Pb1b

Amanda Amico

English 101-108

October 23, 2016

Zack DiPeiro

Pb 1b

“Sneaker Reading 360”

Have you ever heard the term “sneaker head”? In today’s society little material things like sneakers sell for anywhere from 40$ – 3,000$. I went on a website named “Kicks on Fire.com”, and I was able to gain everything I could possibly want to know. This website is the official guide to Sneaker News, Culture, History and Release dates, and even the best places to buy and sell certain shoes. This website is the most read and downloaded sneaker blog. Looking through this website, I was able to find out that not only are sneakers a very big interest among both sexes, but there is money to be made in sneaker sales, may they be private or corporate. There were images of the new Nike flagship store and all different types of sneakers. The author suggests that knowledge of the new sneakers and their release dates is very valuable.

I looked at sneakers from 3 different perspectives. They are listed below with a short explanation with some questions I think may be asked

1. Consumer - When did this shoe come out, and what is the cost of the shoe? Whose shoe is it, like the name brand or the person it’s named after like Jordan, for example. What do these sneakers look like, and what is the level of comfortability for your feet? How popular are they? Are they custom aide or limited edition, are they durable?
2. Seller – Are these worth selling? What does the shoe look like? Who else is advertising this shoe? Will I be able to market and promote this product? How much can I charge for this product? What kind of clientele is this product going to attract? Can I make a profit that’s worth it?  Is the shoe unisex or what age group should I target for this sneaker?
3. Manufacturer – How much is it for the materials needed to make this shoe? Is there enough supply on demand? What contracts do I need to draw up to guarantee the sale of this shoe and any other legal aspects that have to do with making and mass distributing this product? Make sure I have influential people willing to be paid to endorse this sneaker? How many distributors can I get to sell this for me?

I found that certain methods of reading we were taught in class helped me to better understand this text and let me view it differently. Below I will list the methods I used and why I felt they were effective:

1. KWL – When reading about sneakers, people usually look at what they already know about the shoe, they look at things like knowing what they have heard or seen. Then they go do their “homework” or research. By doing this they are able to examine everything they wanted to know. People ask questions like what do they look like, how much does it cost? What brand is it? Are they durable? What do other people think about these sneakers? After both those steps we understand clearly, what we have learned. Can tell you everything from name, release date, popularity rate, sales rates, what celebrities are wearing or endorsing them? what entertainers have mentioned these sneakers in song lyrics or even made whole songs about the shoe..
2. SKIM – I think it is also useful to skim while reading about sneakers. The reason I say this is because, not all people are “sneaker-heads”, so they really don’t want to read the whole thing. So to avoid having to read it in its entirety, they read the last paragraph first, and then they read 1 -2 sentences from all other paragraphs. Or the bold print in advertisements and stuff like that. Reason for skimming is you can get key points without reading the entire content of the text first. Skimming gives you an idea of what kind of shoe, the brand name, release date, etc. Skimming prepares readers for the text itself.

In closing I hope you find the tips I listed just as effective as I did, and are understand why I chose the methods I did. It feels to me like they are going to be detrimental pieces in my writing.

thlog # 2

THLOG # 2

In class this week we read a course reading titled “Reading like Writer: by Mike Bunn. In this Bunn stressed how important it was to know how to make the connection between reading and writing. He also suggests that reading in a certain way can make you a better writer. This helped me to recognize that if I try to understand the choices the author made and why, then I can decide whether or not I may want to make those same choices in my own writing. Now we all know Zack has said to us several times in class that “You are reading to learn about writing, well to my surprise Bunn says the same thing in this text. I also liked the use of Allen Tate metaphor of reading like you were an architect, The reason I found this extra  helpful was because, I was like “fuck, if I got to think like an architect, I’m going to know every inch of this property and why and how these decisions were made. Now if I approach my writing this way I could just research by reading, annotating my readings, asking questions about why the author did certain things, thinking about it and probably ending up having an understanding of why they made certain choices. Then I have the freedom to decide if I want to use any of those writers’ conventions in my future writings. Ultimately you’re trying to learn how the text was constructed, so you can “build” one for yourself (Bunn). Now I am not sure about anyone else in this class, but I NEVER really sat and looked at other [peoples writing and analyzed it for the sake of improving my own writing, Lol! Call me a slacker but I would just read the text and complete the assignments, never wondering about anything the author did. After treading this today when I am about to read a text I am going to ask two questions:

1. What was the author’s purpose for this writing?
2. Who was the intended audience for this writing?

Knowing at the outset that the author as trying to reach a specific group of readers makes it easier to understand that some things may be more or less effective in a general audience. Basically it’s important to know your intended audience and genre, because in writing it is important to know that there are particular genres for particular situations... It is even mentioned that it’s good to question the authors judgement sometimes, ask questions, because everything we learn and all knowledge we acquire can be potentially used or helpful in future writing pieces.

thlog # 3

Thlog # 3

So as you may have already noticed, I am writing in unusual, fancy font. This font is called Lucida Calligraphy. The reason I am doing this is because my professor gave our class a really awesome writing tip. He told us that when we have “writers block” or are just stuck staring at the blinking cursor on the screen, just try paying with the fonts, pick something “funky” or “fun”. Right now I am experiencing that exact problem, I KNOW WHAT I WANT TO WRITE ABOUT, BUT NOT HOW TO WRITE IT!! My professor is what some have called “unconventional”, however he is able to actually show us things in class with visual presentations and his methods have given me –and several others in the class- a better understanding of some difficult things simply by explaining it in a way that may be very unusual to others.

 For example, Zack uses a method with “Nesting Dolls” -which I could actually say is a move of his- simply by him taking apart a set of wooden nesting dolls he was able to give a better understanding of genres. He showed us that genres are also broken down, like for instance, football/teams/coaches/players/spectators. That breakdown was shown to us with him going from the biggest nesting doll to the smallest, demonstrating the breakdown of genres. I find myself imagining the nesting dolls in my head now, applying them to my day to day life. I never in a million years when I entered this course did I think we would be listening to country music, playing with nesting dolls, or even drawing for that matter. We were going over pointers for one of our assignments, and here comes Zack with highlighters, big pieces of white paper and distributes them to me and my peers. Now we are all wondering “has he lost his mind” but we stayed quiet. The assignment he gave us was to draw our thought process of our papers out, like how we composed it in our mind. I thought it was going to be super hard ,and a little useless. However, I actually loved it! After that class I went home and took a blank sheet of paper and sketched out my writing project on there. I wrote like the title and then set a space for each paragraph and put what point I wanted to discuss in each one, then I stepped back and looked to see if the paragraphs were going to transition into one another and flow properly by the points I listed I was able to see if the following points supported the previous one.

 I have found these “unconventional Methods” to be very enlightening, and I know that once I master them better and get a more solid technique I will be able to be an awesome writer (I hope)!

thlog # 4

Thlog # 4

I want to start this thlog off by saying “I fucking love shitty first drafts”!!! I say this because in the handout we read called “Shitty First Drafts” by Anne Lamott; she stresses that in order to gain clarity in your second draft, and sometimes brilliant in your third draft, you must first create the “shitty first draft”.
 “The first draft is the child’s draft, where you let it all pour out and then romp all over the place, knowing that no one is going to see it and that you can shape it later. You just let this childlike part of you channel whatever voices and visions come through and onto the page”(Lamott). This is very familiar to me because I like to write poetry, always have. I have even made my attempts at short stories; it is my dream to one day write a novel. Now when I am in my writing process I find myself just writing whatever flows for me at the moment, and the I go back and revise it, adding things and removing things, until I am satisfied with the final piece. I thought that was just something that I did, maybe because I wasn’t good enough of a writer to compose an amazing piece in my first try. In this text Lamott explains that all writers start with a shitty first draft, like horrible. They too go back and revise it until they are satisfied with the outcome of the final draft before publication.
 In your first draft I feel free-writing is the way to go. The reason I say this is because when you free write, it’s raw and uncensored. You are writing from your very core, not caring if it’s socially acceptable or meets the modern literature association’s standards.  The only thing churning in your mind is ideas that you are transferring to paper or monitors, and when that flow is over, you can sit back read it and then maybe think of what is missing or what is monotonous. You can look and see if you transitioned it properly or gave enough evidence to support your thesis. It is even suggested that you write a second and even third draft, so that you can continue to build and improve your paper In our class we practiced this method by bringing in hard copies of our first drafts, grouped with classmates and did evaluations on each others work, we then came back with a second draft after being given the evaluations from our peers and repeated the process again.
I found this very effective because it gave me a heads up on what I was lacking in and what my strong points were, and then I was able to compose my papers with the confidence that I had come a long way from my “shitty first draft”.