Journal-English Majors Cup@ National Taiwan University

FLLD girls’ basketball team was collapsed last year; however, after we won the second prize in CCU freshman cup, we ten girls decided to recombine the team. In other words, we are all rookies. And it was what everything started.

As soon as we knew there was an “English Majors Cup”, we didn’t hesitant for a moment but sign up for it immediately. We all know it would be a great opportunity to make progress. Therefore, we speeded our practice up and sometimes we even practice at six in the morning!

Our first opponent is Huafan University, we beat them off by 19:9; nevertheless, in the afternoon, we faced off with National Taiwan University, who was the home team of the game. During the game, I was too nervous that I didn’t have a clear thought and had a lot of turnovers. Moreover, National Taiwan University played a hard game that they relied on their home court advantage and put out elbows frequently. We not only lost the game but also got several “souvenirs” from the game-bruising, scratching, strains, sprains…and so on. Although it hurt, we still strived for victory: we all know the true meaning of sportsmanship and the right attitude to play the games. Our third opponent was National Chengchi University. We supposed to win this game but we lost our feeling of shooting ball, and it turned out to be another defeat. It was not a glory record, but we learned a lot from the failure. Is it what the proverb goes, “a newborn calf is not afraid of tigers”? Well…there’s no positive solution. However, it was commendable to have such courage to participate in the game, and we were proud of ourselves.

Besides the game in the daytime, we went shopping in the nighttime. My aunt in Taipei played a great host that she treat me a lot of famous and popular local snacks to show her hospitality, and I really think I was bearing a food baby because of that. LOL~

Anyway, I had a wonderful time during these three days; I improved my basketball skills and bought a lot of things at the same time! I think I just “kill two birds with one stone”!

Journal-Two days one night in Tainan

On 2/27, 2/28, 2010, I and my five other friends (including two locals) bounded for Tainan to celebrate Lantern Festival. It was the first time I traveled to another city with motorcycle, and it was truly a special experience.

Our first stop was Tainan train station, we had our lunch “Chou’s shrimp roll” and “Anping tofu pudding” there, and rest for a while since we sat on the motorcycle‘s back for two hours long. These two are two of Tainan’s most famous snacks, and I think the reputation is well supported by the fact. Then, we paid a visit to “Anping Old Street” to experience the sense of nostalgia, but it was so hot and jam-packed there, so we didn’t spend too much time strolling around. Later on, we bought another snack which is a innovate one, called” Elate Pudding” to “Mo Niang Lin’s park” to watch the sunset. It was tranquil when we lay down on the meadow seeing people flying kites and cute dogs running around. In the end of the day, we chose “Garden night market” as our finally destination because it is elected by the ballot as the top night market in Taiwan. There were no doubt million of faces swarmed into the spot, you don’t even need to move on your own feet-people would push you automatically. After a “drastic battle”, we returned one of the local’s home fully supplied. As soon as we settled our packages, my friend’s grandpa played host to us hospitably with shrimps and crabs and a lot of sea food he bred by himself. He even took out his aged wine to treat us! We chatted till midnight and went to bed with satisfaction.

On the second day, we slept till the sun baked our ass (LOL) and then we set out to visit several temples and went to Luerhmen to see the ceremony of “whipping the spring ox” and to see the fireworks. The fireworks were beautiful, but unfortunately, an accident happened while we were watching it-the fireworks exploded right beside my feet! And I got hurt at the moment! It was quite unforgettable to have such an interlude in almost the end of our journey. Although it hurts, the scar has proved the colorful memory I had in Tainan.

task11

Question 1
How do you like the weekly writing prompts? Are they interesting or boring? Inspirational or weird? Are they related to your life? Can you suggest anything better and give some examples?
I like most of them( the illustrations beside the prompts are cute, too! And they encouraged me to finish the tasks! It seems that TA worked very hard on the layouts, thank you!) , especailly the topic of Britney Spears and Randy Pausch, it is relatively easy for me to bring all my thoughts into full play. Although other topics are related to our lives, it is too similar to write some new contents. It is better to choose something big happen lately.
Question 2
Do you like the two-way online discussion with your keypal? Or do you think we should have more people (like 3~4 students) form a group blog to exchange ideas? Why or why not?
Yes. I think two is just right. Too many people causes more technical problems, especailly the coordination of time. However, we can choose several articles in the end of the semester of others( not our original partner’s article) to give responses so that we can learn from others.
Question 3
Have you encountered any difficulties during the semester when using blogs to discuss with your keypal, e.g., computer problems or anything?
Nope. Not at all. The only problem is that we are both extremely busy so that sometimes we can’t turn in our works on time.
Question 4
How do you like the project website? Are they friendly enough? Have we left out any important content? How do you like the layout/design?
Great, for all the questions above. I think topics related to our lives are not necessary have to be related to the academic ones. It can also related to the things around us, such as big news either in school or in the world.
Question 5
What have you gained from this blog activity?
I find that private schools’ students are not necessary inferior to we who study in national university. Their skills and attitude toward learning and writing are worth learning. I also learned many words and phrases from my kel pal as I mentioned above.
Question 6
If you had an opportunity to start over, would you have done anything differently? If so, how?I will try hard to turn in the tasks on time, to use the grammar more accurately, and to improve my skill of choosing words efficiently.

task 10

1. Please offer your suggestions as how we can grade your performance better?
From my point of view, grammar is probably on of the most important part of our blogging. Only through correct English can we express the right thoughts we are trying to tell others, not to mention we are English majors. Also, the grade should depend on how many efforts we put on it, especially through examine the abundance of the content. And, the progress we make should also be involved in the grading item. It is not hard to see whether we get ahead or not after a long period of blogging from A to Z. Still, the partnership between you and your key pal is a part to consider, too. Good relationship can create better pieces of work together.
2. Based on the criteria you suggested in Q1, please give a score to yourself and explain how you’ve earned it.
I think I can get 7 piont in total( if the full score is 10). I am uncertain about my grammar, but I guess I have improved a lot through these regular practice. I think I do well on finishing the task since I look up the dictionary for simmilar words and phrases, find the information I can add into my article… and so on. Although I may turn in the task late sometimes, I will make it up as soon as possible. As to the partnership between I and my key pal, it is quite satisifying. We responded each other in patiance and we exchange our opinions matually and sincerely.
3. Based on the criteria you suggested in Q1, please give a score to your partner and explain how s/he has earned it.I will give her 8.5 pionts. She always responds me as much as she can, and as soon as she can as well. I can tell from her words that she works hard and she is really a nice girl not only to be a key pal but also a good friend and a good learning partner. She uses good grammar, and I learned couple of words and phrases from her.

task 9

1. Based on your preference, what kind of classroom activity do you like most and which one do you like the least?
Above all the courses I take so far, I like the one that offers students opportunities to show their ideas or themselves. The least I like is anything that does with math or any thing cramming.
2. Can you recall some very fun activity you experienced recently in class? Please describe it.
I like the “show and tell” in English listening and speaking class. Every period of time, we are assigned to do “show and tell”, which is a program you can show everybody what you got. As long as you like it, your topic can include all kinds of things. Now we just finished our show and tell round two, and to compare with our first round, everybody has made a great progress on not only their content but also their performances on the stage. Although it was really a hard work to prepare the content, the program has made us understand more and more about our classmates and brought us a lot of fun. The subtitle editing program is also a lot of fun in Professor Gina’s class. It inspired our creativity and brought us laughter as well. I like those activities full of joy.
3. When encountering some kind of difficult knowledge, do you have any strategies to process it? I would either ask my classmates or go on the Internet to find the information. I would email TA or professor in the end if everything just doesn’t work.
4. Based on your responses to Q1, Q2, and Q3, can you tell the type of learner you are? Why?
I am a self-starter. I know what I am going to do and what I want so bad every period in my life. However, I am lack of composure and persistence. Also, I have a poor memory, but I try my best to keep on with others.

task 8

Compare among various viewpoints, writing styles, communication styles, interaction, and interesting insights between other groups and yours. Discuss with your partner through blog about your pair work quality and answer the following questions.Question 1: From 1~10 (with 10 as the highest score), how well are you two doing? Please grade yourselves and give a suggestive score.
Answer 1: Judy and I decided to grade our blog 7.5 point.Question 2: How and why did you two decide the score?Answer 2: Both of us have tried our best to reply each other’s opinion and give each other comments as detailed as we can.
Question 3: What kind of improvement are you two making in the remaining weeks of the semester?Answer 3: Sometimes we delay a little bit to give out our opinions because we are both extremely busy. It is better to hand out the homework on time in any way. As to myself, I should improve my choice of words and try to enrich my paragraphs. I think my paragraphs are not “mature” enough; therefore, I should read more articles and memorize more phrases to improve my works.

task 7

We young people, especilly the youngsters who were born after 1981, are being mocked as “strawberry generation”. It is said that we are as vulerable as strawberries, who put more emphazise on external (apperance) than internal (personality), and are unstable, unendurable, unprincipled, even are hedonists.
However, from my point of view, those decriptions is a little bit stereotypical and subjective as well. There are always some black sheeps not doing well fulfilling their duty, so that others may take a part for the whole, saying we are this and that.

I am quite unsatisfied with the statemants and the adjectives describing us. At least I am not that kind of young people they mentioned. I think those who are too vulerable to face tha music are because they lack of the courage and are not being trained to do that. Perhaps their parents play a great role on it. My parents, especially my mother, has trained me to solve the problems on my own, and to think independently, which has made me learn to believe in myself, be more and more confident so that I won’t be defeated easily. As I have mentioned before, I take my failure and mistakes as a key to success, so I don’t care how many times I fail or lose. The more times I lose, the stronger I get. I even encourage my friends or classmates to hold on stright anytime they are frustrated. I would tell them some ways to bounce back as well.

Maybe they are right in some ways about we young generation, and I am to no denial. But somehow I am figuring out a way to help my peers to get away from those unwarranted statements. Perhaps we have been taught by the media for too many wrong conceptions, that we act unlike the way we supposed to do. For instance, everyone purchase material life, but we young people just don’t know where is the limit. We do things in an excessive way, which eventually leads to an imbalance and disorder life.

It is important to cultivate a right attitude toward things. Don’t blame on hermon or an impulse, because we are big enough to take care of ourselves and distinguish things from right or wrong.