Blog Reflection

1. What are you most proud of on your blogs? Why?
My favorite part of my blogs are the blogs themselves, because I feel they were written fairly well and were about topics I had a reasonably firm grasp of due to the copious amount of time I devoted to searching for good articles. I also enjoyed perusing the extensive list of gadgets available for use on the sidebars, and as a result I am happy with the sidebar gadgets.

2. What could you improve on future blogs?
Most of the time I had before the deadlines was spent combing a well-known site (New York Times) for articles that fit the assignments, leaving me a fraction of the intended time to compose an informative and insightful blog entry. I plan to improve this slightly unfortunate habit by broadening the scope of my researches to encompass a greater swathe of the news sources made available by the web, but since this habit has not yet resulted in complete failure on my part to complete the assignments, such improvement is not high on my list of priorities. I would also like to possess the patience and technical cunning needed to wade through the immensely complex menus involved in posting a video directly on the blog entry, as a slice of an interview or newsreel would serve both as an attention grabber and force readers to acknowledge the evidence behind my sesquipedalian lucubrations.

3. How has blogging impacted your understanding of the US? The Media? Current Events?
Ever since the beginning of the blogging project, my comprehension of the world has been keeping pace with the current events posted on the New York Times web site, because this is the first time I have been required to keep tabs on the news. For example, were it not for this "blogging to learn" project my knowledge of the current stock market crisis would likely be nonexistent, or at most restricted to the rough outline of the issue, for the simple reason that even If I was possessed of a godlike understanding of the event, there would be absolutely nothing I could do about it. This project has given me cause to monitor the status of the news, and so keep up with various tidbits of information such as the looming presidential election, the aforementioned stock market calamity, the whirlwind of political and scientific activity surrounding global warming, and a host of other riveting topics. Outside the realm of current affairs, this ongoing project has bolstered my knowledge of America's "ideals" as laid down in the Constitution and Declaration of Independence, and this comprehension has been built upon by the reading of Federalist papers 10 and 51, along with an excerpt of Common Sense. For almost every one of these historic documents, we (the class and I) were required to connect the concepts outlined in them to a current event in the form of these blogs. I do not lie when I say that it has been a most enlightening experience, even if the revelations were instigated by the remorseless tedium of homework assignments.