Nayana's AP Blog

      Since today is Friday, I figured I would make the best of today and not let stuff bother me. It's been a busy week so I do really need a break, but I also have to catch up on work so I can start fresh for next week hopefully. I was able to understand more of creating a thesis statement, but for some reason when it was time to write it and the body  paragraph, it just wasn't clicking in my head so it took me longer than I wanted to get it done. I do think I'm getting a little better though. Also I liked the mentality of not thinking of the teacher as a teacher, but as a coach. That made me open my eyes more so I'm definitely more willing to try and keep going even if I don't succeed.

      Today I can say this lesson has actually helped me a lot, but I think a problem for me is quickly of thinking of claims for my thesis. The question to me wasn't very specified and even though we discussed the possibilities of what it could be about, I just couldn't think of anything. Also I'm starting to feel that when we have our opinions, it's like they're considered wrong or there's something to prove that our opinion is invalid. Typically I feel like I would like this class more if some things were done differently. I know I definitely get discouraged when I get called out or we have to present something, it makes me feel less motivated to do work.

      Today was a very exhausting day for me. I personally feel like teachers are just throwing projects at us and making them due in a short period of time. I understand it's virtual and things are fast-paced but we're not machines, we're still human. We all deserve breaks. There's so many countless times where I wanted to give up because it's honestly just too much. In this class I felt like that a lot but not today, because it was more relaxed and I was able to actually focus on the material of writing a thesis statement. Most of the stuff we're learning right now, we won't even use in real life because we all have different jobs and ambitions that we want to do.

 My poem is about equality throughout black history. Throughout black history, people of color, especially black people, have been mistreated and dealt with racism for so long. That's basically my inspiration along with the stuff that's been going on today like the rights, BLM, all of those movements. So here's my poem. Black History Equality Black History, A history that will never be forgotten. Our ancestors, normal human beings, were taken by the hands of Europeans. Enslaved to satisfy their needs, suffered in pain, tortured and mistreated, dealing with racism, from generation to generation. But that never discouraged them, because they continued to fight. They deserve to have rights. Today isn’t it the same way? Still fighting for equality among society. Movements that express how we feel, the change we need so we can start to heal. Our ancestors have planted those seeds, so our voices could be heard.  Until there comes a day. where everyone can live a

      I was meant to post yesterday 2/19, but I got caught up with work and personal matters that I became so tired I forgot to post. The lesson that I took from what we did in class is that boys and man don't really have that opening to express how they feel or say what's good for them because in society men are meant to be strong figures that shouldn't have weak emotions. There's many women movements but not really any movements for men. Before I learned about this, I never really thought about how boys don't have recognition for empowerment, so this lesson really opened my eyes. Now my thing is even though it wasn't a graded assessment, our grades on how well we did was shared with everyone in the class and I didn't like that whatsoever. Other than that, it was one of the best days I've had in this class since the semester started.

      I'm just going to start off with saying that 4th period is always the class that truly messes with my emotions. Some days can be good and some days can be truly bad. I mean I don't mind what we did today but it's its so slow and it pains me, but I have to suck it up and go with it. Even though there's some things I don't agree with personally. I know what it'll help me when it's time for me to do it, so I did pay attention for the most part. Now one thing that completely dreaded me was the "easy" assignment. I don't mind reading poems. Do I understand them most of the time? No but I try my best to understand. When it comes to making one, I struggle. Personally not a big fan of this assignment considering we have to record ourselves which is so crazy to me. Other than that today could've gone better towards the end, but it is what it is.

    I'm going to start being completely honest in my blog posts from now on. Today I was more engaged in class than most days. The poem "We Real Cool" I thought was really interesting. I wasn't into it at first because it's boring always having to analyze and break everything apart so I just wasn't interested, but after a while of listening and actually understanding some more, I thought it was really cool and I actually liked it. Especially the video that went along with it with the different style of animations.

      I learned in class that there are 4 different things that define rhetoric of place.1.) The place of then symbolizes something. 2.) The place often has a history. 3.) The place communicates something. 4.) It is often a place that can stand om its own. You can use these 4 steps for practically anything. Today was shorter than others because it's Friday and I had such a stressful week. I hope next week is easier.

      A lesson that stuck with me today the most was from a short film watched in the beginning of class. It was where this teacher was teaching his students that 2+2=5. Obviously we all know that 2+2 does not equal 5 but in this case whatever the teacher says, it's going to be right. A student spoke out against it saying the correct answer is 2+2=4 and the teacher wasn't happy about it. So he brought is the top students within the school to tell the boy that 2+2=5 but the boy wasn't giving in. To me that boy was the only one to truly stick his ground and not back down from the teacher, others were scared and didn't want speak out against the teacher. It's like the superior vs. the inferior.     What I got from this is that just because someone tells you what they said is right, doesn't mean it's always going to be right. It's okay to speak up and correct them. There's really no reason to be afraid. Also today is my birthday :).

      There are 5 parts to crisis rhetoric that I've learned today. Urgency Crisis as Reality Dramatic Characters Policy as Morality Rhetorically Generative     In class we've used the speech from former president Donald Trump to analyse the different parts of crisis rhetoric. With urgency it's demonstrated that something needs to happen right now. Crisis as Reality needs to show that crisis is effecting the audience. Dramatic characters are the good vs. the bad. Policy as morality states that it's the right thing to do and rhetorically generative is specifically choosing someone to make them out to be evil.

      Writing a claim for an argumentative essay is basically choosing your side that you agree with and explain why in one sentence. It helped me fully understand it more today, but my problem is that I'm a pretty slow thinker, so it takes me a minute or two to come up with something. I'm going to work on that more with my writing, so my goal is to think on the spot without wasting too much time.

           From a class assessment that I did today, it made me think a lot about the different stereotypes we have today. It's very common and well-known that girls associate with beauty, soft things, and girly colors along with the thought that boys associate with being rough, gross stuff, and boyish colors. But in today's society, wouldn't it be better if there were more gender-neutral stuff? That would give kids their own imagination to discover what they like instead of being forced these girly or boyish things, because they were born that specific gender. Today many people are truly discovering themselves and identifying as he/she/they, but it's not society's "normal" because we're all put in this mindset at a young age that girls should stay girls and boys should stay boys.      I'm all about being outside the box and trying different things. It's not a bad thing to have changes and we shouldn't be stuck to old norms, because of thes

      Learning today in class that ownership can extend beyond objects to include intangible things like skills, health, love, experiences, etc. It goes into what truly defines a person and their characteristics. No one truly experiences the same thing, it's always different even if it's similar. Like today we're all living in a pandemic, but we're all experiencing it differently. Usually from experiences it can affect how you are as a person, it can change you for better or worse it some situations. From my personal experience when I was younger, I learned that I can't trust everybody. It's because I was so nice to people, it was easy for them to take advantage of my kindness, but not everyone has bad intentions but some do, even if they're acting nice. Since then I've learned to be more cautious of the people around me and not let everyone be in my business. 

      Starting off the first day of Black History Month , a poem I read along with my class was "The Negro Speaks of Rivers". From my understanding this poem represents history of the black race in a time where they were being discriminated against. There was this question we had to answer and it was, "How are rivers like the blood that flows through human veins?". It really made me think, because when you compare and river and blood, they both flow continuously and only stops when something stops them. So I thought that was really interesting.     Also there's this idea that in the beginning of time, everyone originated from Africa and overtime everyone moved further away. That's how we have Europe, Asia, Caribbean islands. Everyone believes differently so it's just a thought, but I did hear it from someone when I was in middle school so I thought it was really cool that it came up again.