ENGL706 - Survey Says?

WE'RE PLAYING THE FEUD

Between the four commenters on my blog (you all are lovely, thank you) every nuance of the argument I intended was caught. Impressive! I was trying to use my collage to depict something like 'fitness is mostly mental', with a focus on female fitness (since I've been getting into working out lately). I attempted to add the female slant by using bright colors, one whole square of pink (which has been a moniker for female ever since WWII), and a female model as the focus of the largest image. While one commenter mentioned that this /could/ be read as my arguing that /only/ women have to overcome their own mental weakness in pursuit of fitness, but that certainly wasn't the intention. I guess that's one of the dangers of pure image arguments- you can't always anticipate every single way someone may interpret your argument!

I am definitely in the 'images can make an argument' camp, and I define argument rather loosely. Maybe something like 'point'. They make a point, they clearly stand for an idea, or inspire a non-tangible emotional reaction. Even if you're not sure what a visual piece is trying to argue, so long as it has an effect, it is an argument.

ENGL685 #7 - Megapost! Transform and Roll Out!

I'm a bad so I'm rolling the last two annotated bibs into one because I'm still confused on what I'm doing


I owe you 7 entries the sadness abounds. This will be updated in the next few days to squeeze them all in. 

Deadline for this post's contents is 2/15. All subsequent ABs will have their own post.

• Silver, R., Hu, G., & Iino, M. (2002). English Language Education in China, Japan, and Singapore. Graduate Programmes and Research Office, National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University.

• In this work, Silver, Hu, and Iino write three pieces, each giving a detailed history of educational policy about teaching English has mutated since being included in the official government-recommended curriculum. In particular, Hu includes a timeline of government-recommended syllabus changes that took place in China from around the 60s to the 2000s. This is an excellent resource since it lets me look out how an Asian value system changed academic goals in one country. I still have to allow for cultural differences, but such changes may be trackable through Japan's academic history too.

• While mostly the outlining of Japan (located in the center of the book) will probably be useful to me, the other two papers book-ending it help to provide an overarching narrative for English language education in Japan, China, and Singapore. This contextual timeline building seats national goals in place with one another, as well as nicely contrasts the 3 education system styles of each country. While I feel that Japan's insistence on only using Ministry of Education approved textbooks (there are 5- 1 of them is used in over half of all secondary schools) and "teaching to the test" style English education policy could use more digging into, this is an excellent beginning resource for foundational intercultural knowledge.

• Baecker, D. L. (1998). Uncovering the Rhetoric of the Syllabus: The Case of the Missing I. College Teaching, 46(2), 58–62.

•  Baecker (not a typo) is (was) a Doctoral candidate in South Carolina at the time of writing this article. Considering that was years ago, I reckon she's graduated by now. The non-specific theory application of this article is definitely a point in its favor. It mostly discuses language use in the syllabus and how it communicates and distributes authority. For example, when a professor overwhelmingly uses 'you" (as most did) it can come off authoritarian and leave students feeling as if there is no sense of community. Additionally, the attempt to use the royal "we" (inclusive of the instructor) is just as dangerous. When syllabi claim "we" will learn new skills and strategies, the student can usually assume that, since the teacher is at the helm of the class, their development has finished in these areas. The false community created through this type of language use smacks of dishonesty and leads to a diminished sense of responsibility on the part of the professor.

• This will likely be folded into my 'Methods' section, where I evaluate language usage as a rhetorical tool trending towards an end goal of increased comprehension. It has been a challenge thusfar to find a wholesale analysis of 'good' syllabus rhetoric analysis, so I will have to assemble its working parts peacemeal. One of many.

• Parkes, J., & Harris, M. B. (2002). The Purposes of a Syllabus. College Teaching, 50(2), 55–61.

• My favorite of the Sunday roundup. This piece dictates the three types of syllabi (as recorded in the authors' study) as Contractual, Permanent Record, and Learning Tool. These three classifications give me a nice categorical starting place for looking into the differences in syllabi, and also a point of comparison, since it is yet to see whether a Japanese syllabus fits into any one of these three categories (or multiple categories). Additionally, this work is an absolute treasure trove of resources. They list several parenthetical sources related directly to syllabus research and state outright that, in 2002, they had been unable to locate /any/ studies done on syllabus composition and its effect on student comprehension. Coming from a Professor of Psychology and a Professor Emerita, that carries quite a bit of weight. It also says that I should be looking for resources post-2002 as I forge ahead.

• This will likely be another part of my methods, since I definitely need more ground to stand on before I pull naming categories and text-structure conventions out of thin air. Other sources I hope to investigate soon will probably have more to do with usability and the link between page layout and comprehension (since I know there's some data out there on that outside of an academic setting).

• Riches, D. (2006). Innovating English Language Education by Looking beyond the Syllabus of the Typical Japanese University English Program. Seijo University, Social Innovation Studies, 1(2), 75–92.

• An excellent look at /why/ Japanese ELE is the way it is. This source focuses a lot on the reason Japanese English classes are structured with such a limited focus on useful English (or, I guess, creating fluent English speakers) and more on a certain size vocabulary. The terribly difficult entrance examinations that stand between graduating High School students and their college education are the focus of most teaching, and every little attention is paid to whether or not the material is interesting to students, or even very practical outside of a test.

• This will be a part of my recommendations section in the end. Ideally, I will be able to hybridize US and JP syllabi with an equal focus in practicality and test-passing. If this seems impossible (whenever I get my hands on first-hand resources), then I can at least use this to recommend how to change the system towards a more student-friendly mode of learning.

• Kostelnick, C. (1990). The Rhetoric of Text Design in Professional Communication. Technical Writing Teacher, 17(3), 189–202.

• Finally, a source not about syllabi, or Japanese education, but pure, textual rhetoric RE: document design. This is an oldie but goodie. Although some syllabi are delivered digitally now (something which wasn't a thing in 1996), Dr. Kostelnick's theories on the rhetoric behind a coherent document do not suffer in meaning, whether viewed in print or on a screen. The best sections in this piece discuss how headings, bullets, and page design effect how the reader will understand and chunk page information, how bolding, italics, and underlining affect conveyed meaning, and how charts and their placement can vary greatly in meaning just depending on layout.

• This is in the set of sources I'm preparing to analyze US syllabi at the University level, but I also hope to use these to find commonality between JP/US. My sincere hope (and, I guess, hypothesis) is that, although the contents focus and intended use of the syllabus may vary highly between countries, their visual layout and use of spatial and intra/extra-textual rhetoric will be very similar. Fingers crossed- my contact contacted me yesterday with word that I should have a primary source or two soon.

• Kostelnick, C. (1996). Supra-Textual Design: The Visual Rhetoric of Whole Documents. Technical Communication Quarterly, 5(1), 9–33. doi:10.1207/s15427625tcq0501_2

• Another Kostelnick! What a rascal. This piece is a kind of continuation of the source above- a good deal of it goes back into spacial, textual, and graphic design and how this affects a created text. What makes this source better on that front is, since it doesn't spend as much time defining these things, it takes /extra/ time giving examples of how three different real-life documents go about performance in each category, and how to parse out the rhetorical intention of their design. There's also a section on Stylistic Functions, which is basically 'why presentation matters'. It ties nicely into the already defined categories, while providing a 'why do I care' (which, y'know, not all academic writers do).

• The examples in this piece actually helped solidify some of the things I read in his slightly smaller work. This one more explicitly talks about issues like page size, portability, tone, and  context, then gives good examples. One of the example works actually uses a brown recycled paper, which I would have assumed would be a no-go if you were trying to look professional. Kostelnick points out that, since /contextually/ the paper choice is relevant to the subject matter, it's a-ok. Because thematic matching. Mind. Blown.

ENGL706 - Best Guess?

Look forward to everyone's insightful comments!

Engl685 Redux

• Who 
• Who cam I gather information from about JP syllabi?
• Who can provide me with comparative materials?
• Who would be a good resource for rhetorical manuals based on syllabus composition?
• What
• What are some of the ethical concerns with this project?
• What are the questions I want to ask of the materials I'm assessing?
• What do I hope to prove/change through my research?
• Where
• Where in Japan would be best to focus my material studies?
• Where can I look for faculty with tangential research focuses?
• Where would I need to get permission from to publish my findings?
• When
• When do the "mass syllabi" get changed/updated in Japan?
• When do I have enough theory to start analyzing primary sources?
• When do I know I have enough data to begin drawing conclusions?
• Why
• Why Japan and not an English-speaking country?
• Why look at syllabi instead of lesson plans, or other course materials?
• Why?
• How
• How can I apply what this project will teach me to other projects in the future?
• How does syllabus rhetoric affect class understanding/productivity?
• How do syllabus structures function in relation to comprehension?

ENGL685 #6 - I Have Jitters, but It's Probably Fine

Seriously starting to feel overwhelmed yet AGAIN - does this terrible feeling ever go away?

Ask the journalistic questions on your focused research topic (at least 3 questions for each: who, what, where, why, and how). Identify top 2-3 questions. Briefly discuss what/how/why they are your favorite.

• Who 
• Who can my research potentially help?
• Who would be interested in helping me if I furthered this study?
• Who would I submit this project to if I wanted I published?
• What
• What are some of the ethical concerns with this project?
• What kid of person wouldn't want to be polled in such a study?
• What impact with this research have on my daily life?
• Where
• Where are the women I'm polling located geographically?
• Where would I get funding to do this project with a larger group?
• Where would I need to get permission from to publish my findings?
• When
• When would it be best to start making up questions for a poll?
• When is it acceptable to re-post, asking for more poll responses?
• When do I know I have enough data to begin drawing conclusions?
• Why
• Why did I choose this route for my research?
• Why didn't I stay with my older, broader thesis and work from there?
• Why?
• How
• How can I apply what this project will teach me to other projects in the future?
• How many women is enough when it comes to poll data?
• How can I apply my data in other fields?

SHORT LIST

• Where are the women I'm polling located geographically?
• This actually relates to if I chose to expand and re-do this project later on. Does their geo-location affect what they buy and when they buy it? This might just be one of those things that, in /real/ science, you'd have to control for, but I'd be interested to know if it tinges the results any.

• How can I apply what this project will teach me to other projects in the future?
• Well, in theory, the methodology I'm using right now will help me do better research in the future. Especially RE: coding and ethics, I definitely feel like I know more now than I did a few weeks ago. It's a more general kind of help, but I still feel it's totally valid.

ENGL685 #5 - Focus? Focwe? Focthem?

Discuss what you see as your focused research topic for the class. Why are you interested. Based on your research topic/question thus far, answer/freewrite “so what?” questions on BWR p. 34.

3 robust annotated bibliography entries on focused research topic.

"Do the female members of the Nerd Fitness Facebook group perceive increased motivation to adhere to the program when using new/personalized equipment? If so, what equipment caused this effect, and roughly how long does this increase last?"

My idea was that this is a group I have easy access to, that I could probably convince a fair amount of to take a short, multiple choice poll, and that this would lead to qualitative data easier than looking at how/why questions (where a lot of coding is needed to make numbers). Additionally, in Visual Rhetoric, we were just discussing how good aesthetics scientifically make people work better. I'd be curious to see if people report this perceived change with fitness programs as in interface design.

Unrelated to L337 H4X, I would also be interested in the effect of "actual benefit" versus "perceived benefit". That'd take a lot of science and research data I don't have, so this is a smaller, more subjective slice off of that parent interest.

now I guess I'll answer these questions formally blegh blegh blegh

• Who will care about the research you do?
• In all likelihood, just me and the group (with whom I'll probably share my final product, since they'll have been so good as to be my number base). This is (allegedly) already hard science. I'm not breaking hard ground so much as affirming what I saw in one field as fact in another.
• Who will your research affect?
• Maybe no one. My hope, though, is that there is an increase in activity based on good equipment aesthetics, and that'll motivate others to use 'getting what they need' quickly to get themselves un-stuck. Additionally, I'd like to justify my own motivation-based spending habits.
• How will your research affect your own situation?
• I mean, hopefully I'll pass the class. Also, next time someone asks me if I /really/ need a new pair of running shoes, I can have a sweet comeback with data to back it up waiting in the wings.
• What other situations or contexts will your research affect?
• Maybe this will help motivate me and my fitness group to help us help ourselves and get good workout/food-making gear?
• Who does your research need to matter to and why?
• Probably only to my professor, and to myself, but that's okay. Sometimes your research can't be all things to all people. That's a pipe dream, textbook, and you gotta let it go.

Norman, D. A. (2004). Emotional design: Why we love (or hate) everyday things. Basic books.

Right now I have the prologue and chapters one and two, detailing how aesthetics play into better users (like how good aesthetics make people more happy, which makes them more creative, which leads to better problem solving. I haven't investigated the rest of the book and right now, I don't really plan to. If needed, tho, I'm sure the rest of his work will be super helpful in defining how aesthetics changes users.

Hassenzahl, M. (2008). The Interplay of Beauty, Goodness, and Usability in Interactive Products. Hum.-Comput. Interact., 19(4), 319–349. doi:10.1207/s15327051hci1904_2

This study comes the closest to the ideas of the "parent study, where in this case there is a distinction between "goodness" (in usability) and "prettiness". Like the next one down, this is done with usability testing, so it has nice science numbers to back up the testing. I still need to take a deeper read on this one, but it's going to help back up the visual rhetoric I have in the book above and apply it to something other than teapots.

McCormack, G. R., Friedenreich, C. M., Giles-Corti, B., Doyle-Baker, P. K., & Shiell, A. (2013). Do Motivation-Related Cognitions Explain the Relationship Between Perceptions of Urban Form and Neighborhood Walking?. Journal Of Physical Activity & Health, 10(7), 961-973.

This one is also super sciencey, but the result of it is that constructed environments do motivate people to walk outside more. I think this'll help back up the idea that environment gives extra motivation based on how "pleasing" it is to the senses. This is another win for aesthetics, and it has tables too! If we're supposed to worry about data or numbers to give advisers for program funding, this will make excellent back up evidence.

ENGL706 - Mind Map Links

Week One Coggle

Week Two Popplet