Final Portfolio

Jessica Bagby

Final Portfolio

5/5/11

                                                                                Swan Song

This semester has been incredibly eventful, from trials, tribulations, epic quests, spontaneous musical numbers, and research papers.  It’s like watching a really bad movie, a movie without mythological creatures, super powers, money, or handsome warriors who show up just in time to save you from breaking a nail. So in comparison writing and researching papers wasn’t as attention grabbing, or immediate. But I have learned and refined my knowledge in my paper writing skills. Unfortunately the amazing copier at my disposal is at the moment under mutiny and will not scan my notes so I hope you remember me writing everything down.

First off I should mention that on March 23 2011, my aunt was in a horse accident. The horse Soldier fell and my aunt’s L2 vertebrae burst. She had surgery and rehab until she was stable but the doctor’s wouldn’t let her leave unless she had someone staying with her that could take care of her. That’s where I come in as the only single member in my family with her own car and no children that live in Virginia that could take care of her horses as well. So on April 19 I brought her back and all here it is 6 horses, 5 cats, 2 birds, 1 dog, and my aunt that I have been taking care of.  

But on to classwork using my first research paper as a example, my thesis statement was originally “The early Spanish conquistadors were douchebags.” With a thesis statement this amazing I had to have the research and proof to back it up. I needed to find reliable texts and sites to quote from. I researched and found other cultures that had bad experiences with the conquistadors that backed up my thesis statement. I needed to evaluate the important information and leave out the fluff. Then I needed to be able to argue my statement and convince others it was true. Then I had to reword my thesis statement so as to not offend anyone who might think that they are a reincarnated Spanish conquistador.

The rhetorical triangle is not something I remember any professor going over before. The massive differences in Primary versus secondary sources no one had really explained to well. There was also a lot of emphasis on group work that I liked. More often in English there is no real discussion you just do your paper solo. But we talked, debated, and gave help and opinions when they were needed.

There were other good points as well, like we might not how to give an oral presentation but we did go over how to give a good one. And that is a skill we can use not only in any class but at any point that we have an audience.  

Know other things that I’ve learned is that if you want to survive an atom bomb you have to rob a turtle shell from him. And that and the shell will save you from cruel monkeys with explosives. And Dorothy had it wrong. Apparently over the rainbow is not wondrous lands or vacation spots or even leprechauns but its actually a government conspiracy. The man is watching you in your own back yard. And leading into it I never realized before how common fallacies are, even on the web, making sites like Wikipedia tainted.

I think my one real critique would be that I missed only my allotted 3 days whereas my professor missed way more. I perfectly understand sick days or days that have a good opportunity and would rather not catch anything if you are contagious. Really the only thing I’m upset with that is coming in if I didn’t have to and missing that sleep or wasting gas. Maybe in the future there could be an optional universal texting if class is cancelled.

With everything going on here at my aunt’s house and to be honest the horses take up more time than she does, running errands for her, while maintaining my job, and helping out my best friend who is getting married June 11, 2011, and avoiding an ex-boyfriend who thinks “He is God’s gift to women.” While in between trying to research and write papers I hope you understand and don’t take off points if some were a little late.

Alright so the name is way more dramatic then the paper is but I just didn’t want to name this the “Final Portfolio.” It needed to grab attention. I could have really thrown you off if the name was something like, “How to tell the difference between a Flat worm and a Round worm.” Admit it you would wonder if I was “ok”.

I did enjoy your class this semester, the open discussion and everything is debatable vibe helped make it more of a relaxed feel the class. And this semester I think my final grade should be a, ”A.” I was always ready to help or give advice to team mates or anyone really, arguing or debating when necessary, doing my work and turning it in on time or close to it, searching for ‘reliable’ sources of information, not complaining when I come back to class and find that my group has changed the research question to “How did people feel about the dropping of the atom bomb?” Researching cold hard facts is one thing but researching many different people’s feelings and using them to encompass their country’s feeling as a whole was a little difficult.

 And you never know if on one of my epic quests I might have saved the world. I would tell you if I did but you are not supposed to brag about things like that.