Superhero Theme Justification

The superhero theme fits perfectly into the context of this class. We did an entire Watchmen unit that had to do mainly with superheroes. There are many different lenses that go with superheroes and their comics. The different lenses we covered in class that could be used to analyze the superheroes include, the feminist/masculine lens, the racial lens, the power lens, and the underground/mainstream lens. Each of these can give a deeper description of what to expect from them and the message they are trying to get across. They all provide a unique perspective and provide different details. The class encourages us to look at things in a different way in order to understand it and that is what these lenses help us do.
This class also covered the different genres that a book or movie could be put into. Superhero comics can represent a variety of different genres too. They could fit into the science fiction genre, since they contain characters with abnormal abilities, they can take place in settings real people can't be and the characters look different from how normal people would look. The whole superhero franchise has it's own sub genre that is completely its own. They all contain characters fighting evil or a villain, protecting their community, and helping their fellow peacekeepers. Overall, the main theme of a superhero comic tends to be similar. The big theme of the class was whether a media item can be classified as mainstream or underground. Comics about superheroes could be considered as both underground and mainstream. Superheroes can have a big following in the mainstream, but the content itself would probably be considered more underground. The movie adaptations could be considered mainstream since it has a large audience. More people know about superheroes because of their movies, not so much by their comics. The comics contain elements that are more underground than the movies and contain a lot more detail. There is a smaller audience for the comic books, since it is more for readers, and the movies are more for everyone else.  This also really ties into our title of the zines, "Not really underground, actually fairly mainstream" because superheroes have become more mainstream lately. Ultimately, superheroes is a rather broad topic, allowing us to cover almost everything that we have gone over in class and that is why we have chosen this topic.

Response to Jocelyn's Blog Post

I am choosing to write about my own thing this week and stray away from our optional prompt. Sorry guys but this week’s blog will about my obsession will pigs.

• Well I am really glad that I am not the only one who did not write about the prompt. Let me just say that your pictures are adorable and I feel very informed now about pigs. I think you have found yourself a nice little hobby. 

Response to Liam's Post

Although YouTube involves very little reading because it is almost exclusively video watching, I am including it in this list because of the sheer amount of time I spend on YouTube on a daily basis.

• I am glad that I am not the only one who is on youtube a fair amount. It is really addicting for some reason and I really have to make sure that I keep track of time when I am watching videos because some times I don't and next thing you know it is like two hours later. Youtube is definitely a big part of my media intake as well.

Student Athletes

Beep. Beep. Beep. It's 5:25 time to wake up and workout. Next is breakfast and then off to class. First two rows. Then lunch and practice. Finally, dinner, study hall, and then off to bed. Can't forget about curfew check. Wake up the next say and do it all over again.

Well that is my typical day, filled with the obstacles and joys of being a student athlete. There are countless mental and physical challenges, but for some reason we keep going back for more. Maybe it is the feeling that you get when you think that you cannot physically do any more and you get through it because of your team.Maybe it is those crazy times with your team or all all of times that you laugh so hard that you cry that out weigh those days that you are the captain of the struggle bus. Whatever the motivation, you simply have to love playing your sport. I know I have a lot more respect for student athletes now that I am one. You begin to realize how difficult it really is when you live the life day in and day out and no matter what sport, you respect how much hard work everyone has to put in.

I honestly could not imagine being on any other team but the softball team. We are like one big family. We may have some differences, but at the end of the day we all genuinely care about each other. There are countless inside jokes and random conversations that we have had. I even have a little "family," complete with family dinners and all. It is always great to know that you have that support system to get you through the day. The freshmen class dinners at Taos are always a great way to vent about your day and talk with people who can sympathize with you. Even my mentor is always there whenever I need someone to talk to. I could not imagine not living with my teammates, random dancing and all. The part I really love about our team is the team values: Education, Faith, Respect, Relentlessness, and Family. After all, we are here to get our education, we have to have faith in each other, a mutual respect for one another, relentlessness in all that we do, and at the end of the day we are a family. I also love that we give our best effort. It is really emphasized that we need to learn lessons for life, not just softball, and that can only benefit us. We may have a decent amount of rules and standards of behavior to uphold, but at the end of the day I could not imagine doing anything else.

Although the struggles that a student athlete may face are constant and challenging, you do it for those moments that you are so glad you have your team. You do it because you love the game. You do it because you just could not imagine yourself doing anything else. No matter the sport, student athletes at this level work extremely hard and I have a totally different view now when I watch any college sporting events.

Response to Jocelyn's Blog Post

 But being with my grandmother in the hospital on a daily basis inspired me and gave me an idea of what nurses did. It showed me that they can do their job and still enjoy doing it twenty years down the road.

I think that this is an awesome story about how you decided you want to become a nurse. It was very important for me as well to help people and still love what I was doing. Nursing does seem like one of those jobs that you can work forever and still love your job so that is awesome.

Those Who Can, Teach

For as long as I can remember, I have never really wanted to be anything but an elementary school teacher. Since my aunt is a kindergarten teacher and my mom is a substitute teacher, it is what I am surrounded with. For some reason, when I was little, I looked up to teachers. I wanted to be like that. They seemed to know everything and always wanted us to be our very best. As I started to get older, I realized how much I could really see myself being a teacher. I could see myself helping all of the little students as they worked on the new materials. I had found what I truly wanted to do.

Let's be honest here, I am never going to get rich being a teacher. People that teach, however, do not do it for the money or the fame, they do it for the knowledge that they are making a positive impact in the lives of the youth. Teachers live to see that light go on in the minds of their students when they finally understand something or make a discovery that they have never thought of before. It is the best feeling in the world knowing that you have made a difference. I took a class my senior year in high school called Careers in Education and it just strengthened my desire to become a teacher. I got to go into my aunt's little kindergarten class and they were just a bright spot in my day. There were some rough patches, but it was an amazing experience. The students got so excited to see me and everyday I walked in to "Miss Morgan!" or "She's here!". One time I even got a standing ovation when I walked in. Anyways, I got so much real life experience that made me really realize that although it would be hard at times, I still wanted to be a teacher. How can you be sad when you are with kids all day? 

Teaching is just so rewarding. I want to have a job where I can really make a difference in lives, not just sit at a desk all day, even if it does make good money. The great thing about teaching is that you get weekends, holidays, and summers off. Also, I do not have to worry about working any crazy hours or random days. Who could argue with that schedule? A teacher also gets to make their own lesson plans and decide how they want to teach. There is definitely never a dull moment when you are teaching, especially when the kids are that little. I really cannot think of a job that I would rather do than be a teacher. It is so rewarding and the feeling you get when the student finally gets it is awesome. I can think of no other major more exciting and rewarding than elementary education. 

Response to Madison's post

The only thing that is bad about that strategy is that I have to re-type it on the computer, but it still saves me more time in the long run.  When I am writing I just write anything that comes to mind, because if I get stuck trying to think of the perfect words or sentences to use it takes up a lot of time. 

I think that this is a good way to help you with the editing process because as you type the paper it can also help you revise. I also tend to write down anything that comes to mind when I am writing on paper so the retyping could be very helpful.

Response to Liam's Post

I tend to use repetitive words and restate ideas; so the majority of my revising actually boils down to cutting content out and selecting more effective vocabulary. But I also check to make sure my ideas are coherent and the flow of the writing makes sense. I typically only reread/revise my writing only once or twice.

I am glad that I am not the only one who does this. This sounds exactly like what I experience when I am writing. A lot of the words I use to tend to get repetitive so it is important for me to go back and make sure that I did not repeat myself too much.

Writing Process

The writing process is unique to every individual. My writing process is not usually well thought out. I just kinda go with what comes to me. Generally, this is because I am in a time crunch for the piece that I am writing and do not have long enough to come up with an in depth draft. This tend to be a problem because I have been told that I sometimes try to write myself into answers instead of having a clear focus from the beginning, so I have been working on trying to get better about this. I generally have an idea of what I am going to write in each paragraph and what points that I am trying to make, but they are not usually written down or expressed in any particular order. Honestly, I usually still follow the whole first sentence of the essay is theme and the last one of the introduction is the thesis, but that is a force of habit. As far as the revising process, I am bad and do not usually revise papers, especially if they are not a large part of my grade and I am short on time. I sometimes reread for grammatical errors, but unless they are super important, the revision process is almost nonexistent. Now that I am in college and I have more time to review things I generally will look over them, but before it was a rare occurrence.
Well, when I compare my writing process to those mentioned in the PDF I think I would definitely fit into the student writer category. The experienced writers take large amounts of time planning and revising, which I do not do. In my future writing projects I will definitely try and focus more on the entire process and put more time and effort into my work. The more I start to sound like an experienced writer the better. This has really made me think more about how much I plan and look over my paper. Instead of just throwing it together and thinking that it sounds alright, I can review and revise it and know that it achieves what it was intended to. My usual writing process sound like it would be much more scatterbrained than if I were to plan properly. Basically, it has made clear that I would rather be in the experienced writers group than the student writers group so I should start doing the proper things in order to help me get there.
The PDF does sound familiar. I have been told time and time again that it is important to make an outline, proofread, and revise our writings. I have never really thought about waiting a few days after you write your first draft to revise it but now it makes total sense. The writings always seem so much better right after you are done writing it than they do a few days later. This PDF really drives home the fact that revision is important and, although I have been taught a lot of this my whole life, the PDF makes the differences a lot more clear than they usually are.