Monday, September 29, 2008

2b Asian Art Museum San Francisco

Contains the sources you used with links to these sources .25 points
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asian_Art_Museum_of_San_Francisco
http://www.asianart.org/history.htm

Contains a brief paragraph how it connects to your study of humanities. 1 point
This Asian Art Museum connects very well with the study of humanities because the museum is a museum with more that just art, it focuses on history as well. It is one of the larges mesuems that focus strictly on Asian Art. Also the first parts of the Asian Musuem pieces were dontaed by Avery Brundage who was a millionare at the time. But the conditions were that they needed to build a mesuem to house the pieces. It was a wing of M.H. de Young Museum. There was a quote which is a great summary of how this connects with humanities that was stated by Brundage saysing "In presenting this collection to San Francisco my hope is that together with the facilities of the regions great universities it will help San Francisco and the Bay Area become one of the world's greatest centers of Oriental Culture. Today it has more than 17,000 objects which makes it the largest museum in the United States devoted to just Asian arts. It is was located in the Golden Gate PArk, but has recently moved across the street from the Civic Center. Some of their pieces are over 6,000 years old.

Contains the following "analytical elements":
Observation: What did you choose? What do you see or hear or feel or think of in the choice you made? What is the subject of the work? If you chose a 'thing' what is the work made of and what techniques (colors, lines, shapes, textures)does the creator use? Be specific in your description. If you chose a place, be specific in your description of what you see or hear. Talk to your reader as though they cannot see the item but somehow must draw a painting of what you see or hear. 1 point

I chose the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco. When you hear about this musuem you think of the great dynastys of China. You think of the samurais and all of their weapons and protection gear. You think and see dragons of all different colors and solid gold objects as well. You think of jade and precious stones that were valued so much along with their coins that have a square in the center. The subject of the work is anything that is Asian is valued in this musuem no matter how new or old or what condition it may be in.

Interpretation: What is your choice about? Give specific examples to support this statement in 2 sentences; do so in a way that teaches us something about your choice. Make Paulo Freire proud! .75 point
My choice is about celebrating your culture in one place and at the same time learning alot about the culture as well. Which is just like Paulo Freires idea of getting hands on learning techniques.

Judgment: What led you to your choice? What do you think or feel about this choice? Why do
you feel this way? Support your thoughts with specific observations. .5 point
I chose this because I remember when I went to the Asian Art Museum in sixth grade and I thought it was so awesome even though I wasn't really that into Asian Art let alone art at all. I just remember that I never got sick of wandering through the museum. When I think about this choice I think of all the jade pieces they had at the museum. They were so beautiful. I feel this way because I feel like jade is just so pure.

Questioning: What else would you like to know about this choice? When completing the question section, lead your audience into the question by stating a fact you do know, yet you still have the related question. This way, both your audience and you will have an educational experience. Example: I learned that John Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath was based on his personal experience working with farm workers. I would like to know if the characters he used in that book are fictitious or are they people he met? .5 point
I know that Avery Brundage owned many Asian pieces, but I want to know why he was so interested in the Asian culture specifically the Asian Art part of the culture.

5. Using your classmates work from last week, tell us one thing you learned from 1 student. Is this one thing some common experience you share or some experience that is completely different than what you experienced? Is this one thing related to our class theoretical foundation and if so, how? Is that one thing related to historical or cultural context of this country or a different one? Link that persons blog to this entry (eg cut paste that blog entry here) . .5 point

One thing that I learned from Carly Overlid was that San Francisco does really contain a lot of cultural aspects and one definately is the Giants baseball. When I went to a game once there were so many people there and a lot of people make it their weekend routine to go cheer on the Giants. Those fans also get pretty into it and take baseball very seriously. It is a cultural ritual for some people who love baseball.

Monday, September 22, 2008

2a Los Angeles

Contains a title using the format listed above .25 points

Contains the sources you used with links to these sources .25 points
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Angeles,_California
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hollywood_Boulevard

Contains a brief paragraph how it connects to your study of humanities. 1 point
I would say that Los Angeles is the perfect place to relate to the study of humanities because LOs Angleles is one of the largest cities in California. It has a population of 3.8 million and contains about 224 different languages. There are so many differnt aspects of humanities in a place that is that large. This connects to the study of humanitites because humanities is the study of people and you are definately not limited when dealing with a large population.It is the center of culture, technology, media, business and international trade. It also leads the world inpopular entertainment.

Contains the following "analytical elements":
a. Observation: What did you choose? What do you see or hear or feel or think of in the choice you made? What is the subject of the work? If you chose a 'thing' what is the work made of and what techniques (colors, lines, shapes, textures)does the creator use? Be specific in your description. If you chose a place, be specific in your description of what you see or hear. Talk to your reader as though they cannot see the item but somehow must draw a painting of what you see or hear. 1 point
I chose the place of Los Angeles. When you look at Los Angles you see many many different things considering how big of a place the city is. You see miles and miles of cars packed on the free ways as if it were a cement jungle. The freeways intertwine and when you are on the feeways you sit in traffic for hours. Even the streets are packed with cars going 80 mph in a 40 mph zone and intersections bigger than any where in Santa Rosa. Although you see many many cars it almost equals when you see the beatiful beaches. You put your feet into the hot sand and then into the warm blue water. YOu see many surfers and sun bathers and maybe even some people building sand castles. The nice 80 degrees weather keeps people constantly by the beaches that L.A. are so famous for. Also some other main attractions in L.A. that draws many tourists is Disneyland, Universal Studios and Hollywood. Hollwood is a place where many fanatics love to go and look at all the stars on the street. When you think of Hollywood and L.A. shopping is definately something that is popular with many different types of shops even though the prices are kind of expensive for my taste.

b. Interpretation: What is your choice about? Give specific examples to support this statement in 2 sentences; do so in a way that teaches us something about your choice. Make Paulo Freire proud! .75 point
My choice is about having fun. Many people go to L.A. as a vacation spot. They go there because they know they will have fun at the many attractions they have to offer.

c. Judgment: What led you to your choice? What do you think or feel about this choice? Why do you feel this way? Support your thoughts with specific observations. .5 point
I was led to this choice because when I lived in San Diego we would drive to L.A. many times to have fun and just get away from the school life. I feel like if I had the chance to go back again I would go in a minute reguardless of how expensive it is. I feel this way because I loev how the place looks at nights with the many many lights and the warm weather. It is great!


d. Questioning: What else would you like to know about this choice? When completing the question section, lead your audience into the question by stating a fact you do know, yet you still have the related question. This way, both your audience and you will have an educational experience. Example: I learned that John Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath was based on his personal experience working with farm workers. I would like to know if the characters he used in that book are fictitious or are they people he met? .5 point
I know that Los Angles has many attractions and it brings many tourists to their city every day, month and year but I want to know how many people from L.A. visit the attractions every day, month and year?

5. Using your classmates work from last week, tell us one thing you learned from 1 student. Is this one thing some common experience you share or some experience that is completely different than what you experienced? Is this one thing related to our class theoretical foundation and if so, how? Is that one thing related to historical or cultural context of this country or a different one? Link that persons blog to this entry (eg cut paste that blog entry here) . .5 point
I learned from Carly that Freire had something called the "Culture of Silence" which focused on dialogue. This is something that relates to me because a lot of the time when I am learning I can remember dialgue better than a one way lecture. I think I learn ebtter than way and it definately makes the class more interactive with dialogue.

Thursday, September 11, 2008

Assignment #1c

The first blog I read was Taylor Ford's. One thing that I learned about her was that she feels as if non- Californians judge us from what they see on television. She had some very good information on Paulo Freire and one new thing I learned about him was that he studied psychology and philosophy at the University of Recife. I also learned from her that he passed up a law job to work as a teacher which was his true calling. This relates to Humanities because it shows how many great people have passed up other options of jobs and just because they are offered something they always strive for their dream.
The next blog I read was Carly Overlid's. Something about her that I found out was that she has never really blogged before except in high school when she created a web page. One new thing that learned about Paulo Freire was that during his time you had to be able to read to vote. Another new thing I learned was that he originally had all of his books in Portuguese and was later translated into English and Spanish. This will relate to Humanities because it shows how other countries operate very differently than us and we need to be sensitive to that.

Monday, September 8, 2008

Assignment 1b

Paulo Freire was an amazing educator of his time. He had a lot of knowledge in many different areas of education. He grew up in the poverty during the time of the Great Depression. This shaped his concerns for the poor and helped construct his specific educational viewpoint. His first experiement with literacy worked when 300 sugarcane workers were able to read in just 45 days. I cam across a quote by him that I feel explains his approach to education. Freire stated "The future isn't something hidden in a corner. The future is something that we build in the present." This quote works with his literacy experiemnt and explains his work ethic and how he goes about educating. He has bright ideas about education and understands many different ways of learning.
One of his most important aspects of education was dialogue. This was good with informal education which was his style of teaching. It was conversation rather than curricula which included working with eachother. It deepened understanding and was cooperative activity involving respect. This included his theory of "banking which is one of his most important teachings as well.
He came up with two more theories of teaching that I thought were interesting also. He had the idea that the system of education that emphasizes learning as act of culture and freedom. One of his theories was the "Culture of Silence". This was dominated by individuals who lose the means by which to critically respond to the culture that is forced on them by the dominant culture. This led him to take an active role in social reform. He thought that to have education is one of your freedoms. Another theory he had was "Conscientization" which is the process by which the learner advances towards critical consciousness.

Sources:
www.infed.org/thinkers/etfreir.htm
www.education.miami.edu/ep/contemporaryed/Paulo_Freire/paulo_freire.htm
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paulo_Freire