MY ENGLISH SCHOOL PROJECT
CELLPHONE USE
Annotated Bibliography
Freed Richard. " Why Phones Don't Belong in School". Huffingtonpost.com. Apri 12, 2016.
Jan 24, 2018. https://www.huffingtonpost.com/richard-freed/why-phones-dont-belong-in-school_b_9666730.html
A teacher said that students use their phones in class for "digital amusement". So many students use their phones in class now that it is hard to tell them to put it away because it would be almost every student. Schools who ban phone use have higher test scores than schools who do not. Students who do not use their phones write down more notes than students who do. Teachers believe students are safer when they do not use their phones than when they do. This article is viable because it uses articles from newspapers to back up the facts they use. The author is a psychologist and a counselor.
Schaffhauser01/20/16, Dian. “Research: College Students More Distracted Than Ever.”Campus Technology, campustechnology.com/articles/2016/01/20/research-college-students-more-distracted-than-ever.aspx?m=2.
This person believes that students check their phone on average of 11.43 times during class. Believes most of the time it has nothing to do with what is going on in the classroom. In 2013 30 percent of people stated that they use their phone during class. They use their technology to stay connected and fight boredom.
“The Age of Distraction: Getting Students to Put Away Their Phones and Focus on Learning.”Faculty Focus | Higher Ed Teaching & Learning, 23 May 2016, www.facultyfocus.com/articles/teaching-professor-blog/the-age-of-distraction-getting-students-to-put-away-their-phones-and-focus-on-learning/.
Most students don’t multi-task well. Lose much of the talked about studies in class if they are on their phone. Most students and their technology have become inseparable so they will never get off the phone even if it is something important going on in the class. This is a problem because most students believe they can be on their device and still learn to their full potential as well
“Texting and Tweeting in the Classroom: How Do They Impact Student Learning?”ScienceDaily, ScienceDaily, 4 June 2015, www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/06/150604141531.htm.
Instructors are now in a competition with devices over students attention. Students who text and tweet and go online in class tend to recall less than a student who does not. Students who use their phone for school related things score higher on multiple choice tests that students who do not. Students who tweet or send messages at a higher frequency tend to take less notes and miss things than those who don’t.
PLUTOCRACY
OTHER PROJECTS
DOES TRUTH REALLY MATTER?
Does truth really matter? I believe truth does matter in a society where lies are far too common. We are at a place where people lie to get ahead of everyone else. In one of the articles headlines "Trump made 2,140 false or misleading claims in his first year in office" the title shows you that even presidents make lies to help their campaign and get more followers or to be more appealing. I believe the truth is important because it brings more trust to people and whether you like the truth or not it is always a good thing to tell the truth. When you lie you can get caught up in the lie and make more lies and then you can spiral out of control. I believe the truth will always be found out one way or another. I believe lying is easier to say than the truth which is why people lie a lot (The Washington Post).
One reason that you should tell the truth and not lie is because lying can get people hurt. An example that we talked about in class is a news article was published by a known Fake News website about how Hillary Clinton was using a pizza shop for cover of child porn. One person saw this article and decided he would take law into his own hands and he went to the pizza shop and started shooting the place up. Even though no one was hurt it could have been a way worse incident. Another example is the Pope Francis was said to have endorsed Trump's presidential
campaign. This made many Americans mad until the Pope himself spoke and said he did not endorse trump and that the news was fake. This news was not as serious as the pizzeria news but it still shows how effective fake news really is. One reason there is even fake news is because people who are extreme left or right want to make fun of or be humorous of the other party and they do it as a joke but people believe it so they begin to see a way to make a wave and cover the truth and try to shame or hurt the reputation of a person (nytimes.com).
In a place where Fake News is so popular it is hard to be able to identify which is fake and which is not. In an article by NPR they give you steps in how to identify or make easier to identify which is Fake News and which is real news. Step one is to look at the domain of the website. Real websites usually own their domain and end in .org, or .gov, .edu, .com. You should stay away from websites with domains as .com.co or read deeper into the website before you trust what is being said in the articles from it. Step two is to read the "About Us" page. You will be able to find out more about the people who run the website and see if it is viable or not. Steps three and four are look for quotes and see who said them. If it is a real news story there will most likely be quotes from people. Then you should google the quotes and see if they match up. Step five, you should read the comments. News stories get passed through social media so if there are many comments saying that it is fake then it most likely is. Step 6 is to reverse image search. Most pictures from reputable news articles you can search the image and the article it is associated with will come up as well. If you reverse image search it and the photo comes up with a totally different article than what you see it with then the article is most likely fake (NPR.inc).
Another way to lessen how much Fake News you see is to stay away from news stations who venture too far left or too far right. These types of stations tend to skew the news to favor the party or beliefs they believe in. News stations like The Blaze who are way to the right and Occupy Democrats who you can see by the name is way to the left. Reputable news stations to use are ones like CNN, Fox News, USA Today, The Washington Post, and so on who are at least when reporting news are in the middle of the railroad tracks and do not stray too far to one side more than the other (MarketWatch.com).
In conclusion I believe the truth is important. I believe it is important because a lie can get someone hurt. I believe people deserve to know the truth about things because it can make their mind up one way or another. Whether you are a Democrat or a Republican the one thing they have in common is that they want the truth. Lies can be taken way out of proportion and it is easy to share, and repost that it can get way out of control and have more people believe a lie than the actual truth. People need to be more aware of the articles or websites they read from because fake news comes in all forms. It becomes so easy to get pulled into the fake news even though a lot of the fake news you see is so outrageous that it is hard to believe someone would actually believe it
Citations
Davis, Wynne. “Fake Or Real? How To Self-Check The News And Get The Facts.” NPR, NPR, 5 Dec. 2016, www.npr.org/sections/alltech considered/2016/12/05/50358 1220/fake-or-real-how-to-self- check-the-news-and-get-the- fact
Kessler, Glenn, and Meg Kelly. “Analysis | President Trump Made 2,140 False or Misleading Claims in His First Year.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 20 Jan. 2018, www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2018/01/20/president-trump-made-2140-false-or-misleading-claims-in-his-first-year/?utm_term=.59d36698ca03.
Langlois, Shawn. “How Does Your Favorite News Source Rate on the 'Truthiness' Scale? Consult This Chart.” MarketWatch, 17 Dec. 2016, www.marketwatch.com/story/how-does-your-favorite-news-source-rate-on-the-truthiness-scale-consult-this-chart-2016-12-15.
Tavernise, Sabrina. “As Fake News Spreads Lies, More Readers Shrug at the Truth.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 6 Dec. 2016, www.nytimes.com/2016/12/06/us/fake-news-partisan-republican-democrat.html.
COMPARATIVE GOVERNMENTS ESSAY
"For the people, by the people" is what our country was and has been founded on. I believe our country has moved away from this slightly. While the best interest for the people is still at hand I do not believe it is decided by the people. I do not believe our government has strayed far from a Constitutional Democracy but I do believe it has changed quite a lot from when our government was founded. I believe our government in the United Stated is a Representative Democracy. A Representative Democracy is where an elected official represents a group of people.
I believe our country is a Representative Democracy in the sense that we have political parties of Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, or Independent party. Each party represent a different group of people who for the most part have different views and beliefs than the other parties. Citizens vote for said candidates in hopes to get their beliefs heard and used. This can come under attack because when a candidate gets elected other parties are obviously not happy and this can lead to the spreading of "Fake News" and fake news is the type of news that is used to misinform viewers and to cause mayhem. Fake news can be funny but if believed by the wrong person can be dangerous.
Some people believe our government today is possibly an oligarchy or a plutocracy. An Oligarchy is a form of Government that is run by a small group of people, and a Plutocracy is a form of government run by the wealthiest people in that country. I do not agree with this in the sense that the president is still Elected and he or she cannot buy his or her way into office. Presidential candidates have to run a campaign to raise money for their parties and if we were in a Plutocracy I don't think they would have to raise money because they would already be elected or they would have their money to use to win the election. Yes I think that everything lines up with a plutocracy but the president still does not have total power to do as he pleases and our government still has checks and balances from the other branches of government. Others believe our government is an Oligarchy but this cannot be true with the fact that the United States still has elections and people vote for their candidates to win. If the U.S. was an Oligarchy it would somewhat be like the queen of England and how her children will inherit the crown and the thrown. To stay away from this the United States added elections and added term limits to the president.
The Pros of a representative democracy are that it allows the government to act based on what the majority wants. This is why we have a party system with different parties with different views. Another pro is that it allows national level attention to individuals. An example of this is the feminist movement and the walk for our lives movement about gun control. Another example which I have stated before is that there are checks and balances to keep system fair. This form of government has worked for the United States for centuries and I do not see it changing anytime soon. I believe this keeps everything fair, and while nothing is perfect it can have its flaws. Some cons of this government is that gridlock can happen when representatives do not agree on some things. An example is when the government had its shutdown earlier this year. Another con is that there can be a super majority where 2/3 of the same political group rule. Another con is that representatives can act on their own and not by what the people they are representing want.
In the end I do believe our country is a Representative Democracy. Whether we have strayed from this some in either way I believe this is what we are and it is what we will be for a long time to come. I believe it is the safest form of government because there are checks and balances on each branch. No matter what form of party we have whether it is democratic or republican I do not believe they can change this government we have founded our country on. The United States was founded to get away from rule by a king or a monarchy, some believe we may be going back to that but our ancestors fought hard to get away from that I do not believe we will go back to that.
Citations
Lombardo. “Pros and Cons of Representative Democracy.” Vision Launch, 8 Sept. 2015, visionlaunch.com/pros-and-cons-of-representative-democracy/#.
“Oligarchy.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 27 Apr. 2018, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oligarchy.
Volokh, Eugene. “Is the United States of America a Republic or a Democracy?” The Washington Post, WP Company, 13 May 2015, www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/05/13/is-the-united-states-of-america-a-republic-or-a-democracy/?utm_term=.2ca23e903a95.
"SHOOTING AN ELEPHANT"
Have you ever been hunting? What was the biggest animal you have killed? Well George Orwell probably has you beat, imagine killing an elephant. George Orwell though he was not a hunter killed one of the worlds largest animals to ever walk the earth. It takes a lot to take another life even if it is just an animal. Animals are beautiful creatures so to take the life of one takes a lot of thought. George Orwell wrote many books from "Animal Farm", "1984", and "Shooting an Elephant". All of his books and stories were politically charged and showed the affects of totalitarianism and other oppressive governments and how they get started. He believes that people are more easily swayed into oppression because they are not aware of what is actually being said and what is going on
"Shooting an Elephant" is the name of a story George Orwell wrote about his time in the police force in Burma. A lot of people in Burma use Elephants because they are enormous to carry and haul things they need moved, which means Elephants are pretty common there. George Orwell was a police officer here in Burma under the Indian Imperial police force. As a police officer he had a lot of responsibility while also having a lot of people who worked for him. He had a lot of down time so he spent most of the times reading or talking with the villagers. He said he always felt as an outsiders so he did keep to himself a lot of the time. At one particular time an Elephant had gotten loose and was stampeding through the village. The search for the animal went on for awhile and George had almost given up because he thought the Burmans had made up the story. He was about to walk away when he saw someone dead lying on the ground with his face in the dirt looking like he had been smashed. George ended up finding the Elephant in rice fields so he went and asked for a gun. Everyone followed him to the Elephant which he thought was odd. He stated that he did not want to shoot the elephant. He ended up shooting the Elephant because he saw the look on the faces of the people who had followed him and he did not want to let them down and he also did not want to give them something else to hate him for. He stated in the story That this incident gave him a glimpse of how Imperialism worked. He said he understood the real reason why despotic governments act.
George Orwell often wrote about oppression and how to keep it from happening. In "Shooting an Elephant" Orwell always said how he hated his job because Egland oppressed these people and he stated that he was all for the Burmans and against the oppressor. George Orwell felt the only reason he was in Burma was to oppress the people there. He said that as a police officer you got to see the real conditions of the oppressed, the prisoners sad and grey faced, the scars on their bodies from being whipped. He stated that he was torn between his hatred for the Empire and his rage against the Burman people who treated him bad for being there. He stated that he could see how people can easily get oppressed because they let it happen. He said by doing what he knew the people wanted him to do he would be in their good graces. Orwell also said that with doublespeak people are giving in to oppression without even knowing it.
The Spanish Civil War was fought from 1936-1939. The fight was between the loyalist and the nationalists. The loyalists were backed by the Soviet Union and European democracies and the nationalists were backed by the fascist governments if Germany and Italy. This war was were Adolf Hitler newly in power tested his illegal weapons of war. George Orwell fought in the war because he wanted to fight against fascism. He had a police background so he was quickly promoted to corporal. The unit that Orwell was in did not see much action so Orwell said he wanted to be switched. During this time Orwell felt the communists were friends and had no problems with them. At one point the communist press had propaganda out about how POUM (Partido Obrero de Unificacion Marxista) were collaberating with the fascists which made Orwell see the communists different. Orwell ended up getting injured by a sniper when he returned to the front and was declared unfit for service from then on. The loyalist ended up winning over the nationalists and after this Orwell went back to his home in England. When Orwell had returned he and his wife who also went to Spain to help the war effort were charged with extreme Trotskyism.
In conclusion the experience in "Shooting an Elephant" was a defining moment in Orwell's life for the reason he got to see oppression working first hand and also how oppression even starts and its motives by in how it acts. George Orwell states that the British Empire is dying and will soon be replaced, whether it be by the Soviet Union or Adolf Hitler's Nazi Germany. Orwell fought in the Spanish Civil War to fight against fascism and he has written books to help people understand the consequences of becoming oppressed. He wrote books like Animal Farm, 1984, And this short story Shooting an Elephant that are all politically charged to hopefully get people to understand the reality of oppression and other terrible forms of government. George Orwell's writings are still applicable today because it shows people how these governments work and he somewhat gives instructions on how to not get caught in these forms of government. He made a very important message when talking about oppression saying "Don't let it happen."