Falling Whistles

I put on a white shirt with the number 268 written, in black sharpie, on the front of it. On the back of the t-shirt it says, “I was one.” I was one of thousands that attended the Falling Whistles presentation in Emans Auditorium to listen to a young man’s message. Sean, came out on to the stage with such fire and excitement. He wanted to get to know us and wanted to share his story. Sean wanted to help us, help him make a difference in many young boys lives. He said, “They are too young and helpless to fight for themselves, so we must fight for them.” Sean and his interns were selling these beautiful, shinny whistles. But the story behind the gorgeous whistles was heartbreaking.

Sean was searching for adventure with a few of his buddies but instead they found a horrific war that was destroying the lives of young children in Congo. “It was an unspeakable hell.” Sean said. He told us the whistleblowers are children who are too young to carry a rifle. They instead are given a whistle and put on the front lines of the battlefield with instructions to blow their whistles so fiercefully that they will frighten the other army – instead they are unarmed human barricades who are shot to death by the opposing soldiers, or shot in the back by their kidnappers if they try to flee. These young children had no choice, no freedom.

When Sean returned back to the United States he decided he was going to do something. He was going to take action. He and a few of his buddies started from absolutely nothing and built an empire of voices that is growing larger and larger everyday. Sean and his army will stop the madness of hell in Congo and free the children.

What a Hypnotist can do to the Mind

At the beginning of the school year I had the opportunity to attend a campus event. It was an event for incoming freshman to meet new people and have a good time. My roommate and I went to a hypnotist show and had a wonderful time. I was shocked to see so many students at this event. It took place on a Friday night the first week of school. I was able to meet people from everywhere and made new friends. Everyone has a fear of not making friends when they first come to college because it’s such a huge transition for students. We go from small high school classes to extremely large college classes. This event helped me meet numerous people and I was able to see what a hypnotist could do to peoples minds.

The Hypnotist called around twenty people from the crowd up on the stage. They were placed in chairs across the stage in a row. The next thing you know they are all like passed out. None of them were moving and they did not know what was going on. I could not believe what was happening. I never really believed in this kind of stuff and I still have my doubts. Going to this show made me see what a hypnotist could do to the human body. I wish I had the opportunity to go up on stage and see if the hypnotist could hypnotize me. I was glad I made the choice to go that first week of school and meet many new friends. I suggest that all incoming freshman go to this event, if they want to have a good first weekend at Ball State.

Finding and Evaluating Sources

In chapter 5 we are learning on how to find and evaluate research sources. In order to do this you first need to know the topic, the conversation (how the topic is being discussed), and what the different position's are which is the research context. You can gather research from many different places such as, browsing the internet, looking through books and articles at a library, and even interviewing an expert on your topic. Research is like having a conversation, “ composing a response to an ongoing dialogue about a topic.” Research is also like building a relationship with the sources that you chose to use for your topic and the writers who wrote them that you seek along the way. The first thing that you have to do to start your research is look for relevant and interesting sources and then while looking them up you have make sure you use specific search terms. When finding sources make sure you don’t limit yourself to only certain types. There are two different types of sources, primary sources are original texts you analyze in your research paper and secondary sources are sources that provide commentary on your primary material or on your topic in general. Searching for primary sources you should look for original documents, rare books and manuscripts, portfolios of photographs, and government documents. Secondary sources come from dictionaries, library categories, electronic databases, electronic journals, and google scholar. When evaluating sources you have evaluate the author, source or publisher. You have to look for credibility, the arrangement of the text, and the website your information is coming from.

Drafting and Organizing

Drafting is a very important part in creating anything. Writing a research paper is almost just like making a film when it comes to organizing it and putting things together. In chapter 6 it says the first thing they say you have to do is find all of your resources and information you plan on using to write your paper and try and figure out how they relater to each other. One way you can organize your information is by creating a bubble web where you arrange your information into different categories using shapes and color. Another way that you are able to organize your information is by making graphic flowcharts. This where you list one of your ideas and draw arrows to show the cause and effect and relationship between other ideas. After you have done this you are able to make an outline by using all that information. Outlines help you put your information in order in a way that will make your paper flow from one idea to another. Making a formal outline consist of a detailed list that uses numbers and letters to indicate subsections of your argumentative paper. It also helps you create ides within the body to make your paper longer. Using subheads while making your outline help guide readers on what your arguing about, they are labeled headings for each subsection in your outline. After you are done with your outline you can start writing your paper. When writing make sure you have really good transitions to help your paper flow to the next idea.

Control Your Drinking and Partying #ShotsonShots

Our collaborative project is about getting college students to understand how much of an impact drinking has on their life. We want to get the message across to them that they need to stop or slow down on their drinking habits, because all of the consequences of drinking will end badly. One of the statistics we found is that one out of every four college students drinks alcohol. This, along with other statistics in our video, will hopefully influence students to cut back on drinking. We will be showing a slide show of pictures, statistics, and a video to our class to get the message across.

-Kaley, Katie, Katie, Megan, and Jordan

Freaky Fun Sports Teaching You The Benefits Of Sports

We've all heard about the various benefits of staying active and being involved with a sport, but have you ever seen a list that spells out the benefits right in front of you? Well, that's about to happen.

Tyra, Spencer, Scott, Sadorah, and Shane are proud to present Freaky Fun Sports, a site all about the benefits of various sports that you can be active in.

So, here's how this works. The home page of our site is all about the benefits of sports in general. This is what all sports have in common.

Then, there's a page for the individual sports of cheerleading, football, lacrosse, rugby, and swimming. On those pages, you'll find out how and why those activities are beneficial for those participating and fans alike.

The site is sure to be your new one-stop-shop for any information that relates to health questions and sports. Hopefully, you enjoy your stay at Freak Fun Sports.

Let's Get Started

On Thursday the 17 we all were working on our multimedia group projects. My group, we had our website up, but we weren’t sure on what our argument was going to be yet. We knew that we wanted to do something that involved with sports, but we weren’t sure yet on how to make an argument out of it yet. Mostly every group in the class were making a video for their multimedia project, so we were shown examples of what people did in the past years, which was very helpful in trying to figure out on how we should put our project together. Another thing that we had to figure out was how we were all going to be able to communicate with each other when we are not together. There were many different choices that we could have chosen from such as, a facebook page, setting up a gmail account, texting, and even skype. My group decided that we were going to communicate from gmail using Google docs because it is easier to access and we are able to communicate with each other and see all of the information we wish to put on the website. The last thing that all of our groups had to figure out was where we were going to get all of our information. We have the choice of getting it from the internet, but the professor suggested that we use our own material when it came to pictures just because of copyright issues.

How to: Evaluate Sources

In chapter five of Envision, we learned how to find and evaluate research sources and the right way to do so. The first thing someone must do is assemble a list of search terms/criteria about their topic. It is important to have quality search terms when researching sources. By having good search terms, you should be able to find quality, reputable sources for your specific topic. Scholars divide research into two categories: primary and secondary sources. Primary sources are original texts analyzed in your research paper and secondary sources are sources that give you commentary on your primary source or just on your topic in general. Finding primary sources can sometimes be labor some and tiring, but you can find these sources in the library in: general stacks, archives, or multimedia collections. It does take time to find sources that will be useful in writing your paper.

The most important thing a person must do is evaluate their sources. There are literally millions of websites and books these days on any given topic. When looking for websites as sources, look for sites that have .org or .gov as opposed to .com. These sites most of the time are reputable, trustworthy sites. Look at the layout of the webpage and how the site looks to you. It is fairly easy to tell if some nobody made this site or if it has a scholarly background and therefore good to use. When looking at academic sources, look at the author. Do some research on the author to see what they have written. Look at the location of publication. Also look at the date the book was published to see how recent it is. Lastly, look at the table of contents/index to see if this source will be useful to you or not. At the end of your work, you must have a works cited page. A works cited page gives credit to the author that wrote the piece you used in your paper. There are different forms such as: MLA, APA, and Chicago. A works cited page is a neccesity and will prevent you from being accused of plagiarism.

Group Collaboration Requires Collective Thought

This group project that we are currently working on is by no means my first assignment I've ever worked on in a group setting, and I'd be shocked if that's not the case for virtually everyone in the class. To be perfectly honest, it's not exactly a new rodeo, but this journal has made me take a closer look at what it takes to effectively work as a group, and that's what I want to break down right now.

1. Know your group - I think it goes nearly without saying that people that don't know each other won't work well together. That's why I think it's so important for members of a group to find common ground, even if that ground only relates to the task at hand. It seems to me that the number 1 most important thing is communication. If everyone has a defined role, and they're aware of it, group work will go far more smoothly than in a chaotic situation.
2. Voice opinions - We've all likely been in a group where 1 person throws out all the ideas, no one responds, and the group goes with those original ideas with little to no input from anyone else. I'm not saying that everyone in the group needs to be confrontational, but members of the group need to be willing to voice their opinions, and yes disagreement, if that's how they feel. After all, you don't want to be working with other peoples' ideas all the time, right?
3. Group think - What is better for the group? In a setting where we're all working on our own projects, what's best for us is best for everyone, but in a group setting, that all changes. As I mentioned above, communication is key, but that's worthless if no one is willing to compromise. Essentially, that's what this project is all about. We're developing the ability to put independent opinions together that form a product that is greater than the sum of its parts.

I hope this was helpful to someone. Just thinking about it as I write this is making me rethink some of what I've thought about the project. Happy Turkey Day everyone!

Geelhoed, Havitz Give Lecture About IU, MSU Cross Country Rivalry At BSU

On Thursday, November 17, Dr. Bruce Geelhoed of Ball Statue University and Dr. Mark Havitz of the University of Waterloo gave a lecture about the storied rivalry between the IU and MSU cross country teams of the 1940s and 1950s. The primary focus of the lecture was on MSU's legendary cross country coach, Karl Schlademan.

If Coach Schlademan's name isn't familiar to you, you're not alone. In fact, I had never even heard of the IU, MSU rivalry before the lecture, much less the coach of MSU's cross country team of the time.

Honestly, the lecture gave me a new respect for cross country as sport (one which I have been involved with in the past) and the genius behind Schlademan's coaching style.

While it may seem like a cold reality, college cross country coaching is all about grooming your start runners, and no one did this better than MSU in the 40s and 50s. Coach Schlademan had a demeanor that not only demanded respect, it gave it back as well. The result was the ability to recruit nearly any great runner in the nation, and it led to over a decade of dominance from the MSU cross country team.

While much of the early rivalry between IU and MSU went very much in IU's favor, Schlademan turned the fortunes of MSU around. Cross country was the first major sport that MSU achieved national dominance participating in, and Schlademan's coaching likely propelled the university into other sporting ventures. Schlademan's importance to the school can not be over-stated.

The lecture was the result of a summer worth of collaboration between Dr. Geelhoed and Dr. Havitz. It was informative in a very interesting topic that is often overshadowed by other, more popular sports, but it proved to be one of the best lectures of the semester.

Not so Glamorous

After I saw the movie Picture Me, it reminded me somewhat of my argument of the ideal body image; only this was focused on different motives. The story of Sara is not just a story based on her, but based off of the lives of others as well. Though it seems many people would do anything to be in her shoes, it is obvious they do not know what goes on behind the scenes. Sara did not choose modeling, modeling chose her. Sara took the adventurous road, going for the chance of a life time and opting out of college. She made more money in a day than more people make in a year, and even made more than her parents that had high end careers. It was fun for her at first, but after a while doing seventeen shows in two days, basically living on airplanes, making that much money was pretty much expected instead of a surprise.  Sara eventually went from being motivated by money to becoming stressed by it. She began feeling like she was constantly paying for everything, especially in her relationship. She began feeling somewhat lonely because she knew her friends would be graduating from college soon, while she is traveling around the world, but not really getting to see the world. The experience of a life time became not so appealing after she learned she was basically in debt to her agents. They pay for her plane tickets, living quarters, copies of her book, etc.; but it all adds to her debt. Essentially, the life she chose was just one big pile of stress. Though it was not necessarily a career that required large amounts of thinking so they (the models in the movie) say, they had many worries such as being taken advantage of by photographers and clients, getting booked for agencies, and having to perform at least seven times a day. Sara did not necessarily become bored with modeling, but she knew she wanted to do bigger things with her life. In sum, the career that everyone dreams of is not as glamorous as it looks.  

Collaborative Project

The past two class periods we have been discussing the Group Collaborative Project. Sometimes English exams are the hardest for me, so I was so glad to hear that this project will take the place of a final exam for this English 103 class. With this project, we could either choose to create a website or a video. Our project will consist of our group making a video. In this video we will give statistics of college students that have been injured or even died due to consuming too much alcohol. We plan on acting out a scenario in which this could possibly take place. Our goal after our audience watches our video is to inform them that if they choose to drink, then they need to do it cautiously. Consuming too much alcohol could possibly lead to death. No one wants to be the name that goes along with the horrible story of "that one kid that drank too much and died while he/she was away at college." We have been brainstorming ideas for the past week, and we cannot wait to start actually making the video. My group and I get along really well, so I am excited to work with them and see how our project will turn out.

How to Find and Evaluate Research Sources

In chapter five of Envision you learn how to find and evaluate research sources the right way. The first thing someone must do is construct a list of search terms over his or her topic. It’s important to have quality search terms when looking for sources. By having good search terms you will be able to find the best sources for your topic. Scholars divide research into primary and secondary sources. Primary sources are original texts you analyze in your research paper and secondary sources are sources that provide commentary on your primary material or on your topic in general. Finding primary sources can be difficult but you can find these sources in the library in general stacks, archives, or multimedia collections. It takes time to find sources that will be helpful in writing your paper.

The most important thing a person must do is evaluate your sources. There are millions of different websites and books out there on a certain topic. When looking at websites look for websites that have .ORG or .GOV these sites most the time are quality sites. Look at the layout and how the site looks to you. Most of the time it is pretty easy to tell if some random person made this site or if its a good safe site to use. When looking at academic sources look at the author. Do some information on the author and see what he or she has written. Look at the place of the publication of the book. Also look at the date this book was published to see how current it is. Last, look at the table of contents and index to see if this source will be helpful to you or not. At the end of papers you must have a works cited page. A works cited page is giving credit to the author that wrote the piece. There are different forms like MLA, APA, and Chicago. A works cited page is a must and will keep you out of trouble when it comes to plagiarism.

Invisible Children

Last night in the Student Center Ballroom at 7pm, the non-profit organization called Invisible Children came to Ball State University to get the word out about their story and what we, as college students, can do to help the problem. To give a little background, this group started when a couple of guy friends went to Africa for fun and they then found that children were kidnapped from their homes and forced into war and a life of hatred. After seeing these kids living like this, these men decided to do something about it. They made movies (one of which was showed last night), clothing, bracelets, accessories, etc. Also, besides creating this group and items for people to buy, they had plenty of fundraisers to raise money that goes directly to Uganda and the children.

After the movie was over, a man who lived in Uganda and was apart of this terrible world, came to speak to all of us. He was definitely heartbroken by this tragedy, but he's incredibly happy that all of us are willing to help and take interest in this issue. He was incredibly motivating and touching to hear. A "roadie" from Invisible Children was there and able to speak to us about what we could do and how we can get things started on raising money. There were booths set up from Raphahouse, Free the Slaves, Invisible Children, and a few other groups. It was a great night to learn about the unfortunate people in Uganda and how I can help. It was definitely worth going to and it really helped get the word out about this organization and problem.

Robert Abbott

At the tail end of October I had the chance to go and listen to a man by the name of Robert Abbott speak. Mr. Abbott is a founder of the show "E:60" and ESPN. It is a weekly sports documentary show that airs every Tuesday night. He, just like Mark Champion, pretty much just gave us information he sought fit for us to succeed in the Sports Broadcasting world. He went over ways to interview, set up lights, and tell a good story. The best part of his presentation I thought was the movie he showed. He has been working on a film for ESPN called "Roll Tide/War Eagle". It is a movie the documents the intense college football rivalry between the University of Alabama and Auburn University. The movie focuses at first on more of the history of the rivalry, but it quickly comes to present day. 2 years ago, Alabama had the Heisman Trophy winner and their team won the national championship. Oddly enough, last season Auburn had the Heisman trophy winner and they won the national title. The movies show the excellence of both programs and the hatred they both have for each other. He brought this movie with him because it was set to premier on November 8th, and this was the 1st time anyone had seen it. The world premier! It was fantastic. I took so much away from Mr. Abbott's visit. I also thought seeing the world premier of a movie was pretty sweet, and it was an incredible watch.

Mark Champion

In October, I went and saw a speaker by the name of Mark Champion. He is a sports broadcaster who specializes in play by play. He has done work in the past for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Detroit Lions, Michigan State Men's Basketball, and he is currently the radio voice for the Detroit Pistons. Mark is a Ball State Alumni and helped shape the way our telecommunications program is today. He told a few funny stories about his days working with the Bucs and Pistons, but mainly he was there to answer any questions we had about the telecommunication business. He gave us some insight on what the industry is like today and what things we should be doing now to get us ready. The main thing I took away from him was the advice he gave on what he need to do now. He told us to be ready to do any line of work in the telecommunication field. Whether it be on camera, behind the camera, or in the editing booth, companies now a-days want people who can do everything. And Ball State now trains us that way. I think getting people like Mr. Champion to come and speak with us is the most beneficial for us students. He is someone who has "been there and done that", and those are the types of people we should be talking with, we should be interacting with. I thank Ball State for the opportunity to speak with a professional, and I hope I will have more opportunities like this in the future.

Ladies and Gentlemen, David Axelrod

Despite the wind and rain David Axelrod still gave his anticipated speech at Emens Auditorium. David Axelrod was the Senior Advisor to the Obama administration. The bulk of the speech is telling stories about Barack Obama and the things tat happened before and during his presidency. He made a few jokes, like having to change the speech when he asked about people being their by choice or assignment. It went over pretty well.

He started by talking about the country’s economic crisis and what it was like to “inherit” them, so to speak. Just as they were coming into office economists came to President Obama and told him to they were facing a 1 in 3 chance that the country could fall into another Great Depression.

This knowledge helped the president to make his first big decision in office, the bailout of the auto industry. Axelrod told the audience how calm and concise Obama was at this time. His ultimate choice to bailout the industry was based on the 1 million plus jobs that could have been lost if the American automobile companies went under.

He also talked about Obama and Pelosi’s healthcare plan. The advisors all told him that it was an unpopular plan and he would get a lot of flak for it. But, Obama was so confidant is what he thought as right that he went on with his plan. As time shows, his advisors were right. However, Obama deserves credit for sticking to his guns.

I personally am not an Obama supporter, although by the end of the speech I do have a new-found respect for out president. Although I disagree with some of his policies, President Obama’s his ability to hear all the input from his advisors and still make a confident decision.

Easy Ways to Avoid Plagiarism

In chapter seven of Envision its main focus is avoiding plagiarism and documenting sources. Plagiarism is a big problem in today’s world for numerous different reasons. There are countless websites out there that have all sorts of information. The problem is people take other peoples writing and use it in their own writing. There is no problem with this if you cite the source. It doesn’t take long to cite a source and give that person credit for their work. If people had a better understand on how they could avoid plagiarism less of it would happen. Plagiarism can happen in the forms of writing, composing, and speaking. There are two main ways to avoid unintentional plagiarism, which can happen easily. First always keep in mind that you are contributing to a conversation with other writers. Next develop effective ways of note taking while reading through your sources.

When downloading images and multimedia it’s important to cite those sources also. It’s not acceptable to just give the URL. You need to spend time making sure what issues can occur. There are copyright and permission issues sometimes when dealing with images. Understand in-text citations can safe someone from plagiarism. There are four different forms of in-text citations: MLA, APA, CSE, and Chicago. The one used the most today is the MLA citation in papers. When you use someone else’s idea all you have to do is put their last name and the page number you got it from. This is an easy process so when the reader is reading your paper they can easily locate the source you used. There are all sorts of material out on the web and in books that everyone must cite. There are websites to help people cite sources correctly to avoid plagiarism. Plagiarism is a problem and easy thing to do on accident. When doing anything involving someone else’s work make sure to look up how to cite the source.