Language Investigation 3

I was that really nerdy kid that hated homework. So, basically a big dork with big brown plastic glasses and long stringy hair. Oh yeah, I was THAT kid. But I loved reading, I just hated writing. So, I didn't. I talked a LOT, but not writing. But eventually my love for reading spilled over into me wanting to be a writer. It just kinda evolved that way. I wrote journals, I wrote my first short story when I was like 8 and I think it was about something grotesque, but I blame DOOM the videogame (which I played on my old dinosaur of a computer.That and Wolfenstein. haha.) The point is, I loved it. I wrote about everything, I narrated my life in song, as if I was in a perpetual musical. Big. Nerd.
But then just as I started feeling like I was getting enough tools to articulate what I had in my brain in an exceptional way, my teachers were like "hey! advanced English for you!" and away I went to write papers. And what happened? My creativity was sucked out! I took Creative Writing in HS and that was hard for me b/c I wasn't used to writing with "I " anymore, or saying anything without it being a formal, basic, boring paper. I think I defaulted to teenage angst, which, I am NOT looking forward to reading as a teacher. I was SO whiney, it's really pathetic, and quite embarassing. Ah, the embarassment of youth! Once I was a junior and they had us writing a research paper and I think that finalized the death of my suffering creativity. Gone. So, now? I struggle between finding my voice and being appropriate, and making sure that what I say can be understood. What do I do? I speak what I'm writing outloud as I write it. Oh yes, I'm doing that right now. If you do that, you'd be an insider with me. If you struggle to find your creativity, you're an insider with me. If you can rock the 5 paragraph essay, and bust out a research paper and be damn good at it, you're an insider with me. But if you're the writing master, who never had to conform to testing and school regulations, if you had creative schooling like Montessori school, or if you don't talk to yourself when you're reading/writing you are definitely an outsider.

Warm up 2

On page 141 he says "Mys tudents needed to be immersed in talking, reading and writing, they needed to further develop their ability to think critically, and they needed to gain the confidence in themselves as systematic inquirers. They had to be let into the academic club." I think that this relates to what we were discussing as far as insiders tatus. They msispelled words or wrote fragments or dropped verb endings and this made barriers between them and others. This "labeled" them as undeducated or below. He goes on to say "Mys tduents, too, were strangers in a strange land, and I wanted to create a safe section of the city and give them an oportunity to acquire the language." So he did this by bringing in newspapers, magazines song lirics and political pamphlets to actually study and analyze language int he real world. He would have them summarize short readings, and moced from comparing and contrasting, to anaylizing and took babysteps to help them master what they were doing. I think he was fearful that he would overwhelm them and make them feel like more of an outsider instead of making them feel like an insider from gaining this knowledge through immersion. He also used excerpts, like sentences to compare instead of whole essays. That way it was easier to tackle. He also provided context and prepared these readings and writings in order so that they were easy to accomplish, and the students were able to build upon them to reach the larger goal of writing an essay or analyzing a main text.

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Language Investidation 2

I'm Catholic, which is weird and mysterious to some people just because there is a whole lot of supersition and tradition and separation between the Catholic church and most protestant churches, making it hard to understand.

We believe that the Eucharist is the literal body of Christ. Eucharist is the bread that, once blessed, mysteriously transforms through faith. Since we believe it's literally Jesus, we keep it in the church, in a special display box called the Tabernacle, on certain days for people to spend time with Jesus. This is called adoration... where you just come to adore and be in the presense of Christ.

Then there are Feast days, which are holy days devoted to Saints where we celebrate the life and achievements of that particular person. Sometimes we literally have a feast in the church. There are Holy Days of Obligation, which are days that you should come to church to recieve Communion, even if it's not a Sunday. Communion is when you recieve the Eucharist, which we do every time we go to church, not just once a month. It consists of the Eucharaist and the wine that has been transformed into the blood of Christ. As you can see, most people use the terms Eucharist and Communion interchangably, which isn't entirely correct, but close enough to be understood.

The sign of the cross is kind of a phrase or lingo, because it distinguishes us from other faiths. We touch our heads hearts and cross our shoulders while saying "In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen." The act of doing this is to physically remind us to keep Christ in our mind, in our hearts, and to be prepared to carry the weight of the faith and others at all times.

There are Marian prayers, which are prayers devoted to Mary, to have her pray to God on our behalf. This includes the Rosary. The rosary is holy object consisting of beads that represent different prayers, which are said in a repetitive nature, while thinking of different events in The Bible.

There are Relics, which are considered holy objects through coming in contact with a holy person. This can be pieces of bone, wood, cloth, and there are "degrees" of relics, classifying how close it is to the holy person. For example, a piece of bone of a saint is "more" holy than a piece of cloth they wore. Most churches will have relics buried in some part of the church, to make it more holy. St. Joseph church has a relic of bone in the front of the church. There's a name for the front, but I honestly can't remember it!

And lastly, there is the Catechism, which is a book that accompanies our Bible, that has meetings and councils going way way back, that explain why we do what we do, what is important, and where the biblical support can be found for these traditions.

These things are strange and different to others, and it can take some getting used to just to understand some of the concepts that the words reflect. However, they are important words to know in my faith, because the concepts they represent are essential to the beliefs of the church, and subsequently, the people who attend the church. It was a little long, but it's hard to explain one word without using another word and needing to explain that.I hope some of this made sense, and didn't just freak you out! We're quite normal. Well. Maybe not quite... =)