Class 4/16/09

Today's class topic was the historical development of English. Today's class was very engaging for me because I was interested in the topic and also able to use my background knowledge of other languages.
My favorite activity was the passage comparison. It was fascinating for me to see how languages develop over time. Also, my knowledge of German and a little bit of Dutch was very helpful in analyzing old English because German and Dutch are the two closest languages to English. So the final "e" in words often appears in German and Dutch in adjectives. Also, German tends to end sentences and clauses with verbs. Also, V's were initial syllable which is very common in German. V's are not usually place in the middle of words. So for me to be able to see these similarities and differences was very eye opening. It was great to be able to make all of these connections between languages. It also showed me that languages can have influences on other languages.

Class 4-9-09

Today's class went by very smoothly. Todays topic was speech acts. We first met in small groups to discuss a few questions that Dr. Smidt had put on the discussion notes. Then, we discussed our trial writing sample in small groups. We then moved into large groups and discussed some of the terminology that we will need to use when doing our final writing sample. I thought it was good practice to hear some of these terms again and keep working with the material that we have covered through out the semester. Overall, I thought it was a great class even though I continue to have microphone problems.