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#Post#: 50--------------------------------------------------
Outside Reading Assignment #4 - Biography
DIR By: MrLyon
Date: October 1, 2012, 8:07 am
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For your previous outside reading assignment, you were asked to
write about one of two biographical essays that you were
specifically assigned to read. Now comes your turn to read and
respond to a biographical narrative or essay of your choice.
Search the Internet for a biographical news article or feature
story that contains adult-level subject matter, word choices,
and language conventions/techniques. After reading your
biography, provide an in-depth analysis of your selected piece
of literature based upon the "magnificent seven" traits of
strong writing. In what way does the narrative's author use
ideas, organizational techniques, sentence structure, word
choices, voice, and mechanics in order to convey meaning and
illuminate purpose? What choices has the author made to help
make his/her work successful?
Remember to follow all outside reading instructions and to post
a link to the URL address in your response so that we can all
read your chosen biography.
DUE DATE: Post no later than 7:45 AM, Wednesday, October 3.
#Post#: 51--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #4 - Biography
DIR By: cblock07
Date: October 1, 2012, 5:24 pm
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In the article that I read it talked about Clark Hoyt. He is the
third public editor for the New York Times. He recieves
questions and answers from the public and publishes them in the
paper. After he had started working for the New York times he
started to work for the Knight Ridder at the Detroit Free Press.
He was such a great editor for all of these places, more
companies wanted to hire him. After all of his accomplishments
he was named business editor of the Free Press. Clark even
shared the Pulitzer prize with Robert S. Boyd for their
coverage. In this article the author uses good ideas to show how
successful Clark was. His ideas really relate to the article and
all that Clark did. Everything is very organized in this
article. The whole aritcle seems to flow nicely and it wasn't
confusing to read. The article didn't go off topic and it was
just written nice. The sentences were written well. Not too much
and not too little. The article also used great vocabulary. It
was very discriptive and used good word choices. With this
article I could really see someone telling me wha happened. It
was like I could hear the writer saying all of these things. I
think the use of vocabulary has made the author succesful.
HTML http://www.nytimes.com/ref/opinion/hoyt-bio.html
#Post#: 52--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #4 - Biography
DIR By: cblock11
Date: October 2, 2012, 4:43 pm
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I read a biography on a band instead of just one person. I was
going to do Alex Gaskarth who is the lead singer for All Time
Low but couldn’t because I couldn’t find any websites with any
biographies on him. So I decided to do their entire band. All
Time Low is a band signed with Hopeless Records the band
consists of Alex Gaskerth, Jack Barakat, Zach Merrick, and Rian
Dawson. The band isn’t very well known at all in fact rarely
anyone knows about them but has heard of them because of their
track Dear Maria, Count Me In on there It’s So Wrong, It’s Right
album. The album never got any rewards or such but Dear Maria,
Count Me In was certified RIIA Gold with 500,000 sales in the
US. Reading this biography about them I honestly don’t know how
they do it. Their band isn’t what some would consider big
because rarely anyone knows them. I knew that but I didn’t know
really anything about them until last summer. The writers who
wrote their biography only saw All Time Low in a good light.
They highlighted their achievements such as saying “completely
overwhelmed” this really highlights, in my opinion, their
accomplishments. The fact that they “completely overwhelmed”
expectations tells me as the reader that it’s a good thing.
While not even highlighting or bringing attention to their in
other words fails. They were ever fails but never as successful
sometimes as they thought. But the author doesn’t highlight
this. In this they talk about the album So Wrong It’s Right but
instead of calling it a total fail they call it an underground
success. If someone wasn’t reading this article carefully they
could have been mistaken and thought they said it was a success.
The author specifically chooses words to highlight achievements
and down grade failures, while not really bringing any attention
to the stuff in between.
HTML http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Time_Low
#Post#: 54--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #4 - Biography
DIR By: cblock12
Date: October 2, 2012, 7:40 pm
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I chose a biography on Marilyn Monroe to read and analyze. But
the message I received was just a typical biography. I wasn’t
impressed with the way the author wrote the biography, because
she didn’t focus in on one trait of Marilyn’s, or one story of
her life, but jammed her whole life into one page, which is
always a signal of a weak biography. I would describe this
narrative as generic, and although it was about a very
interesting person in my opinion, the biography was written like
any other, and didn’t have anything special to it. Even the way
it started, “She was born on 1 June 1926 in the Los Angeles
County Hospital, the third child of Gladys Baker”, lost my
attention almost immediately. If a biography is started strong,
then chances are it will keep the readers attention through out
the piece. Although it did zoom in on her childhood, it never
focused in on one particular story about her childhood, or
something she learned that made her who she was. This biography
hit every piece of Monroe’s life, from the moment she was born
in the Los Angeles County to the moment went they found Marilyn
on the ground dead of a believed overdose. What began to be
excessive was when the author would explain every marriage and
divorce, because Monroe had so many. This biography lost my
interest not because of the topic, because Marilyn was a very
interesting person, but because of the way it was written. For
example, I learned that Monroe changed her name, from her
original name, Norma Jean Baker, to Marilyn Monroe. I also
never knew about Monroe’s acting career, I thought she was only
into modeling, because that is how everyone remembers her as
risqué because of her many photo shoots with her skirt flying
up. This biography could have been written better, because the
topic was strong.
HTML http://www.thebiographychannel.co.uk/biographies/marilyn-monroe.html<br
/>
#Post#: 55--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #4 - Biography
DIR By: cblock13
Date: October 2, 2012, 7:42 pm
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In this essay, I like the fact that the author wrote it in first
person to make it seem as if Emily Jenkins was a different
person besides herself. The only thing is that she would just
state the facts about how she became a writer instead of making
her biography interesting. She would go on about how different
her two parent’s houses’ were. “My mother read me countless
picture books, but at my father's house there wasn't much of
that nature. He read me what was at hand: Alice's Adventures in
Wonderland, Huckleberry Finn, Sherlock Holmes. He also made up
stories for me and recounted the plots of Shakespeare plays.” At
home, a reader could easily tell that both of her parents are
clearly into literature, but he father was much more creative.
The author didn’t use much of any sophistic sentence structure.
The author is a very imaginary person: “Growing up, I spent
large parts of my life in imaginary worlds: Neverland, Oz, and
Narnia, in particular.” A reader could tell that the author was
very into literature and writing at an early age. “Around the
age of eight, I began working on my own writing. My early
enterprises began with a seminal picture book featuring an
heroic orange sleeping bag, followed by novel-length imitations
of The Wolves of Willoughby Chase by Joan Aiken and Pippi
Longstocking by Astrid Lindgren.” A reader could tell that the
author was passionate about what she does. She was also
determined to publish her first book. In the essay it describes
how her and her father wrote a novel together through the mail.
Throughout her college life, she was introduced to several
illustrators, which led to the production of her centerpiece for
her senior thesis. She ended her life as a successful writer and
teacher at a Montessori school teaching 6-9 year olds.
HTML http://www.emilyjenkins.com/essay.html
#Post#: 56--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #4 - Biography
DIR By: cblock06
Date: October 2, 2012, 8:06 pm
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I read a biography on Demi Lavato. In this biography I learned
about Demi’s childhood, experiences in being bullied in middle
school, and her music and acting careers. The biography talks
about Demi’s experience with being bullied and how that slowly
ended and helped her career in becoming a spokes person to anti
bullying organizations. Demi also has an acting career and has
been in “Camp Rock” and “Camp Rock 2: The final jam.” The author
gave a lot of detail with what happened to Demi in middle school
and her music and acting careers but she didn’t do it in a way
to make it more interesting. The author just stated the facts.
The author used very good organizational techniques because all
the facts about Demi were in chronological order to what was
happening in her life. The sentence structure and word choices
were strong in some parts because the author gave good detail
with stating facts about Demi but in most parts the word choice
was very vague. The author’s voiced was very boring. The author
would state the facts and not show any meaning to what Demi’s
story was or how she felt. Most things were stated directly to
the reader with no emotions.
HTML http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demi_Lovato
#Post#: 57--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #4 - Biography
DIR By: cblock09
Date: October 2, 2012, 8:32 pm
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The biography I read was about Wilt Chamberlain. The biography
was well organized. It started with when he was born then
continued to talk about his NBA career. Mentioned every team he
played for each year and all of his accomplishments in those
many years. Then went on to mention his coaching career then his
death in 1999. I liked how it was set up. It is set up like most
professional athletes but he accomplished so much it was
interesting to read. The author mentioned the work "defeating" a
lot which made Wilt sound like an all out champion. Mentioning
the point scored per game shows how much he really "defeated"
everyone. He averaged 50 points per game, 42 points per game, 36
points per game and a 100 point game. The biography was written
in 3rd person. It was all facts on his career with no dialogue
of Wilt. The story flowed smoothly. It repeated itself related
to dates and accomplishments at different times. Started each
paragraph with dates with accomplishments and kept me the reader
interested with what I was reading. It was successful because
Wilts career was successful so by mentioning stats in his career
can easily make a successful biography.
#Post#: 58--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #4 - Biography
DIR By: cblock09
Date: October 2, 2012, 8:56 pm
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sorry forgot to post URL on original post. Here it is:http:
HTML http://www.biography.com/people/wilt-chamberlain-9243766
#Post#: 59--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #4 - Biography
DIR By: cblock10
Date: October 2, 2012, 8:59 pm
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The Biography I read about spoke mostly about Thierry Henry’s
life. His life is given in chronological order; using the clubs
he played for as talking points, but only after a short
summarization saying what will be spoken of. The structure is
also strong and easy to follow. The idea doesn’t stray from his
soccer career, except when speaking about his personal
information or regarding his birth, where he lived, and a little
bit about his social life. The voice of the overall text seems a
little admiring, maybe for how Henry can play soccer or for his
devotion to anti-racism in sports. The word choice isn’t
extremely amazing but can be very descriptive, easy to
understand, and showing a specific type picture, for example “…a
lucrative contract from FC Barcelona.”(paragraph 1), “…devoted
to their sons, but their marriage ended…”(paragraph 3). The
biography also utilized quotes to firmly back-up some
statements. The sentences are easy to read and transition
smoothly from the current one to the next. The mechanics are
correct and the presentation is using titles to split off
different parts of Henry’s life. Using an early summary section,
then a pre-pro entering pro soccer life, a pro-soccer life with
some activities related to personal life, and separate
informative lists. With this we have an orderly summary of his
career up to the biography’s written point, while also having
other basic information grouped for convenience.
HTML http://go.galegroup.com/ps/retrieve.do?sgHitCountType=None&sort=RELEVANCE&inPS=true&prodId=GPS&userGroupName=mlin_w_lmhs&tabID=T001&searchId=R2&resultListType=RESULT_LIST&contentSegment=&searchType=BasicSearchForm¤tPosition=1&contentSet=GALE%7CK1606003957&&docId=GALE|K1606003957&docType=GALE&role=BIC1<br
/>
#Post#: 60--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #4 - Biography
DIR By: cblock04
Date: October 2, 2012, 9:07 pm
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Just by reading the first paragraph it is apparent that this is
a professionally written biography. It depicts Mitt Romney’s
many accomplishments with fluidity and ease. The main message
of the biography is that success does not come to anyone who
does not put in the right amount of work. Romney has received a
Master of Business Administration degree from Harvard Business
School and a Law degree from Harvard Law School, which shows
devotion and perseverance. I think these two quotes use mature,
descriptive language “He helped rescue the 2002 Winter Olympics
from financial and ethical woes, and helmed a successful Salt
Lake City Olympic Games in 2002” and “But was defeated by
longtime incumbent Ted Kennedy.” The biography is organized
well with specific titles splitting up each section to make
finding certain information easy. The voice of the author seems
mature and intelligent which is apparent by the word choices.
The sentences are easy to understand and read, except for a
couple words that I had to look up because of the author’s
extensive vocabulary. All of the convention rules seem to be
followed; I could not find any spelling or punctuation mistakes.
Despite how well written this biography is I did not like the
presentation of it. The blue, clickable words and innumerable
amounts of advertisements on the site drew my attention away
from the biography many times.
HTML http://www.biography.com/people/mitt-romney-241055?page=1
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