Post 12: Most Interesting Concept About the Importance of Play

In my opinion, the most interesting concept about the importance of play is that it develops people, specially infants, not only physically, but also mentally. Children can become the most curious, creative, and innovative living beings while developing if allowed by their parents. In today’s society, infants have nearly completely lost all of their freedom to play and develop necessary skills for their future. Parents are now providing their infants with technological advancements to entertain them; the consequence of this act is that kids are becoming extremely dependent on technology and lack social and professional skills obtained just by playing outside. As altercated by Doris Pronin Fromberg in her article “Play and social interaction in middle childhood: play is vital for a child's emotional and cognitive development. But social and technological forces threaten the kinds of play kids need most," parents are ignoring the importance of freely chosen play and the opportunities are now narrowed for infants. Children have lost most of their play time to dancing, music, and video games. Playing outside can influence infants enormously and contribute to their emotional, social, physical, and cognitive development; but it has often been ignored or addressed to the minimum by their guardians.  

Post 11: Time Management & Procrastination

I would honestly like to use this free choice post to talk about procrastination and how frustrating it is to me to realize how bad I manage time sometimes...

As a college student, I expect myself to be able to manage time well enough, that I can keep up with my academic goals and also my life outside of school. I feel frustrated how sometimes I find myself wasting valuable time doing nothing or just being lazy, knowing that I could be doing something productive. I doubt I'm the only one that just procrastinates all week, whenever I can, and then rushes all weekend trying to keep up with all compromises and trying to finish all assignments; something I could have easily done slowly during the whole week. As of right now, one of my mayor academic goals is to stop being so much of a procrastinator and to get myself to manage time correctly; so that I don't have to rush at all times.

Post 9: My First Playground Experience

The first time I recall myself playing at a playground was when I turned 5. I remember my cousins and I running around playing in the monkey bars and "escondidijo," which translates to "hide and go seek," or it's similar enough. I was the youngest out of all 6 of us, but I was also the fastest one, which made my cousins always want to play with me. Unfortunately, while we were playing in the monkey bars, the girl I "liked" wanted to play with us. For obvious reasons, I said she could and started showing off to her, ha ha! Because I was the fastest one, I just wanted to race everyone so she'd be impressed with how fast I was. After racing a few cousins, I felt like I still had to impress her more, oh how I regret this! I started playing in the monkey bars with only one had, keep in mind I had done it before, just not in front of her. Before reaching the last bar, I accidentally fell and broke my right hand. It was the most impacting moment of my childhood life. Something I find funny is that even though I broke my hand and was in extreme pain, while my dad was taking me to the hospital; I stopped crying for a second and said: "Dad, I bet you 5 bucks that the girl liked me... yeah, she was impressed!" Ha ha!

Post 7: "Digital Nation" By Rachel Dretzin

The Internet has become an addiction to the majority of the people around the world. Initiating from the younger generation to our elders, cyberspace has become part of humanity’s way of life and a major dependency. The inquiry is whether or not the Internet is a harmful addiction. As contended in the film Digital Nation (2010) directed by Rachel Dretzin, it is a necessity that has led most students to become smarter and exceptional at multitasking. On the other hand, scientist and college professors believe that the habit of using the web can hinder people’s mental progress, especially students who appear to stay connected continuously. In my opinion, I believe that a proper combination of both ideals can lead to a convenient usage of the internet without having to eliminate it.

Post 6: “Is Google Making Us Stupid?: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains” By Nicholas Carr

In my opinion, Google is definitely not making us stupid. I is simply a search engine in which us, the students, or everyone in general, can look up important information and keep up with the world's biggest news and occurrences. Our problem is that we use it for the wrong reasons. 

 

Some of the wrong reasons can be either looking up opinion-based videos or articles that can change our beliefs or the way to view information. The biggest problem is, we believe that those articles are stating a fact and not an opinion. This can make us what some people would call “ignorant,” and cause them to blame Google for our own mistakes.

Post 5: "Gaming Can Make a Better World" by Jane McGonigal

In this video the author altercates  that humanity can be saved by maintaining an active life in the virtual world. This is because she believes that by playing video games people develop many skills that are necessary for our survival, such as extreme optimism, social fabric, productivity, and epic meaning. She states that "if we want to survive the next century on this planet, we must go from 3 billion hours a week to 21 billion hours a week," relating to how long we should play video games. McGonial's goal for the next decade is to try to make it as easy to save our world in the real life as it is to save it in the real world, and she believes that it is possible. I feel like the theme of the video is to point out that video games aren't harmful as many people believe, but they are actually necessary and substantial for a more peaceful environment and a better development of humanity. As stated by the author, gamers become "super-empowered hopeful individuals," and exceptional problems solvers. the key to our survival and solution to our problems.

Post 4: Fist College Experience

My first day in college was absolutely unexpected. Honestly, I was expecting classes to be a lot harder and more intimidating. I pictured college as a place where I would have to know everything before I even went to class, and that's what made me nervous. After my first class was over, I realized that college was nothing like I expected it to be, and that I actually enjoyed being in such classes and environment. Its ironic how my biggest dream since I came to America, which was to attend college in the U.S., was also the experience I was so nervous about. The freedom that you have as a college student helps you realize that time management is a lot more complicated when its all up to you. I guess you could say that attending college really is the time when you start "living in the real world." Budgeting your money, spending time wisely, and becoming a non-procrastinator becomes mandatory in college, it has to become a routine if you want to succeed. I'm looking forward to those challenges that can  lead me to a successful academic experience, which is my major goal in college.

Post 3: "Once More to the Lake" by E.B.White

E.B White created a really vivid and descriptive image of what it is/feels like to re-live a memory, especially the ones from childhood that can mark a person's life so deeply. Even more, when he  realizes that it has become a tradition; that the memories he had lived with his dad are now existent between him and his son. If I'm honest, I have to admit that I cannot relate to the wilderness or nature described in this story. I did not get to experience to visit a place like that. I have been in the wilderness, as I like to call it, but it is nothing related to what E.B White describes. In my opinion, the author describes being with his son and going back to the place where he used to go with his dad as a child; as something exciting, captivating, and to be proud of. I feel like the theme of the story is that a single memory or experience can thoroughly impact people's lives and adapt them to who they are and will be as a person.

Post 2: "Mother Tongue" by Amy Tan

The author of "Mother Tongue" describes how she grew up her entire life hearing her mother speak "broken" English and how used to it she was. It had gotten to a point where she spoke that same way and thought or felt that her mother's English was perfect/proper. Society made her realize that the English she was used to wasn't really understandable, or as she thought, proper. The author managed to bring back experiences and thoughts that I've personally had relating to my English and my family's English. I can actually relate to this a lot, as many people might already know. Although I have an accent, I feel like I speak somewhat properly. My English isn't broken, I just sound different. Ha ha! On the other hand though, my family's English can be considered broken but I can still understand them completely even when what they said makes no sense to any other person. I guess its because I know what they tried to say in Spanish and realize that they translated it in a way that doesn't make sense in English, but I completely get the idea of what they tried to say and many times correct them. I feel like the theme of the story is that people, including me, need to understand that not only our peers influence our way of expressing ourselves (talking), but our families have influence as well and it doesn't mean that our English is proper or perfect just because we're used to the way they talk.

Post 1: "Champion of the Wolrd" by Maya Angelou

The author of "Champion of the World" created a really vivid and detailed image of the moments lived by the African-American people. Even though the story is told from a little girl's perspective, she describes the anxiousness, nervousness, excitement, and hope that black people felt while listening to a boxing match, specially the ones that gathered at Uncle Willie's store. The boxer, Joe Louis, who was also black and viewed as a hero by all of them, was fighting a white man. The lost of this fight represented degradation to the African-American people. They felt that if he lost, the accusations of being "lower types of humans beings", and that even God himself hated them, were true. On the other hand, a victory would mean that they were the strongest in the world. From what I understood, the authors feels that if Joe Louis won, they were going to be more respected and that it would prove that white people weren't any superior to black people.