Check Your Blogs, Please!

If you get this late Friday night or early Saturday morning, I've commented on all of your blogs and scored them. Check in the comments section of your last post. If you have any questions or comments we can talk in class tomorrow. Until then, sleep well and dream of how great your final presentation will be!

Final Homework Assignment: Blog Self-Evaluation

Hello! For your final blog post (once you've finished all your required posts!) I'd like you to do a blog self-evaluation, much like we did in AP-5. The only difference besides the topics is that this time I'd like you to remember that your blog is 50% of your final grade, since it's replacing the "journal" grade in your evaluation. So both the posts and this evaluation are important. I will take your input into account when grading your journals, so please give your evaluation the attention it deserves.

I'll post the assignment here (yes, it's very similar to the last one from AP-5). Also, any blog additions or changes you want to make need to be made by Friday at noon at the latest, so I can take your comments into account before our class. Like before, I'd like you to be honest, so if you'd prefer not to post this to your blog, that's OK; you can send it to me by email instead.

For your self-assessment, write a couple of sentences about each of your posts, including a score for each on a scale of 1-10 (10 being the highest). You should take into consideration first of all your English use (Vocabulary, Grammar, Mechanics, etc.), as well as your promptness, completeness, and your interaction with your group partners and their blogs.

You had 5 assignments, so you'll have to write your comments for the 5 posts. To remind you, they were:

(click on each description for a link to the assignment)

Assignment 1: Questions about American and Costa Rican culture

Assignment 2: Linking behaviors to cultural values

Assignment 3: Describing your own personal culture

Assignment 4: Paragraphs combining multiple answers

Assignment 5: Culture shock questions

For example, you could say:

Assignment 2: 7/10. I feel that I could have done job with this post, since I posted it late and my answers were a bit incomplete. I only identified two behaviors, and they weren't concrete. But after my classmates commented and said that they needed to be concrete, I changed my post and tried to make it a little better.

So, do that 5 times, and you should be fine. Remember that you can also email me this assignment if you feel uncomfortable posting it to your blog. You can also take this opportunity to give me feedback about any aspect related to the class.

That's it for now. Thanks for giving me a nice class to look forward to on Saturday mornings. I hope that you learned something new, improved your English, and enjoyed the class. See you on Saturday, and don't forget to prepare your final presentations!

Third Wheel

I found this comic on the internet yesterday, and I thought I'd share it with you since we were talking about the idea of the "third wheel" in class last Saturday:

Have a good day!

Week 6 Homework and Final Presentation Note

Trivia: Where was this picture taken? First to answer in the comments section gets a prize.

Since we talked about Culture Shock this week, your blog assignment is to answer these questions:

A. What do you know about culture shock? Have you ever experienced it or known anyone who has? How do you think you personally would deal with culture shock?

B. What advice would you give to a friend suffering from culture shock?

C. What personality traits do you think could help prevent culture shock?

D. What variables might make culture shock more or less severe?

Like before, please don't just list the questions and the answers, but try to combine your responses into a coherent paragraph or two. If you have any questions, please tell me.

Also, your final presentation will be during our last class (September 3rd). I'll give you some suggested topics today so you can think a bit about what you'd like to do. You can also tell me if you have a different presentation idea related to culture and/or communication. You can work alone or in a group, as long as your presentation follows the guidelines (it must involve the class in some way, for example; you all did a good job on your first presentation with this aspect). 

TWO SUGGESTED TOPICS:

A. Role-play a conflict based on cultural values. Then, lead a class discussion that interprets the situation and comes up with potential solutions.

B. Through an interactive demonstration of some sort, highlight your own values (whether they’re personal, cultural, or universal) and/or have your classmates demonstrate their values.

If you have a good reason for wanting to do your presentation this coming weekend (August 27th), you can send me a message and we can possibly work out something. Like I said in class, though, I'd prefer to do all the presentations in our final class, so that it won't seem like we're constantly doing presentations.

That's it for now. Have a good week, and see you on Saturday!

Week 5 Homework

As a reminder, your homework this week is to respond to at least 4 of the questions we used in our warm-up in our last class. Instead of just posting questions and answers, try to combine two or more of them into a coherent paragraph.

If you've lost your paper, the questions were:

1. How did you “get” your name?

2. Who named you? Why did they choose your name?

3. Do you like your name? Why, why not?

4. What do you know about naming customs in other countries?

5. Does your name mean anything?

6. If you had children, what would you name them?

7. If you had to invent a name for your alter-ego, what would you choose?

8. What is a tradition that your family—and only your family—has?

9. Do you think that you are more of an individual or group-oriented person?

10. Do you think that people are essentially good or essentially bad?

11. Do you value practical or beautiful things more? Why?

12. Have you ever felt homesick? Where and why? Or why not?

13. If you could only listen to one musical group for a month, who would you choose?

So, there's plenty to choose from! Have a great week, and I'll see you on Saturday!

May I Have Your Attention, Please?

Guys (and Girl), 

As we discussed in our first class, your blog replaces the "journal" grade on the syllabus, and as a result will count as 

50% 

of your final grade. If I knew more about HTML, I'd find a way to make that "50%" spin around, flash, and shoot fireworks, but I don't, so I made it super-big so you don't miss it!

I don't want to see your grades massacred because of this, so be sure to update your blogs!

Sincerely,

Ryan

Week 4 Homework

Hello! I hope you had a good weekend. This week's homework is not very complicated but it does require some thought and reflection. I'd like you to talk about your own, personal "culture." 

First of all, please define culture in your own terms. Then identify and explain at least 4 aspects or characteristics of your personal culture. You can mention values or behaviors that we've talked about in class, or you can go in a different direction if you wish.

That's the homework. If you've still got to give your presentation, please be prepared on Saturday. To all the people who presented last Saturday: nice work!

If you're behind on your other blog posts, you need to do them this week also, and to be sure to comment on your partner's blog posts. As before, if he/she hasn't posted yet, you can comment on a different classmate's blog.

Good luck, and please tell me if you have any questions. Have a nice week, and see you on Saturday!