Overview of the Semester and Finals

One down, four to go. 

I managed to finish my Globalization 101 Final Paper today. The thing with this class is that it’s relatively easy. I don’t pay attention in class or anything but the material is easy. The readings are easily understood and the class itself, although boring, is a given to me. The paper was really easy to write overall. The only problem I had was that the topic question was really general and I had so much to write about. I’ve had three papers due before the final and for all of them, I start off being really nervous but then as I write I realize that I have a lot to say. The teacher for this class is awful nice and so I’m not nervous. I’m doing well grade-wise and I need a…26/30 on my final paper to get an A in this class. I would be doing better if I had known what the countries in Africa were. O well! I feel somewhat confident about my paper. I started pretty well but rushed at the end because I was running out of time and still had so much to say. I’m just glad I finished it. 

FRENCH 309: I’m going to miss this class. The teacher is way cool. He goes on tangents a lot and sometimes it seems random but we all learn a lot. He told us he’s going to move to California next year or something. That sucks, I was hoping he would be teaching another course here that I could take. Maybe he’ll get a job at Berkeley or something and I can take his course there when I’m there for grad school! Even though my masters’ll be in East Asia Studies. Ah well, wishful thinking. Anyway, finals wise, we have a test. I don’t think it should be too bad. The teach said that he’ll send out a list of what we need to study. I’ll be going through the book and making a final run-through of all the vocab and grammar anyway so yea. Grades-wise, I don’t think I’m doing too bad. I’ve been doing OK with all my writing assignments. My quizzes suck but they’re not THAT bad. Well…yea let’s just leave it at that. So I might be getting an A in this class. I’m going to really try hard and get a perfect, OK almost perfect, on the final exam. Yay!

HONORS 130: Ermm…yea…I’m just happy that she cancelled class today and our last class ended up being last Wednesday. I just really, really disliked the class. It was like…a philosophy class. I guess, I don’t really know how to categorize it. But anyway, some of the readings were interesting enough, when I understood them. Even when I didn’t understood the readings right away, I knew that the stuff she talked about in class had nothing to do with the readings. How do I know? Because I had to reread a majority of them for the papers I had to write in her class. She introduced a lot of interesting overarching ideas but she never went into them or linked them to our class (Conceptions of Self). Ok, “othering,” a very interesting concept…and? Our final is a 10-12 page paper on a topic of our choice. I think I’m going to write about othering and how it is a two way street. Those who other others (ha!) are also othered by those others (double ha!). WHAT? Yea I don’t know. It sounds good in my head! Doesn’t everything? Grades – A low A? Maybe? If I’m lucky. 

MUSIC 101: Yea…Ok…I’m totally getting a C in this class. Or maybe a B- if the man upstairs likes me enough. The final is a huge test. I’ll have to get a perfect, give or take 10 points, to get a B. Ok well, I’ll be OK I think with a C. I can’t get a C- because then I wouldn’t be able to get the course overload request approved for next semester. Man I really disliked this class. I want to play! PLAY MUSIC! Not hear boring history lectures about it. The teacher was absolutely…ahhh! He was the complete opposite of my french professor. He was just…boring. The french teacher was funny, on purpose or not I don’t know, but he was funny, in a smart way. The music teacher tried to be funny so much that it was annoying! He wasn’t “smart” funny at all! He was like…for lack of a better word…pathetic funny. And I’m NOT trying to be mean.

And finally…

Honors 122: Ahh this class…I have no idea what the teacher wants from me. She constantly gives me B’s because of my grammar. She has no problem with my points, she either agrees with them or elaborates on them with her own ideas but she’s never in disagreement with my points. Even so, I always get the same grade as my friend’s boyfriend who she is always in disagreement with points-wise. He never backs up his points and he never gets support from the text. I know what it’s a poetry/arts class, therefore writing is important, it’s important for all classes. But I mean, the paper is also a close-analysis of a poem, you would think the analysis itself had some larger affect than the grammar. I’m not trying to justify my bad grammar, or what she says is bad grammar, but I don’t understand how she can give me the same grade as someone who blatantly BS’s (excuse my language) points with no textual evidence. And also, my last paper got the exact same grade as all my previous papers (a B-) even though her comments to me were something along the lines of good improvement. WHAT? I improved and yet I get the exact same grade as the papers in which I sucked?? Seriously?? I feel dumber after this class in terms of literary analysis. I want to write “Krauth” papers but I haven’t been able to. Her prewriting assignments are to paraphrase every line in a poem. Yes, paraphrase, not analyze. So my second prewrite was on “Smoke” and the first line was “Can you imagine the air filled with smoke?” or something like that. For the prewrite I had to write something like…”The narrator asks the listener if he can imagine the air filled with smoke” but what I wanted to write was something like “The speaker asks the listener to imagine a time when the city was filled with smoke, implying through the use of imagination that a city with air filled with smoke is somewhat of a fantasy, something unreal and nonexistent.” But I couldn’t write that because the assignment wasn’t to analyze. And for some reason I always pick long poems and so I just spend two hours wasted on paraphrasing poems. For the last assignment which was a second close reading analysis, I wrote a “Krauth” paper. Or attempted to. Compared to my papers on Raskolnikov or Gregor or whomever, it really sucked. We have a final that is basically three prewrites and two papers that are either as long as or longer than our previous close writing papers, but whereas those previous prewrites were 5% of our grade and the actual papers 10%, the three prewrites and two close analysis that make up our final are only 10% of our grade. Not each, all of them, together. I don’t understand. Whatever. Obviously I’m going to try my best. Since the exam is take-home I’ll have more time to figure it out. If I get a really, really good grade on this, which will be hard, I might get a low A. Fingers crossed!

Yea so…the only class I’ll be missing is French. Lolz. I’ll miss the class overall. Everyone in there were really nice. The teacher is totally cool too. I hope he gets a nice teaching job in California, preferably at Berkeley because I hope to be there in four years! I guess the teacher from Global Affairs 101 was nice too. She wasn’t that exciting, not like the french guy so I won’t be missing her. And my other classes, thank goodness they’re over. 

I don’t want this post to be so long since it is about school. EWWW!

Is all then I guess. I’ll be spending the rest of the week until next Monday studying and writing so I probably won’t be back anytime soon. UNTIL THEN!

Dratz I still have to start choreography for that new song. AHHH wa…Phooey.