Learning Essay

In my initial hypertext I was more informal and still figuring out the program of Dreamweaver. Even during the first hypertext revision, my tone was more informal because I was talking about my video game experiences online. Over the course of the next hypertext I focused more on a clean presentation of the information because I wanted the information to stand on its own without a lot of design. Through my revisions of the second hypertext I found my tone becoming more formal because my goal was to inform the reader about the topic and to have them create their own opinions on the subject. During my final hypertext I turned to a more scholarly tone, but kept the same design through the second hypertext. I felt a clean presentation for an academic webpage would highly the information I was presenting rather than distract the reader who would be look through the site. My final hypertext I tried to make as formal as possible, which was difficult due to the webpage format.

For the final hypertext, the annotated bibliography and review of the literature helped to shape the premise of my linear paper. The review of the literature helped to show what I could contribute to the subject area without repeating information that was already known. Both the annotated bibliography and review made it easier to create a linear verison of the final hypertext. I felt it was easier to come up with the linear version after completing the hypertext because I could just rearrange the webpages into paragraphs and just add the transitions. It was difficult at times though because I am so used to writing in a linear format and I found it hard to break that generic way of writing. Sometimes I would get hung up on just trying to find the right word rather than just writing out the whole hypertext and editing later on. On the final hypertext I did add more pages as I began to think about the linear verison and what it would have to look like.

For my civic engagement project I planned to focus on body image in regards to teenage girls in high school and how the media influences self esteem and self image.  My original goal was to draw more attention to the subject because I feel young girls suffer more because friends and parents especially do not take notice to destructive behavior.  I want my project to bring awareness forward to individuals who would have the most influence over a young girls’ self image (such as the parents) and show young girls they do not have to be “model thin” with big boobs and butts to be beautiful. I created my video to hopefully show friends, parents and the teen girls themselves that they can be beautiful without having to become a victim of eating disorders and other unhealthy behaviors.

"The purpose of critical thinking is, therefore, to achieve understanding, evaluate view points, and solve problems. Since all three areas involve the asking of questions, we can say that critical thinking is the questioning or inquiry we engage in when we seek to understand, evaluate, or resolve." Maiorana, Victor P. Critical Thinking Across the Curriculum: Building the Analytical Classroom. 1992.

I think this quote applies to my experience in composing this hypertext, as well as the others. I felt that planning my webpage and finding sources were relevant to the critical thinking process because I had to find what I needed to create the webpage so it could be used as a resource to a reader interested in my concerns about body image. My engagement in these projects differed from other critical thinking because the hypertext were in a different format and I needed to essentially think outside the box in terms of presenting the information.

"Critical thinking is the use of those cognitive skills or strategies that increase the probability of a desirable outcome. It is used to describe thinking that is purposeful, reasoned and goal directed - the kind of thinking involved in solving problems, formulating inferences, calculating likelihoods, and making decisions when the thinker is using skills that are thoughtful and effective for the particular context and type of thinking task. Critical thinking also involves evaluating the thinking process - the reasoning that went into the conclusion we've arrived at the kinds of factors considered in making a decision. Critical thinking is sometimes called directed thinking because it focuses on a desired outcome." Halpern, Diane F. Thought and Knowledge: An Introduction to Critical Thinking. 1996.

This quote also applies to my experience in creating this hypertext because I had a vision of a desired outcome, which shaped the creation of the final hypertext and the final video. I had to consider who my audience would be so I could provide background information as well as insight to the issue to allow the readers to formulate their own ideas on the subject and hopefully take action on their own.

I can definitely use the Dreamweaver skills for other classes I still have here at SCU, but I can also use them for Marketing and web design, which is a potential career I’m going to pursue.  Planning and creating a website is even something I could do for fun and I may use my first hypertext project and expand on it over the course of the summer.  In terms of writing and research, being able to write for a webpage has helped me break out of the stereotypical structure of writing (into, paragraphs, conclusion, etc.).  It was much easier to write a webpage, getting all the words out on one page and then sifting through the ideas and organizing them, rather than trying to get thought 1 out, then 2, etc.
I think most classes here at Santa Clara, especially in the business school, should focus on using technology (like Dreamweaver and others) because that is the medium of choice for users today.  This class has prepared me with skills that I can use in the future because everything moving forward will be using online media, at least in the field of work I plan on going for.

I can only hope that my civic-engagement website could be used as a resource to someone who has been affected by the issue or would recommend it to someone else as a discussion piece. I mostly aimed my civic-engagement project at individuals who have control over the issue (parents and friends) and its influence on adolescent girls. I think someone would use my site as a resource and insight to a deeper issue that is growing, not only in the United States, but in the world. While the main audience for my site was parents and friends of young teens suffering from negative body image, I wrote personal stories as a way to speak to those who may also be suffering from the same feelings. My goal would be to inform adolescent girls of how the media controls what they perceive as beautiful and to show them to question those beauty standards that have been created for them.

My ideas of research writing has changed because I found it can be fun. It seems funny, but I just needed to learn how to find a subject I have passion for and it made doing to research and the writing easier. Learning about hypertext composition also taught me to just write out everything that I am thinking. As I remember Marc saying, "Just write, don't think" and it is completely true. I learned that I just have to write and worry about word choice, structure and grammar later.

I did participate in the revising of the group screenplay.  We kept changing the script up until we finished the machinima video and even then I felt we had done too much editing where the video didn’t really make sense anymore (but I let the writer do what he wanted with his work because it was his).  After reading about intellectual property and authorship for the class, I have changed my perspective on copyright.  Before this class, I supported intellectual property because it protects someone’s unique idea or process (like a patent for technology).  However, now I think intellectual property holds back progress and makes everything more difficult at all ends of the technological and societal spectrum.  Honestly, I think intellectual property rights were created to protect the United States because we can only offer the world our ideas since we really don’t produce anything else that is useful.

I personally love informal writing because it gives me an opportunity to show who I am as a writer and individual using my own voice instead of stagnant academic format.  Informal writing enhances my learning because it allows me to more freely get my ideas down on paper for me to go through to organize rather than struggling over getting the introduction written before I can start that actual paper.

I tried to keep my webpages clean and easy to navigate. I also wanted them to look pleasing, but wanted to keep the colors and design to a minimum as to not over power the text. I liked the idea of having a white background with colored text for the second hypertext because it resembled a paper, but with a webpage feel because of the font color and layout. For the final hypertext, I wanted the darker background to set the serious tone of the subject and so the photos would stand out on the dark backdrop.

If I was to continue working on my site, I would have gone back and edited my first hypertext so the layout was similar to the last two. I think I could have made the presentation of the personal hypertext more clean in comparison to the second one. If I were to do a fourth hypertext I think I would use a similar layout to the second hypertext, but try to vary the page layouts throughout the site for visual interest. As for a subject, I would want to focus on another online gaming issue (at least I'm sure I would pick something like that). I would have liked to do more personal hypertexts through the course of the class and would want to create another one for the personal homepage if I had a chance.

I think any of my Marketing classes would benefit from a website final project because the skills I learned apply to Marketing in the business world. The class I am thinking of specifically is Marketing Across Cultures. Knowing how to create websites that appeal to multiple areas of the world is extremely important, especially for international companies.

My first hypertext has 13 individual pages with an average of 4 internal links per page and 3 external links for the whole site. This includes 3017 word of my own writing, and pictures I have taken while playing World of Warcraft.

My second hypertext (Gender in Cyberspace) has 10 individual pages, including the review of the literature and annotated bibliography. There are an average of 4 internal links per page including the 3 standard links and no external links (except the one leading to the ENGL 138 class website). This site includes 2460 words of my own writing, with an 8-item annotated bibliography with links to three online sources and five library-based resources. I included a video as well, separate from the video we produced in class because our class video had been pulled down from Youtube.

My final hypertext (Body Image in Teens) has 16 individual pages, including the annotated bibliography and review of the literature. Each page has an average of 5 internal links per page including a navigation bar of links (ranging from 3 to 4 per page) with 1 external link. It includes 3361 words of my own writing, plus a 2830-word printable verison and an 8-item annotated bibliography with two links of online resources and six library based resources. This site also includes a video produced by myself and embedded on one of the webpages.