, etc you have written about? If it doesn’t represent that version of you, you might change it. Why is it important for it to represent you? Use examples from the readings to support your answer. (Also, be sure to give credit to the creator of your avatar image, whether it was you or someone else! And be sure you have permission to do so!)
Class notes for 9/12: Project #2 and the role of the artist
Update about what we’re doing for Project #2: As we draft, you will develop answers to many of the questions we brainstormed. Ultimately, you will produce an interview with an introduction, much like the format of Ksenya Samarskaya’s interview with Nontsikelelo Mutiti, “Nontsikelelo Mutiti on Interrogating the Euro-centric Design Canon.”
Homework due 9/17: Answer 4 questions from our list, trying to think about any kind of theme or awareness-raising your work expresses or you want it to express. Aim to write approximately 150 per question. To submit your homework, add a post with your 4 questions and answers, using the title Project #2 First Draft, category ENG1101 Project #2, the tag Drafts and anything else you choose to tag it.
Also, read Nancy Sommers’ “Revision Strategies of Student Writers and Esperienced Adult Writers.” Bring a copy to class, or let me know that you need a copy.
Write your cover letter. If you are not in class, please refer to the cover letter instructions and submit your answers in class on Tuesday.
“No Place for Self-Pity, No Room for Fear”:
Sadness, fear, dread as basis for art
For The Nation‘s 150th Anniversary issue
We can use any time–no matter how bleak–as inspiration to do something good
Artists and writers have the power to heal, influence, bring awareness, awaken people, solutions
Art as outlet for artists, to express how they felt about war, dictatorship, etc
Any connections you made to the reading?
Yes, it’s motivation: telling us we can keep going, to express ourselves creatively.
Connection to Kemple in Emily Gosling’s article: “With design, you have this amazing ability to have an impact…designers have a resonsibility to make work that has depth.” Also, Mututi’s examples about colonialism and Western examples vs local examples in design theory.
We can use design to inspire, even to inspire others to do something creative. What message comes from our design?
Does your design work reflect your personal aesthetic? your personal politics? the state of affairs you’re working in? are you working on raising awareness? can others see your local situation through your work?
Cover Letter for Project #1
Now that you have completed Project #1 and posted your work on the First Year Learning Community site (using the category 2019 Spevack & Rosen), please write a letter to me reflecting on the work and your writing process.
In your letter, try to answer all of these questions–though you don’t need to follow this order.
How did you approach writing this project? What steps did you take or what stages did you work in?
What was different about this writing project? What was familiar?
What did you learn by completing Project #1?
What do you want me to know about your experience? Is there anything you want me to know about you as a writer/student/person as I read your writing?
Did you 1-complete the writing? 2-post it in the right place? 3-comment on 2 other classmates’ posts?
Beginning Project #2: Brainstorming Interview Questions
If you were asked to participate in an interview about being a 1st year design student for a COMD publication, or for Eye on Design-AIGA, what questions would you want to be asked?
- what catches your eye when looking at other people’s work?
- what is your dream job in the field of design
- what other skills do you want to learn in this program?
- how is the community in your major?
- what is the schoolwork like in your coursework?
- what in the class draws your attention?
- where do you think the future of design will take you?
- why did you choose this major (COMD) as a design student?
- within COMD, which track would you want to pursue?
- what were some of the difficulties you encountered in your first semester and how did you overcome them?
- why did you choose this major (COMD)?
- how do you intend to grow as a designer with this program?
- what are some of the things you wish to accomplish as a designer?
- what influenced you toward this major? (eg in your childhood)
- how do you intend to use the skill set you learn to influence your community?
- why would you choose Graphic Design out of all the majors?
- what are your past graphic design experiences?
- do you prefer working by yourself or in a group environment?
- do you think your background affects your design?
- what is your motivation (eg creative expression) in graphic design?
- what are some things you like to design?
- what are your expectations of being a COMD major in your first year?
- what outside activities do you participate in that led you here?
- what job do you desire after this?
- what are your favorite COMD classes?
- what are some difficulties you face in COMD?
- can you see yourself doing anything else?
- who is a role model you look up to in this field?
- what design work inspires you?
- what are you passionate about?
- where do you see yourself in 5? 10? 15? years
- what is your personal aesthetic? what is your aesthetic sensibility? what is your design aesthetic?
For homework, respond to my homework post with a comment answering one of the above questions, and commenting on two others.
