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Hey E319 Students,
Did you find it difficult to annotate "Letter from Paradise" and "Why Soldiers Won't Talk", without the lyrics to annotate on? Why do you think this will help you further on in the year?
Side Note- If anyone needs assistance with any content/revisions, feel free to email me!
(Jay Mehta Approved)
posted by Jay Mehta @ 11/28/2011
10 comments
10 Comments:
I found it difficult to annotate "Letter from Paradise" and "Why Soldiers Won't Talk" without the text in front of me, but I think it will not only help further on in the year, but it will help me be more rhetorically analytical in day-to-day life. On the microscopic level it will help during the year because Mr. Robin said we would be doing more assignment like these. From a more macroscopic viewpoint, it will help in life because life isn't a text. When listening to debates, or speeches one must be able to analyze the rhetoric being used without a text in front of him or her. As Mr. Robin always says, nothing worthwhile comes easily.
-Hannah Coombs (3rd hour)
It was both difficult and worthwhile to annotate “Letters from Paradise” and “Why Soldiers Won't Talk” without having the text right in front of me. I am so used to being able to look at text while I am reading and having the luxury to look back at whichever part I want to, so not having the text in front of me was difficult and in a sense made me feel like I was grasping at thin air, not being able to see the stories physically. However, once I sat back and completely gave myself over to my sense of hearing, everything changed. I realized that being stripped of my sense of sight heightened the amount of attention I gave to the stories and in turn made me pick out things I probably would have never noticed while simply staring at a black and white page. To my surprise, I found out that annotating these stories through listening to them was not as difficult as I thought it would be and it was a very enjoyable experience for me. I definitely think this will help me further on in the year because it made me realize that if I really pay attention to a text, whether I am reading it or listening to it, I can pick out both important and interesting things that I would not have paid attention to before.
- Marzena Socha, period 3
Yes, yes, and yes. I found it very difficult to annotate something I could not even see with my own eyes. I found myself writing the words in my head to make it easier (or make myself think it was easier at least…). In some cases, I was thinking it was less difficult as it was simply more time consuming. Some parts of the story, specifically “Letters from Paradise”, I could not understand some of the words the man said so I could not even look them up in the dictionary! My brother once told me, relating this to tennis, that if you can learn to play the best, when you go back and play people at your level, it will be easy to beat them. I connected this task to that quote because it is very true. If we E319 students can annotate words we cannot actually see, can you imagine how easy it will be in the future to annotate books when you can see the words and can easily reference back to a certain sentence?
-Jori Nelson P:3
Personally, I didn’t find annotating the audio texts very difficult. I have a theory that it may be because I am on debate. And because I’m on debate, I have to write quickly and absorb data and text just as fast. Only, listening to this text was less difficult than that because there was a pause button. During a debate, you cannot just raise your hand and say, “Woah, woah, woah, slow your roll.” I’m assuming that would be seen as rude. So, having a pause button is a fantastic advantage in this situation. If I needed time to process the information or look up a word, I was able to do that. So, all in all, I thought the process was only mildly challenging. Also, I really like “Letter from Paradise” because I’ve been to the Pearl Harbor Memorial and felt how it feels, and how spooky it is. And having this skill will definitely be beneficial in the long run, especially in college, in those huge lecture halls.
-Mac Kienitz (p.3)
Before actually starting to annotate “Letter from Paradise” and “Why Soldiers Won’t Talk”, I had to listen to both stories at least once, because if I didn’t I would have no idea what was going on. Overall, annotating with a text is much easier for me, just because I am used to it and I can keep my own pace with it. But annotating with no text has its advantages, I think I was able to catch some rhetorical aspects that I would have never seen if I was just reading, especially in “Letter From Paradise”. This will probably help later on in the year when we have to do the news assignment and we have to listen to the TV when we can not even rewind like we could in these stories though. And also, being able to listen is a skill that always turns out to be useful.
~Federica Tresin (Period 3)
Both “Letters from Paradise” and “Why Soldiers Won't Talk” were very difficult for me to annotate. This was partially because of two things. The first thing is that I did not have a tangible sheet of paper that I could quickly write down what I thought. The second thing is that I am not used to actually listening in depth to people speaking. Throughout the year though, this will help me understand more of Mr. Robin's songs that he occasionally makes us listen to and analyze. This will also help us understand and interpret arguments that others make in class.
-Adam Kobiela(period 3)
I think initially it is difficult to annotate “Letter from Paradise” and “Why Soldiers Won’t Talk” because since the beginning of the class we have been given the text. Being given the text when told to annotate is like riding a bike with training wheels, simple and anyone can do it. I think annotating without it was for the better, although it was difficult. I think it will help us for further in the year when we are given more difficult listening activities, and it will improve our annotations. I also think that annotating to audio visual will better round our annotation skills.
-Nicole Vetter
I found it very hard to annotate these two pieces without having the words in front of me. I often had to pause the voice and write down what I wanted to annotate for. A habit I noticed my self-starting (now I stopped it) was writing down quotes then annotating on the quotes. By the end of “Why Soldiers Don’t Talk” I had half the story written down. Yikes! Mr. Robin mentioned to our class 2nd period that this assignment will help us in the future with the next book we are reading, Sirens of Titan, because in this book the author uses high diction. Though annotation without text is difficult, in the near future when we have text in front of us, though that text will be difficult to read, it will make annotation seem so much easier in the end.
I think that while challenging and very new, the annotations from “Letter to Paradise” and “Why Soldiers Won’t Talk” were not as difficult for me as I thought they would. Without a doubt, listening and finding the use of rhetorical devices in the piece was much more time consuming but very worthwhile. I found it interesting because the way in which the short stories were read, is the way the author intends the piece to be read as well. Regardless of the difficulty or the demand for more time, I think that listening and annotating exercise will help us develop our listening skills and critical thinking. Listening carefully for rhetorical choices in these two stories are key to creating a sensible awareness of rhetoric in our everyday lives as well.
Carlos Sarasti
Pe. 3
Like Mac said, my experience on debate helped me significantly with this assignment. This is what I do every time I listen to a speech, especially in PF or LD (excuse the jargon). For me, it was as if the four hundred pound weight was lifted. I could use the pause button. The reader spoke clearly, slowly and enunciated. Also, I could listen to the selection as many times as I wanted too.
What I liked about listening to the stories instead of reading them was that I could clearly hear the tone. The way the reader stressed or inflected different words changed the meaning slightly. So, I felt I had a better understanding of what the author was trying to convey. Just like when you send an email, and you attempt to add sarcasm. Sarcasm is difficult to portray in an email, so your friend mistakes it as rudeness. Because they could not hear the inflection, the meaning the author was trying to convey was completely lost.
~Sylwia P3
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