let's end it with a bang!
15 years ago
Thursday 21 May 2009
reflecting on my mindmap...
It is not so easy to understand how we learn a language...thinking about it I realized that I learn English in many and many ways!
The easiest way is the University, with regards to my formal learning. But also newspapers, books, conferences and other things can be very helpful!
As far as informal learning is concerned I think that foreign friends, activities in pubs, music, newspapers, travels and of course the Internet, are just a small part of the useful 'tools'.
If I do not consider the University way of learning (as I am suppose to finish my University career in a quite short time (at least I hope so!!) ) I'm sure I'm still having a lot of nice sources to use in order to improve more and more my English language!
The easiest way is the University, with regards to my formal learning. But also newspapers, books, conferences and other things can be very helpful!
As far as informal learning is concerned I think that foreign friends, activities in pubs, music, newspapers, travels and of course the Internet, are just a small part of the useful 'tools'.
If I do not consider the University way of learning (as I am suppose to finish my University career in a quite short time (at least I hope so!!) ) I'm sure I'm still having a lot of nice sources to use in order to improve more and more my English language!
Monday 18 May 2009
uh.....
Hello everybody!!
Last week we tried to understand some 'internet words' such as phishing, trojan horse, hacker etc. I think it is very important to know our enemies in the use of the web!!
This week I am suppose to develop a map concerning my improving during this year. I am trying to draw it in a paper and then put it in my blog (as our teacher suggested us!)...it is taking more time than expected.... I think I will postpone this task, also because I'm having two exams this week....keep your fingers crossed for me!!!!!
see you :))
Last week we tried to understand some 'internet words' such as phishing, trojan horse, hacker etc. I think it is very important to know our enemies in the use of the web!!
This week I am suppose to develop a map concerning my improving during this year. I am trying to draw it in a paper and then put it in my blog (as our teacher suggested us!)...it is taking more time than expected.... I think I will postpone this task, also because I'm having two exams this week....keep your fingers crossed for me!!!!!
see you :))
Tuesday 12 May 2009
INTERNET RISKS
Last week we reflected on the possible risks we may find using the internet. The most important risks we found concerne the possibility for other people to have access to our personal information. There are also persons who called themselves 'hackers' and can create viruses or spyware and have access to our personal computers. They can see all the information we have on our computer and send us advertisements; they can also damage our operating system.
I think that the most dangerous things a person can do is to use the internet in a non resposible way, which means to share personal information with others (in particular with persons that he/she does not know) and have access to web sites generally considered 'not safe'.
We should always keep in mind that everybody can see the information we put on the internet and for this reason we should avoid the publishing of personal information (address and phone number) or personal data (credic card number). A nice thing to do could also be to change periodically our passwords.
With regards to web sites like Facebook we should always remeber to share our information just with our friends and with people that we know in our daily life. In particular we should avoid the publishing of photos too much private or that include other persons (we may ask the permission to those people first!).
I don't think we should simply stop using the internet, because it is a very nice tool and a very useful one...we should just try to do everything using our brain!
A big problem could come out with regards to the use of the internet for young people. Teenagers usually use the internet just trying to have a different life; if they are not popular in the 'real life' they may try to create a different character for themselves and search for friends in the web. In this way they can talk with nicknames and do not know the real person to whom they are talking....in this case I think that parents are still the only ones who can do something as far as the young boy/girl understands the possible risks...
As far as viruses and spyware are concerned I think that the only one thing we can do is to download free antivuruses and free antispyware and check our computer safety many times a week!!!
I think that the most dangerous things a person can do is to use the internet in a non resposible way, which means to share personal information with others (in particular with persons that he/she does not know) and have access to web sites generally considered 'not safe'.
We should always keep in mind that everybody can see the information we put on the internet and for this reason we should avoid the publishing of personal information (address and phone number) or personal data (credic card number). A nice thing to do could also be to change periodically our passwords.
With regards to web sites like Facebook we should always remeber to share our information just with our friends and with people that we know in our daily life. In particular we should avoid the publishing of photos too much private or that include other persons (we may ask the permission to those people first!).
I don't think we should simply stop using the internet, because it is a very nice tool and a very useful one...we should just try to do everything using our brain!
A big problem could come out with regards to the use of the internet for young people. Teenagers usually use the internet just trying to have a different life; if they are not popular in the 'real life' they may try to create a different character for themselves and search for friends in the web. In this way they can talk with nicknames and do not know the real person to whom they are talking....in this case I think that parents are still the only ones who can do something as far as the young boy/girl understands the possible risks...
As far as viruses and spyware are concerned I think that the only one thing we can do is to download free antivuruses and free antispyware and check our computer safety many times a week!!!
Monday 4 May 2009
EDITING REFERENCES
Last week we were supposed to edit some references that our teacher gave us.
We created an account on google.docs and we created a document which has to be shared with the peers of each group.
Google.docs is very useful!
Being able to share documents and comments with other people is very helpful because we can work all together at the same time and we can see each other's work without necessity of sending texts by email.
We should use both APA and MLA styles in order to find mistakes in the references provided and try to correct them. Here is my part of job:
We created an account on google.docs and we created a document which has to be shared with the peers of each group.
Google.docs is very useful!
Being able to share documents and comments with other people is very helpful because we can work all together at the same time and we can see each other's work without necessity of sending texts by email.
We should use both APA and MLA styles in order to find mistakes in the references provided and try to correct them. Here is my part of job:
Lanham, R.A. (1995) Digital literacy. Scientific American, 273 (3): 198?.
Lanham, R.A. (1995) Digital literacy. Scientific American, 273 (3), 198-200.
Lankshear, C. and Knobel, M. (2006) New literacies: Everyday practices and classroom learning. Maidenhead (IL): Open University Press.Lankshear, C. & Knobel, M. (2006) New literacies: Everyday practices and classroom learning. Maidenhead (IL) and New York (2nd edition).
Lee, L. (2006) A study of native and nonnative speakers' feedback and responses in spanish-american networked collaborative interaction. In: Belz, J. A. and
Lee, L. (2006) A study of native and nonnative speakers' feedback and responses in Spanish-American networked collaborative interaction. In J.A. Belz & S. Thorne, Internet-mediated intercultural foreign language education (147-176). Boston. Thomsen & Heinle.
The first sentence corresponds to the reference given us by our teacher, while the second sentence contains my corrections. I basically corrected the references editing the text in the italics format when the title of the article is long.
Names of the authors should be written with the capital letter, in alphabetic order, and if there are more than one name we should separate them with a &.
It is important to put the complete name of the title and the reference to the pages and volumes of the article or book which we are referring to.
There are also fixed rules for the punctuation which are different in APA and MLA style.
In my group we tried to use more APA style becuase it seemed the clearest one. APA style provides also rules regarding different ways of writing references for articles or books.
Well, I can say that being able to write references in the right way is a very difficult purpose...but I think that with a little more study and strenght of spirit I will learn the most important things about this topic and I will write references in my final thesis in the right way!!!
LET'S ANALYSE!!
Unfortunately I wasn't in class last Thursday...but I made the E-tivity6 and I analysed the article I chose.
I based my job on APA and MLA styles and I learnt (oh, well, I think I learnt :) many useful things.
Here I paste the job I did.
I based my job on APA and MLA styles and I learnt (oh, well, I think I learnt :) many useful things.
Here I paste the job I did.
This text may be freely used providing the source is credited.
Published: 21 September 2004 , last edited: 26 June 2006
Viewings since posted: 7598
APA STYLE:
- paraphrase a part of the article + in-text citation:
According to the Bretton Woods Project (2004), the Independent Evaluation Office (IEO) of the IMF, made a report describing the role of the International Monetary Fund in managing the Argentine debt crisis for the decade from 1991 to 2001.
The IEO said that the crisis has done sizeable damage to the Fund's reputation: the IEO associated the damage with inappropriate policies, and created a perception that the IMF lacked in dealing with member countries, and put its role in signalling sound policy environments into question.
- summarize a part of the article + in-text citation:
IEO argeued that (as cited in the Bretton Woods Project, 2004) IMF in the pre-crisis period severly lacked surveillance. The Fund provided economic suggestion wich appeared not right and provided economic solutions that the government of Argentina did not accept.
The Fund did not control the policies which were activated in that period and chose "to endorse the exchange rate regime itself".
IEO also said the the majority of problems that caused the economic crisis was due to the refusal of the government to accept the rate regime variable and proposes a stronger control in the near future.
- choose a direct quotations from the article + in-text citation:
In accordance with the Bretton Woods Project, IEO, on the Fund's handling of the Argentine crisis in 2001, argues that "repeated attempts to use the same strategy when it was evident that it had failed."
- write the bibliographic reference that comes at the end of a paper:
Smith, A.(2004). World Bank changes its tune on tax and regulation, vol 2 (6). Aprile, 23,
2008, from http://worldbanks.com
Jordan, F. (1998) Finance ministers fail to deliver on G20 promises . Washington IMF
meeting, vol3 (7). May 15, from http://finance&economics.com
Murdock, J. (2001) Zimbabwe assets face seizure after World Bank ruling , April, 12, 2001,
from http://zimbawe.com
Madison, S. & Freeman, M. (1995) IMF: As bad as ever. vol 2(9).
MLA STYLE:
- paraphrase a part of the article + in-text citation:
Bretton Woods Project (2004), "from IMF’s “role put into question”: Argentina crisis evaluation. http://brettonwoodsproject.org/art.shtml?x=65659 23 April. 2004"
the Independent Evaluation Office (IEO) of the IMF, made a report describing the role of the International Monetary Fund in managing the Argentine debt crisis for the decade from 1991 to 2001.
The IEO said that the crisis has done sizeable damage to the Fund's reputation: the IEO associated the damage with inappropriate policies, and created a perception that the IMF lacked in dealing with member countries, and put its role in signalling sound policy environments into question.
- summarize a part of the article + in-text citation:
IEO argeued that (as cited in the Bretton Woods Project (2004), "from IMF’s “role put into question”: Argentina crisis evaluation. http://brettonwoodsproject.org/art.shtml?x=65659 23 April. 2004") IMF in the pre-crisis period severly lacked surveillance. The Fund provided economic suggestion which appeared not right and provided economic solutions that the government of Argentina did not accept.
The Fund did not control the policies which were activated in that period and chose "to endorse the exchange rate regime itself".
IEO also said the the majority of problems that caused the economic crisis was due to the refusal of the government to accept the rate regime variable and proposes a stronger control in the near future.
- choose a direct quotations from the article + in-text citation:
In accordance with the Bretton Woods Project (2004), "from IMF’s “role put into question”: Argentina crisis evaluation. http://brettonwoodsproject.org/art.shtml?x=65659 23 April. 2004", IEO, on the Fund's handling of the Argentine crisis in 2001, argues that "repeated attempts to use the same strategy when it was evident that it had failed."
- write the bibliographic reference that comes at the end of a paper:
Smith, A.(2004). "World Bank changes its tune on tax and regulation, vol 2 (6). " Aprile, 23,
http://worldbanks.com
Jordan, F. (1998) "Finance ministers fail to deliver on G20 promises . Washington IMF
meeting, vol3 (7)." May 15, http://finance&economics.com
Murdock, J. (2001) "Zimbabwe assets face seizure after World Bank ruling , April, 12, 2001," http://zimbawe.com
Madison, S. & Freeman, M. (1995) "IMF: As bad as ever. vol 2(9)."
I didn't find many differences between APA and MLA styles. The first thing I noticed is the fact that MLA style is more specific about the references we put in a text.
I learnt also the importance of the two styles. It is very important to know the different ways for writing references and it is also important to know that there are many information within a text. As I said, one of the easiest ways to avoid plagiarism is to know how to do it and now I can say that Apa and MLA style are very useful!
Sunday 26 April 2009
Analysing the text
When I write a blog post I always try to organize my thoughts and then express them in the best way possible. I often use tools such as Wikipedia and the dictionary on wordreference.com which give a big support to an Italian speaker who is writing in English.
But when I read an article on the web I try to understand the whole meaning at a first reading and then elaborate on the content. In order to get more information about the author, the context etc, it is very useful to use some online tools; the ones I prefer are: a monolongual dictionary and a bilingual dictionary, wikipedia, google and delicious which help me to understand everything I read and maybe analyze the social or historical contexts within the article.
For the last e-tivity I fiund an interesting article about the Argentina crisis. The purpose of the e-tivity was to analyze that article,
- Who was the researcher?
The researcher of my article is not a single person I guess, but the text has been made by the "Bretton Woods Project" which was "created as an independent initiative by a group of British non-governmental organisations (NGOs), it works with an extensive network to press for increased transparency and civil society participation in World Bank and IMF policies and interventions". http://brettonwoodsproject.org/project/about.shtml
- About the research
The article is a report realized with the aim of focusing on some problems appeared during the Argentina crisis. The researcher does not provide personal comments but makes an analitical description of the facts.
The article was written on september 2004 and data includes refer to the years from 1991 to 2004. The researcher collected all the information with regards to the mistakes of the International Monetary Fund.
The research was made using many fonts, but there are not specific reference to the exact fonts used to write the article. The conclusion refers to a long term period because the article ends with suppositions about the future and the next steps of the IMF and the International Organizations.
I did not answer to all the questions given in the handout 1 because that task was very difficult for me. I didn't find the information required inside the article I found. For example I was not able to answer to "what were the findings" and "what reservations or limitations on the research did the writer mention".
Some more data about the analysis of the article refer to the reason why I decided to use that particular article.
When we read articles or texts whether in the web and in newspapers we should always read the whole text and analyse the way in which the information are given. I decided to use the article I found because it is written in a very good way and refers to the topic I wish to talk about in my final thesis. The article was very interesting because it underlines a different aspect of the Argentina crisis, that is mistakes and problems of the IMF. The credentials of the author are perfectly acceptable because the article was written by a project competent about that specific topic.
In the last posts I tried to make a complete analysis of an on-line text providing also examples. I hope this would be useful also for my future work on my final thesis.
My next step will be analyzing the content of the article, considering the words used and the different ways of expressing things in order to persuade the reader.
But when I read an article on the web I try to understand the whole meaning at a first reading and then elaborate on the content. In order to get more information about the author, the context etc, it is very useful to use some online tools; the ones I prefer are: a monolongual dictionary and a bilingual dictionary, wikipedia, google and delicious which help me to understand everything I read and maybe analyze the social or historical contexts within the article.
For the last e-tivity I fiund an interesting article about the Argentina crisis. The purpose of the e-tivity was to analyze that article,
- Who was the researcher?
The researcher of my article is not a single person I guess, but the text has been made by the "Bretton Woods Project" which was "created as an independent initiative by a group of British non-governmental organisations (NGOs), it works with an extensive network to press for increased transparency and civil society participation in World Bank and IMF policies and interventions". http://brettonwoodsproject.org/project/about.shtml
- About the research
The article is a report realized with the aim of focusing on some problems appeared during the Argentina crisis. The researcher does not provide personal comments but makes an analitical description of the facts.
The article was written on september 2004 and data includes refer to the years from 1991 to 2004. The researcher collected all the information with regards to the mistakes of the International Monetary Fund.
The research was made using many fonts, but there are not specific reference to the exact fonts used to write the article. The conclusion refers to a long term period because the article ends with suppositions about the future and the next steps of the IMF and the International Organizations.
I did not answer to all the questions given in the handout 1 because that task was very difficult for me. I didn't find the information required inside the article I found. For example I was not able to answer to "what were the findings" and "what reservations or limitations on the research did the writer mention".
Some more data about the analysis of the article refer to the reason why I decided to use that particular article.
When we read articles or texts whether in the web and in newspapers we should always read the whole text and analyse the way in which the information are given. I decided to use the article I found because it is written in a very good way and refers to the topic I wish to talk about in my final thesis. The article was very interesting because it underlines a different aspect of the Argentina crisis, that is mistakes and problems of the IMF. The credentials of the author are perfectly acceptable because the article was written by a project competent about that specific topic.
In the last posts I tried to make a complete analysis of an on-line text providing also examples. I hope this would be useful also for my future work on my final thesis.
My next step will be analyzing the content of the article, considering the words used and the different ways of expressing things in order to persuade the reader.
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