User:Fergiaj

malissa edwards    journey through the digestive system

Senior Writing Seminar May 1, 2007 Academic Writing Proficiency Exam Over time there has been an increase in interest in what circumstances encourage people to become “effective, competent, and independent” learners. Developmental psychologist Margaret Donaldson wrote a book published in 1978 called Children’s Minds, which devoted a passage to the desire to learn. In it she concludes that there “is a fundamental human urge” to pursue learning. Her view, one that I share, is that in order to encourage people to develop this urge we need to engage in activities that “we experience as freely chosen.” Several experiments put on by scientists of the time show interesting results when they put this theory to the test. In one experiment put on by R. Anderson, S.T. Manoogian, and J.S. Reznick three groups of children were weigh against each other. One group was given prizes for their drawing; a second group was not; a third group was not given prizes, however they were praised for their drawings. Then the children at a later date were given the chance to draw again. The results of the experiment were clear-cut- giving material rewards could be related to a “decrease in time spent on the activity later”. However giving verbal rewards had the opposite effect on the children. In the play called The School For Wives by Moliere some of the principles of the research are illustrated. The play is a satire, involving a young woman raised to be a perfect wife who overcomes her naivety to fall in love. As she grows up she is taught a great variety of things such as needlework and managing servants. Her only reason and motivation to continue to pursue these tasks was the verbal praise of her husband. This play demonstrates, in a small way the circumstances needed to encourage someone to be an independent learner. I have been able to see and experience the circumstances necessary to become “effective, competent, and independent” learners is the freedom to choose what to learn. When I have the ability to pick out a book to read I enjoy it and remember more about it than one I am forced to read in English class. Many of the classes I take for electives are the ones I enjoy more and do better in. The more freedom I have in my curriculum the more I seem to enjoy the work I do in those classes. Now that I am in my senior year a great deal of my classes are those that I choose to take. Because I had the freedom to choose I have become more interested in those subjects. I have had my highest GPA ever as a senior, despite the fact that I am taking four AP classes. I find myself choosing to spend the extra half hour studying my French 6 grammar work instead of watching TV. I have elected to work ahead in my chemistry class. I have also done a lot extra credit for my Animal Science class despite the fact that I don’t need help with my grade in that class. These classes are those that, though they aren’t necessary to graduate, I have chosen to pursue and explore them because of the reasons I took the class for. Without material reward I have found myself pursuing new goals. Donaldson believed that in order to become “effective, competent, and independent” learners we must have the freedom of choice. Donaldson concluded that it is in the nature of humans to want to control themselves. “We do not like being controlled; we like controlling ourselves.” So freedom of choice is essential in developing effective learners.

I am a piece of rice that hopes to reach my goal of being sold in a store just like all my other rice friends. Yay the day I get put into a bag and sent to a store. The worst thing has happened I was fed to a bird today. The birds beak is hard as a rock and very powerful on chomping me and all my rice friends in half. I’m on my way down the esophagus and being temporarily held in the esophagus. I’m being softened before I reach the stomach. Now that I am soft I am on my way down to the gizzard, wow it’s slimy and gross in here I don’t want to be here. What are these things coming after me? Hydrochloric acid, mucus and a digestive enzyme, pepsin are secreted by specialized cells in the proventriculus and starts the process of breaking down the structure of the food material. It’s breaking me down so I can leave the gizzard now I feel all soft and slimy and not the same as I used to feel. Now where am I going? I’m on way down to the small intestine where food is digested and absorbed. Ahh I’m being absorbed this can’t be happening to me I wish my life was on that store shelf waiting to be sold to a farmer or a family that needs rice. My parents really hoped that this wouldn’t happen to me but it did. Enzymes, produced in the pancreas, break down proteins and fats in the small intestine. The avian large intestine is reduced to a short, featureless connection between the small intestine and the cloaca. The cloaca is the final holding area for the waste products of digestion until they are voided through the vent. I’m being held in the cloaca help me I don’t want to become a piece of waste that the bird poops out (crying) why did this have to happen to me. where the feces meet with urates and urine, from the kidneys, and than pass out through the vent. The urates are usually whitish in color and the feces are usually brown or green. Well at least I am out of that birds body now a fly is after me, oh man my life doesn’t seem to be getting any better. Oh man I just got stepped on now I am flat.