Reflection: My Journey Through English 104

It’s that time of year where we are overly excited that the semester is over. But now it is time to look back at all we have done and reflect upon whether or not we have improved from all of this hard work. English 104 at Northern Illinois University was not a blow off class by any means. There was a lot of reading, analyzing and reflecting to be done. So how did we benefit from this, or did we not?

This was my first ever English class where we addressed the significance of blogs. I was very unfamiliar with the purpose of blogs and how to be a successful blogger at the beginning of this course but all of these questions were definitely answered by the time the end of the semester came around.

Throughout this course we wrote multiple drafts before we finally put together a final copy. I believe this a major key in being a successful writer. As a writer when I began an assignment I would write whatever came to mind. Then, whenever my mind was blank I referred back to the assignment guidelines and had to change, add or delete some things in order to make sure I was following the assignment. Next, I would reread one more time before I left it alone for a couple days. After a couple of days I would come back and reread and sometimes I even realized what I had made no sense. Finally after writing and rewriting I had a final draft to turn in. In this class we had to turn in a hard copy to our professor and an electronic copy on our class blog. The professor would return our hard copy with many suggestions on how to improve. I always found her suggestions very helpful. The main thing I noticed about my writing through instructor feedback was that I tended to add a lot of unnecessary words or phrases that I thought made me sound more intelligent. My professor helped me realize that these words or phrases were not making me sound more intelligent but in fact were rather distracting to a reader. The purpose of posting an electronic copy to our class blog was for our classmates to comment on it and have conversations with one another. From the beginning of class the professor stressed how important it was to read each other’s writings and create a sort of blog atmosphere. However, I feel as though our class failed miserably. According to the syllabus, when we posted anything on our blog we were suppose to comment on two other posts. While many of us did this, the comments were often just “good job I can relate to what you were saying!” But I believe this did not give the writer any feedback on ways to improve or what he/she was doing well. Therefore, I did not see our class blog very helpful at all when helping me with revisions. However, I did find our class blog helpful when it came to prewriting strategies. I often found myself stuck or lost on where to begin an assigned topic. I often would go on our class blog and read my classmate’s assignments to see what they were doing well or what seemed as though it wasn’t following the assignment at all. This was often extremely helpful because it led to ideas of where to begin for my own assignment and what to try and stay away from.

I believe my writing has improved a lot this semester. I already mentioned that my professor gave me insight on how I was distracting my readers with the use of unnecessary words and phrases but in addition to this I believe I improved a lot more. Throughout this course I really understood the importance of word choice. For example in my third encounter, Time to Enter the World of Bodybuilding, I started off by saying “an upcoming issue in American society is how overweight our society as a whole is becoming…” the issue with word choice here is the word upcoming. Obesity in America has been a problem for a while now and is not an issue that is about to be addressed, it has been addressed. I knew this when I was writing but I was trying to say it was a major issue that is becoming more and more well known. Therefore the word upcoming should be replaced with a more proper word choice of recent or drastic. Another way I improved my writing from this course was that I really tried to break down what I was saying as much as possible. My professor constantly iterated “imagine as if I am constantly saying why, why, why as you are writing.” This really helped me when I was writing because it made me think of why this particular part is necessary to put in my assignment. I believe I really demonstrated this in my article one. I ended article one by summing up all my points. For example, “OSBG is still educating its students … (how/why)… Each student is benefiting from the education they are receiving … (how/why) … they [are] bettering themselves and their community… (how/why).. they are building their community back up from the disaster” Here I added in how/why to show that I was breaking down my writing to important factors. I believe the new strength I found in my writings was writing narratives. I find writing narratives is much easier than any other form of writing and I never realized that this in fact was one of my strengths. I find that I often struggle with writing, mostly on getting started. I never know where to begin or how to begin when writing assignments. I dealt with this issue in different ways. First I already addressed one way, where I referenced our class blog to read other classmates assignments and try to spark ideas that way. Another way I dealt with this issue is constantly thinking about the assignment. This lead to me not even working on the assignment but an idea just popping into my head and I would then send an email to myself what the idea was in order to not forget it. Then when I got home, I would start typing it up in Microsoft Word and when I was stuck again I would stop. This might sound crazy but I actually got a lot of ideas for assignments when I was out and about and not even near any of my English material. I would say that I did notice improvement in my writing because I believe my writing started to have life and not just be dull and boring.

Now that the semester is over I can look back at my time in English 104 and say that I have improved as a writer. I now know my strengths and my weaknesses and how to improve from them. I am confident that I will take what I have learned here with me and apply it to any future writings I will do.

Artifact 2: Day in the Life

BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! It’s 4:05 a.m. he is half asleep and walks to the kitchen to gulp down a protein shake before he heads to the gym. I roll over and am glad to enjoy 2 more hours of sleep before I have to wake up for work. I support my husband on everything he does and I am glad that he is not part of the majority of Americans who are overweight but I do worry about his bodybuilding lifestyle that he has adapted to over the last couple years. He wakes up two hours early just to get a workout in before work, consumes an unhealthy amount of calories just to keep his weight up, and constantly deals with body issues. So yes, I am concerned that he will never be satisfied with the body he obtains, that in the long run something will go wrong with his health because of the lifestyle he chooses today, and that his hobby of bodybuilding for fun is now becoming a routine he cannot escape.

It’s now 6:15 a.m. and I am just getting out of bed and into the shower while Jarred, my husband, is returning home from the gym. He consumes yet another protein shake and injects himself with testosterone before he jumps in the shower. At 8 a.m. Jarred arrives at work for his job as a financial analysis and by 10 a.m. he takes a break in the coffee room to slurp down a protein shake and swallow estrogen blockers to keep his body from bloating. I like to think that Jarred’s hobby is not getting in the way of his career but it sure is getting in the way of our expenses. One major expense is the 5-gallon tubs of protein he constantly buys to mix with water to obtain his protein shakes. Also his suits for work are extremely expensive because he has to special order them through Von Maur or Nordstrom’s since Jos A. Bank does not accommodate people of his size, not that he is extremely huge, he is more fit than anything, he just has really broad shoulders.

Later that night as both of us are just sitting down to relax Jarred enlightens me that he will be competing in Ironman in a couple months. This is not his first bodybuilding competition but hopefully it will be one of his lasts. Whenever he decides he is going to compete, he goes into his bulking stage where he consumes an overload in calories, more than he already is. Then just weeks before the competition, he begins a cutting phase where he diets like crazy. I don’t know how much longer he is going to be obsessed with this hobby but hopefully not much longer. I would like to start a family within the next couple years…

Artifact 1: One Baby Step at a Time

Imagine a wave over taking your house. Destroying everything inside and around it. What would you do? What would your next steps be? Would you move and start over or rebuild what you at one point called home? A lot of families in New Orleans dealt with these exact decisions when Hurricane Katrina hit their town. Some families moved away and started over while others, with the help of many volunteers from around the country, helped rebuild the community. In the process of rebuilding the community, a school was created known as Our School at Blair Grocery (OSBG). This doesn’t sound like a typical school name and in fact this isn’t your typical school.

In Ari Le Vaux’s piece “A Different Education: Compost and Community, Not Literacy” he talks about how Hurricane Katrina has changed the community of New Orleans’s Garden District and how a school, OSBG, has now developed. Le Vaux informs us that “many of the students [at OSBG] can’t read [and] learning to read is not mandatory.” So you might be wondering, how is this a school? Learning to read and write are basic skills and building blocks for new material right? Can you even imagine what it would be like to live in our society without being able to read or write?

It’s important to remember what has happened to this community. It has been destroyed and the civilians were forced to start over from scratch. Obviously this school does not follow the average US education system but this school is not an accredited school. It’s the surrounding community that decides what needs to be learned and because of the disasters, it is more important for the students to learn certain survival techniques. In Le Vaux article the school founder, Nat Turner, “thinks worse disasters await, both natural and manmade.” Whether or not he is correct, it is good that the school is teaching and preparing its students for the future, which is what every school in the nation is suppose to do. Although this school is not accredited, OSBG is still educating its students just in a different way than what we are use to. Education is a very broad term and has multiple meanings. Trying to cover it all it a short definition, I would say education is the process of learning concepts that will eventually become the foundation to learn more in depth material in hopes of ultimately bettering oneself in the future. We all learned thing in high school that in college we reflect back on or build from, and we have been educated on things that will help us with our future and help us better ourselves. We all agree that having an education is the best thing for us especially in the economy we now live in. There is no better example then the economy that OSBG deals with. The economy they are in is a “food desert, without easy access to fresh produce.” Because of this, OSBG teaches its students how to plant, harvest, and screen soil in order to deal with this economy.

Yes, education can have many definitions but they are all very similar. Le Vaux defines education as the process where “student’s explore their interests, learn skills, and formulate and pursue goals.” I would agree with Le Vaux. We all attend school, especially higher-level education, to explore our interests, learn skills, and formulate and pursue goals. At school we are enhancing our skills and learning new material; and although all of us are receiving different educations depending on our interest/major, it’s still an education we are learning from a school. Just like at OSBG, where the students interest is to repair their community. Throughout our lives we take baby steps in learning new material. In order to benefit the most, we have to completely understand one thing before we move onto new material. Similar to at OSBG where the students are taking baby steps with rebuilding their community. The students have to have a stable economy before they can begin to learn what the average American student learns.
OSBG’s motto is to “create a resource rich-safe space for youth empowerment and sustainable community development” and this is exactly what it is doing. Le Vaux even puts in his article that “one current student is a former gang member suspected of vandalizing the school when it first opened.” However, now he is in school becoming educated on concepts that he will eventually build off of to learn more in depth material in hopes of ultimately bettering himself in the future. This student is bettering himself through education.

Although when you first read Le Vaux’s article you may be shocked by how this school functions; it’s important to realize that OSBG is still educating its students just in a different way than what we are use to. Each student is benefitting from the education they are receiving while they better themselves and their community. Eventually I would like to think that the community would build itself back up and the students would move on to learning reading, writing, math, and science like most high school students. But just like everything else, it takes one baby step at a time.

Day in the Life: The Sequel

THIS IS THE SEQUEL TO MY PREVIOUS POST:  DAY IN THE LIFE

BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! It’s 4:05 a.m. and I am half asleep as I stumble into the kitchen to gulp down a protein shake before I head to the gym.  It is important for me to get an early morning workout in because I have yet to eat breakfast so everything I do at the gym will burn unnecessary fat. My wife thinks I am crazy for getting up this early while she gets to sleep in for another 2 hours but she just doesn’t understand. She tends to get irritated about my hobby but I don’t see any harm in it; working out is just something I enjoy doing.  When I get to the gym, there is only a couple other people here but this is the way I like it.  This way I don’t have to wait to use certain machines. After a two-hour workout, it’s time for me to head home and get ready for work.

It’s now 6:15 a.m. and I just started the coffee maker for my wife as she just hopped in the shower.  Because of my workout, it jumpstarted my metabolism which in turn makes me wide-awake for the work day I have ahead of me. Muscles are made mostly of protein and water so as I am waiting for the coffee to be done brewing, I consume another protein shake. My wife gets out of the shower, comes and gets a cup of coffee and I give her a kiss on the forehead before I jump in the shower. At 8 a.m. I sit down at my desk and begin analyzing financial statements for a client I will be meeting with at 2 p.m. After two long hours of figuring out how I can make my client more profitable, I take a break in the break room to drink another protein shake and swallow some estrogen blockers to keep my body from becoming bloated.

Later that night, my wife and I are just sitting down to relax and I am thinking about how I am going to tell her that I will be competing in the Ironman in a couple months.  Not that my wife isn’t supportive, I think she is just getting tired of this hobby of mine.  She constantly complains that this bodybuilding lifestyle is getting in the way of expenses.  But it has taken me four years to obtain my desired body and I am not just going to throw it all away.  I make enough money being a financial analysis to pay for this hobby of mine and have a little extra spending cash.  So as thoughts begin to run through my head on how this was going to pan out I decide to just tell her, “Hunny, I think I am going to compete in Ironman in a couple months…” She just looks at me replies, “figures…” and looks away. Obviously I wished it would have gone better than this and I know all she really wants is to have a family. Soon enough she will….

Rewrite: One Baby Step at a Time

Imagine a wave over taking your house.  Destroying everything inside and around it.  What would you do?  What would your next steps be?  Would you move and start over or rebuild what you at one point called home?  A lot of families in New Orleans dealt with these exact decisions when Hurricane Katrina hit their town.  Some families moved away and started over while others, with the help of many volunteers from around the country, helped rebuild the community.  In the process of rebuilding the community, a school was created known as Our School at Blair Grocery (OSBG).  This doesn’t sound like a typical school name and in fact this isn’t your typical school.

In Ari Le Vaux’s piece “A Different Education: Compost and Community, Not Literacy” he talks about how Hurricane Katrina has changed the community of New Orleans’s Garden District and how a school, OSBG, has now developed. Le Vaux informs us that “many of the students [at OSBG] can’t read [and] learning to read is not mandatory.”  So you might be wondering, how is this a school?  Learning to read and write are basic skills and building blocks for new material right?  Can you even imagine what it would be like to live in our society without being able to read or write?

It’s important to remember what has happened to this community.  It has been destroyed and the civilians were forced to start over from scratch.  Obviously this school does not follow the average US education system but this school is not an accredited school. It’s the surrounding community that decides what needs to be learned and because of the disasters, it is more important for the students to learn certain survival techniques.  In Le Vaux article the school founder, Nat Turner, “thinks worse disasters await, both natural and manmade.”  Whether or not he is correct, it is good that the school is teaching and preparing its students for the future, which is what every school in the nation is suppose to do. Although this school is not accredited, OSBG is still educating its students just in a different way than what we are use to.  Education is a very broad term and has multiple meanings.  Trying to cover it all it a short definition, I would say education is the process of learning concepts that will eventually become the foundation to learn more in depth material in hopes of ultimately bettering oneself in the future. We all learned thing in high school that in college we reflect back on or build from, and we have been educated on things that will help us with our future and help us better ourselves.  We all agree that having an education is the best thing for us especially in the economy we now live in.  There is no better example then the economy that OSBG deals with.  The economy they are in is a “food desert, without easy access to fresh produce.”  Because of this, OSBG teaches its students how to plant, harvest, and screen soil in order to deal with this economy.

Yes, education can have many definitions but they are all very similar.  Le Vaux defines education as the process where “student’s explore their interests, learn skills, and formulate and pursue goals.”  I would agree with Le Vaux.  We all attend school, especially higher-level education, to explore our interests, learn skills, and formulate and pursue goals. At school we are enhancing our skills and learning new material; and although all of us are receiving different educations depending on our interest/major, it’s still an education we are learning from a school.  Just like at OSBG, where the students interest is to repair their community. Throughout our lives we take baby steps in learning new material.  In order to benefit the most, we have to completely understand one thing before we move onto new material. Similar to at OSBG where the students are taking baby steps with rebuilding their community.  The students have to have a stable economy before they can begin to learn what the average American student learns.

OSBG’s motto is to “create a resource rich-safe space for youth empowerment and sustainable community development” and this is exactly what it is doing.  Le Vaux even puts in his article that “one current student is a former gang member suspected of vandalizing the school when it first opened.”  However, now he is in school becoming educated on concepts that he will eventually build off of to learn more in depth material in hopes of ultimately bettering himself in the future. This student is bettering himself through education.

Although when you first read Le Vaux’s article you may be shocked by how this school functions; it’s important to realize that OSBG is still educating its students just in a different way than what we are use to.  Each student is benefitting from the education they are receiving while they better themselves and their community. Eventually I would like to think that the community would build itself back up and the students would move on to learning reading, writing, math, and science like most high school students.  But just like everything else, it takes one baby step at a time.

Day in the Life

BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! It’s 4:05 a.m. he is half asleep and walks to the kitchen to gulp down a protein shake before he heads to the gym. I roll over and am glad to enjoy 2 more hours of sleep before I have to wake up for work. I support my husband on everything he does and I am glad that he is not part of the majority of Americans who are overweight but I do worry about his bodybuilding lifestyle that he has adapted to over the last couple years. He wakes up two hours early just to get a workout in before work, consumes an unhealthy amount of calories just to keep his weight up, and constantly deals with body issues. So yes, I am concerned that he will never be satisfied with the body he obtains, that in the long run something will go wrong with his health because of the lifestyle he chooses today, and that his hobby of bodybuilding for fun is now becoming a routine he cannot escape.
It’s now 6:15 a.m. and I am just getting out of bed and into the shower while Jarred, my husband, is returning home from the gym. He consumes yet another protein shake and injects himself with testosterone before he jumps in the shower. At 8 a.m. Jarred arrives at work for his job as a financial analysis and by 10 a.m. he takes a break in the coffee room to slurp down a protein shake and swallow estrogen blockers to keep his body from bloating. I like to think that Jarred’s hobby is not getting in the way of his career but it sure is getting in the way of our expenses. One major expense is the 5-gallon tubs of protein he constantly buys to mix with water to obtain his protein shakes. Also his suits for work are extremely expensive because he has to special order them through Von Maur or Nordstrom’s since Jos A. Bank does not accommodate people of his size, not that he is extremely huge, he is more fit than anything, he just has really broad shoulders.
Later that night as both of us are just sitting down to relax Jarred enlightens me that he will be competing in Ironman in a couple months. This is not his first bodybuilding competition but hopefully it will be one of his lasts. Whenever he decides he is going to compete, he goes into his bulking stage where he consumes an overload in calories, more than he already is. Then just weeks before the competition, he begins a cutting phase where he diets like crazy. I don’t know how much longer he is going to be obsessed with this hobby but hopefully not much longer. I would like to start a family within the next couple years…

One Baby Step at a Time

Imagine a wave over taking your house.  Destroying everything inside and around it.  What would you do?  What would your next steps be?  Would you move and start over or rebuild what you at one point called home?  A lot of families in New Orleans dealt with these exact decisions when Hurricane Katrina hit their town.  Some families moved away and started over while others, with the help of many volunteers from around the country, helped rebuild the community.  In the process of rebuilding the community, a school was created known as Our School at Blair Grocery (OSBG).  This doesn’t sound like a typical school name and in fact this isn’t your typical school.

In Ari Le Vaux piece “A Different Education: Compost and Community, Not Literacy” he talks about how Hurricane Katrina has changed the community of New Orleans’s Garden District and how a school, OSBG, has now developed. Le Vaux informs us “many of the students [at OSBG] can’t read [and] learning to read is not mandatory.”  So you might be wondering how is this a school.  Learning to read and write is one of the most basic things right?  Can you even imagine what it would be like to live in our society without being able to read or write?

It’s important to remember what has happened to this community.  It has been destroyed and the civilians were forced to start over from scratch.  Obviously this school does not follow the average US education system but this school is not an accredited school. It’s the surrounding community that decides what needs to be learned and because of the disasters, it is more important for the students to learn certain survival techniques.  In Le Vaux article the school founder, Nat Turner, “thinks worse disasters await, both natural and manmade.”  Whether or not he is correct, it is good that the school is teaching and preparing its students for the future, which is what every school in the nation is suppose to do. Although this school is not accredited it is still doing its job by educating its students.

From past experiences I would have to define education as the process of learning concepts that will eventually be built off of to learn more in depth material in hopes to ultimately better oneself in the future.  We all learned things in high school that in college we reflect back on or build from and we have been educated on things that will help us with our future and help us better ourselves.  We all agree that having an education is the best thing for us especially in the economy we now live in.

Yes, education can have many definitions but they are all very similar.  Le Vaux sums up education as “when student’s explore their interests, learn skills, and formulate and pursue goals.”  I would agree with Le Vaux.  We all attend Northern Illinois University to explore our interests, learn skills, and formulate and pursue goals.  At NIU we are receiving an education; and although all of us are receiving different educations depending on our major, it’s still an education we are learning from a school.  Just like at OSBG, the students can only take baby steps because their entire community has been destroyed.

OSBG’s s motto is to “create a resource rich-safe space for youth empowerment and sustainable community development” and this is exactly what it is doing.  Le Vaux even puts in his article that “one current student is a former gang member suspected of vandalizing the school when it first opened.”  However, now he is in school and bettering himself for his future, which ties in with my personal definition of education.

Although when you first read Le Vaux article you may be shocked by how this school functions, it’s important to realize that OSBG is still educating its students just in a different way than what we are use to.  Each student is benefitting from the education they are receiving while they better themselves and their community. Eventually I would like to think that the community would build itself back up and the students would move on to learning reading, writing, math, and science like most high school students.  But just like everything else, it takes one baby step at a time.

Rewrite: Beauty Blog

Finding a blog that I was interested in was quite difficult; mostly because I am unfamiliar with blogs and had no idea where to start looking. First, I tried to Google “Blogs” but that didn’t really give me a specific blog just blog sites like WordPress!   I needed to take a different route so I started thinking about sites that I like that might have blogs on them.  Of course my favorite magazine, Cosmopolitan Magazine, was one of the first ones that came to mind.   Just like I assumed, there was a blog section and I chose to explore the blog of Beauty Tips & Tricks. Hopefully I didn’t just lose all the male readers!

Under the Beauty Tips & Tricks section there were six different categories to choose from; so I chose Hair.  This blog fits extremely well with the site since Cosmopolitian Magazine is all about sex, makeup, hair and beauty.  The Hair blog was started in October 2007 and when I viewed it, it consisted of 560 threads.  At first I didn’t think 560 threads was a lot, but then I realized how many new things could you really say about hair?  Also after further exploration, I realized that under each of the 560 posts there were even more comments about hair.

So I began scanning the comments.  The first thing I noticed is that nobody got off the topic of hair, which is essential in effective web communication because all of the other commenter’s are on the blog to talk about hair, not anything else.  Also, I noticed that everyone shared their own tricks about hair, asked questions and advice, and gave answers to other fellow bloggers. In addition, the original poster came back frequently and continued the conversation with either a thank you or an additional question, which is important in effective web communicating.

Although this blog is viewable to the public, you need to create a free account by creating a username and password and give your email address in order to post or comment. By forcing bloggers to create this account, it filters out those who will just comment once and never view again because it’s just a hassel for those who don’t care and wont come back.  This is an important feature that many blog sites follow and is important in effective web communicating because you want bloggers who will continue conversation and have an input of the topic.

One thing I really like about this blog is that under a user’s comment you can see exactly how many times that user has posted and/or commented.  This is a good feature because it allows you to get a feel on how active people are on the blog.

To wrap everything up, effective web communicating can be obtained if commenter’s register to the blog before they can leave their input, the original posters and other commenter’s need to check back frequently and continue in conversation, and the comments need to stay on topic.

Time to Enter the World of Bodybuilding

An upcoming issue in American society is how overweight our society as a whole is becoming but should this be our only concern? Or should we also worry about those who take staying in shape to excessive measures? How many of you are aware of contests like Mr. Olympia or Mr. Universe? All of these competitions as well as many others consist of extreme body builders, those who take working out beyond healthy measures.

When I began my research, I was already well informed about the topic of bodybuilding because it happens to be my boyfriend’s passion.  While researching I came across two helpful websites. The first one being fitnesshealthzone.com and the other one being bodybuilding.com.  As I began browsing both of these sites, I realized it was easy to find exactly what I was looking for.  Both of these sites promote healthy lifestyles, bodybuilding, and other products like supplements and protein powder. However, their credibility remains because supplements and protein powder are a necessity for any extreme bodybuilder.

Attempting to draw its viewers in, fitnesshealthzone.com has pictures of famous bodybuilders. The number one bodybuilder, according to this site, is Arnold Schwarenegger.  Before he became Governor of California he was named Mr. Universe at 22 years old and also won Mr. Olympia seven different times. These are extreme accomplishments and are what every extreme bodybuilder dreams of and this site uses him as well as other top bodybuilders to help establish trust among its audience.

Similar to fitnesshealthzone.com, bodybuilding.com draws its viewers in by giving a list of strategies to follow in order to obtain this god like figure.  One of the strategies the site mentions was the need to consume double your bodyweight in grams of protein every day.  If you are unaware of how much protein one should consume a day this might not be too shocking.  But according to cdc.gov, another website that will help draw the line between staying healthy and taking extreme measures, a male 19 years old and older should only consume 56 grams of protein a day NOT double his weight. Although these two sites contradict each other, the trust from the reader still remains because bodybuilders are known for their infamous protein shakes. Clearly it takes extreme measures to expect extreme results.

Most girls are dreamy over guys with six packs and defined biceps.  So when does working out go to the next level? Yes, these extreme bodybuilders are athletes who expect ultimate results.  They expect to go further than the average man.  They desire to look “juiced out,” “bulked out,” and as if they mean “serious business.” Working out is no longer an activity or hobby for them it became a lifestyle.  So when does bodybuilding or staying fit become unhealthy, where is the line drawn, and what side effects are associated with these “hulk like” men? Stay tuned and the answers are sure to come!

Beauty Blog

Finding a blog that I was interested in was quite difficult; mostly because I am unfamiliar with blogs and had no idea where to start looking for a blog. First, I tried to Google “Blogs” but that didn’t really give me a specific blog just blog sites like WordPress!   Even though that wasn’t very helpful, I started thinking about sites that I like that might have blogs on them.  Of course, Cosmopolitan Magazine was one of the first ones I thought of.   Just like I assumed, there was a blog section and just to keep everything appropriate I chose Beauty Tips & Tricks to explore more. Hopefully I didn’t just lose all the male readers!

Under the Beauty Tips & Tricks tab there were six different categories to choose from.  I decided to go with Hair, which at that time had 560 threads.  At first I couldn’t decide if that was a lot but then I realized this blog has been up and running since October 2007 so almost 4 years and only 560 posts!! This is not a lot at all! However after further exploration, under each of the 560 posts there were more comments so that was a relief!

Without being a member you are only able to view what everyone said; so in order to post or comment you would have to create an account. On the upside, the account is free! In order to sign up all you have to do is create a user name, password, and give your email.  Therefore, I don’t think this affects the kind of comments they leave.

One thing I really like about this blog is under a user’s comment you can see exactly how many times that user has posted and commented.  I think this is a good feature because it allows you to get a feel on how active people are on the blog.

I found that the original poster came back frequently to check what others said and to comment back.  Also, I believe that the nature of the conversation followed the website.  Cosmo is all about sex, makeup, hair, and beauty so I feel if the comments wouldn’t go along with the site you wouldn’t even be on the site in the first place.

All in all, in order to have effective web communicating blog commenter’s need to register before they can leave their input, original posters along with other posters need to check back frequently and continue in conversation, and the comments need to stay on topic.  Staying on topic is especially important because all of the other commenter’s are mainly only interested in or well informed on that topic which is why they spend so much time on the blog in the first place!