User:Tionnetakala/NMAC 3108 Journal

June 1st, Introduction
My name is Tionne Rhodes, matriculating English at Middle Georgia State University and I plan on using my degree to teach high school literature. In addition, I want to teach in a rural area and help level the playing field for those students, motivating them to achieve their dreams. Coming from Taliaferro County, I know the importance of good teachers and mentors. These people encompassed what teachers of today should be: good leaders, honorable, compassionate, and passionate. Sounding cliche, I want to make difference in the lives of others. Teachers do that.They take young, active minds and they teach them to think, process information, and use them to shape their futures. Not only that, but I consider myself to be an adventurous person. I enjoy taking long road trips by myself to flee away from my every day life. I take trips to the beach to go parasailing and kayaking. My favorite activity is watching scary movies on Netflix and spending time with my pet Simon. Tionnetakala (talk) 07:11, 1 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I like your ambition; I, too, was an English major. Welcome to the course. —Grlucas (talk) 13:23, 1 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I too appreciate teachers who helped the literature come alive in the classroom. Your ambition to help young people is admirable.  I love long solo drives!  I hope this course helps deepen your skill set and drive. :)Jknox72 (talk) 20:13, 1 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I can agree with your statement regarding teachers. The best memories I have are of the teachers that incorporated relevance and creativity into our lessons. -AaHoward (talk) 23:55, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Nice, literature is a really interesting area, world literature is definitely one of the most interesting classes I have taken. Writing is really good in literature so hopefully this class would help you a lot. Ysabella Escalona (talk) 03:24, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Nice to be taking this course with you. I very much agree with your statement about the importance of teachers.Ousainou Adeniyi (talk)

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June 10th, Writing for Digital Media
So far, I have been introduced to a lot of new terms and important aspects to being an efficient Wikipedia editor. In Writing for Digital Media, Chapter 1 and 2 provides us with some basic information that a lot of us should already have some sort of familiarity with. In order to be a successful writer, it is important to follow the basics in writing. For example, Chapter 1 alludes to being "clear and concise". It is also important that while writing for Wikipedia, the writer must present their audience from a neutral and respective perspective. Their editing for the article should also be factual and not opinionated. Wikipedia is considered to be an encyclopedia not a blog where you are given the opportunity to share your insights. Chapter 3 focuses on teaching the correct way to insert headers. Headers are valued to be attention grabbers. When people surf the net, they search to find articles the header sticks out to them. This chapter also focuses on how efficient headers can be for humanity. While writing headers, it is important to write in present tense.

I totally agree, there was a lot of new vocabulary. However, most of the materials was relate-able in some aspect --AmaniSensei (talk) 16:03, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

Missing information
Tattnall Square Academy employs some important information; however, the article lacks major detailing about this school system. The history section gives minor detailing in regards to the educational systems facility. This Wikipedia article provides updates only up until to 2018.

Missing Academic information
Important information that this article lack includes that 90% of students qualify for Hope, over 2 million dollars in scholarships are awarded and the 10,000 hours of community service students partake in to give back to their community. It also does not mention that Tattnall's math team placed first in the Georgia State competition. Based on the school's web page, Tattnall is the only school in Macon to qualify for this competition.

Potential Colleges not listed
Contrarily, the website does share the graduation and college acceptance rate of 100%. They also state that, after graduation students matriculate to some of the most "prestigious colleges" in the country such as; Duke, Vanderbilt, and schools like [[Baylor] University]. The students are afforded the opportunity to get a jump start into college courses. The Academy offers 18 dual enrollment credit hours through local colleges in Macon, Georgia. The article lists the exact colleges that accept the dual enrollment credit hours.

Article lacks neutrality
Despite aforementioned educational information listed, the academic section is still inadequate due to the articles outdated nature. I wouldn't consider this article neutral, because it only views this school system through a positive lens. The article only applauds the school system for it's achievements; however, the publisher does not include the hardships faced. For Instance, the only information mentioned happens to be the wins that the Boys baseball team upholds. It say nothing about other sports; Such as, Football, cheerleading, basketball, swimming, tennis, or even track and field and their losses against other teams.

Staff
Additionally, another missing component is the amazing staff that guides the students in their paths to success.Something historical about the staff is that the Head baseball and Softball coaches has been working there since 1999. Their hard work was dedicated towards the 407 wins added to the school's record.

Improvements needed
The Wikipedia's content on this academy demonstrates that there is room for growth and updates. An active entry for this school should be monthly.

https://www.tattnall.org/

Progressivism
John Dewey view of education, knowledge and children is that everyone should be afforded the opportunity to receive a quality education that leads to real-world knowledge and applications with all children being able to learn and succeed. Our nation’s education system must take the this knowledge to make sure our youth are prepared for a global society. At the forefront of this is science, technology, engineering, and math but we must also must make sure our youth are well-rounded and that they possess the employability skills necessary to compete in a global economy. The youth can learn and they can succeed but teachers must equip them. Furthermore, it is important to keep the children engaged and interested in learning so they want to continue to learn.

Personal Philosophy
I have always believed that the best teachers are the ones that made learning exciting, stimulating, and practical. Learning is dynamic and we must go back to teaching students instead of to a test.

My educational philosophy would be Progressivism. I feel that learning should be done by living an active experiment. If we get hands on in an activity then we are much better to recall how things were done and why. I believe that allowing kids to use their experiences will help them. John Dewey had the correct thought process, in my opinion, when it came to the youth of the world. Let them get their hands dirty.

John Dewey, Principal Figure
John Dewey was a Principal Figure in the "Progressive Education Movement". His teaching philosophy still sticks around today in school systems.


 * You are right on the money. Progressivism is suited to fit people's learning process. Research shows that people retain/learn information better when they are active. The traditional way of doing things isn't as beneficial --AmaniSensei (talk) 16:08, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

June 15th, Article Selection
Option 1: Macon Centreplex

References cited on the Macon Coliseum are poor and invalid. For example, the first reference appears to be a broken web page. To improve this article, I will use more reliable sources that have valid information. Such as, information from the "about us" section on the Centreplex's web page to improve the content.

Macon Coliseum does not indicate the recent update to the facility back in 2015. Also, Contact information is missing the web page. The web page lists over 20 famous people including Elvis Presely that has performed here. Some important people that are not listed are: The Jacksons, Billy Joel, Reba McEntire, and Little Richard. There is also a "In Fiction" tab that lacks information, it is not relevant.

https://www.maconcentreplex.org/ contains reliable content.

Option 2: Sidney Lanier College

Sidney Lanier Cottage is a representation of a neutral article; however, it does lack a handful of important information. Not only that, but it is missing supporting evidence and reliable sources. Information in regards to chronology is not evident in the text. His educational experiences are not included. Scholarly sources on Galileo indicate all of the missing components. The article shares a lot about the founder but does not share a lot of information on the facility itself.

Option 3: Amerson River Park

There is no article on this historical park. I will employ all valid and important information to create a neutral, yet appropriate article.

Tionnetakala (talk) 17:25, 15 June 2019 (UTC)


 * I see what you are meaning about option 1 for the Macon Coliseum. Besides the website for the centreplex, are there any other sources you have found? Which article did you look at for your second option? Because the link turned red, there is not a page with that specific name. If you are able to find more sources it seems like the first option would be a pretty good one. NVaden (talk) 04:04, 16 June 2019 (UTC)


 * Why are your links red? Why do you link more than once to the same article? Your journal needs to be cleaned up; did you read about Wikipedia formatting? The correct way to link? That said, all of these options could be string contenders, if solid sources can be found. —Grlucas (talk) 11:37, 18 June 2019 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure why my citation is red. I'm reviewing the training now to see what I'm doing wrong. Also, I saw that one of my classmates chose to do something pertaining to their home town. Are the article selections limited to the Macon area? Or can we chose something from our hometown. Tionnetakala (talk) 18:11, 19 June 2019 (UTC)


 * Your links were red because they were incorrect. Be careful about spelling. Yes, if you have a hometown page you want to edit, please let me know. —Grlucas (talk) 10:57, 20 June 2019 (UTC)

June 15th, Establishing Credibility
Important key facts about credibility include: maintaining accurate contact information, immediate assistance, and intuitive navigation. Websites that are not credible are often difficult to access. The proxy denies your request to access the web page, it appears to be broken. Pop-up ads can be a sign of a site that doesn't have credibility. In order to have a concise and appropriate Wikipedia article credibility must be established.

June 16th, Citations and Copyediting
My experience with adding citations has been a tough obstacle to overcome. I've never used wikipedia before this class so I'm being introduced to a lot of new material. Training has been a life saver during this course. Training cleared up a lot of mistakes that I have previous ran into during the duration of this Course. After reviewing training once more, I learned that it is easier to cite through the visual editor. User:Cavaliergirl96 also has a well-developed journal that is interesting to read but also provides some very helpful information on linking citations. Copy editing is important because we're capable of improving and correcting articles. A lot of information online is inaccurate, but with the help of copyediting, articles are polished with accurate information.


 * I completely agree that the training provided through the WikiEdu was very helpful in teaching me how to add citations. I kept wonder how to get the references down there and if it was connected to linking a page. I edited my first article. I felt weird doing it but I understand that this is the only method to make Wikipedia a more accurate environment. I'm glad to know that I am not the only person in this class who is having their first experience with Wikipedia.Kehli.west (talk) 21:34, 22 June 2019 (UTC)


 * Thank you for the kind words! I'm glad to hear the citations are easier now. I've had a tough time with the source editing, but switching back and forth between using source editing and visual editing has been my work-around. I still wish the process was more intuitive. --Sara Kathryn 04:49, 24 June 2019 (UTC) (talk)

June 16th, Ethical Decision Making
During this course, we have learned to be concise during our editing process on Wikipedia. Chapter 6 introduces the idea of making Ethical Decision. Ethical Decision making employs that the writer should learn the preferences of their audience. Research consists of searching for where the audiences lives. For example, it would be bad ethical decision making if one was to discuss a children's outdoor facility down south to an international audience.

Developing concise content takes a lot of time. It's important to find out everything you need to know about your audience. Ethical editors are independent writers that develop their stories to be real. While doing so, they take their sources and treat them with a high amount respect.

Chapter 6 indicates understanding, developing, and picking the right type of audience for your content.
 * What you discussed is very important and is something that we need to practice doing as we move forward contributing to articles on Wikipedia. It is important to know who the target audience is before we edit because the kinds of information provided can be better tailored for their needs based off of that fact. Atallent (talk) 10:32, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

Idiosyncratic
Enhancing your writing skills can accomplished by practicing everyday writing. A writer must also be well-driven and dedicated to expanding their horizons while transitioning into being a more authentic writer through practice and gaining new knowledge. Carroll refers to this as being idiosyncratic".

Earlier in Chapter 6, Carroll alluded that writing must be directed towards a specific audience in regards to the topic. Something I learned was the differences between a blog and a article. Blogs are presented in chronological order. They also are built to express your own personal style in writing. This gives everyone around you a glimpse of your style, through your blogging.

Free Blogging
Sites that offer free blogs pages are: Tumblr,CoverItLive.com, and Blogger. With sites offered like the ones provided, writers are afforded the opportunity to practice and polish their skills.

Sidney Lanier Cottage
The article has a neutral tone in each of the sections discussing Sidney Lanier Cottage. I recommended moving the second paragraph in the first section to the "history" content. Also, including more information on Sidney Lanier would be appropriate for this article. Something else I suggested would be deleting the museum hours from the "museum today" section, because it is stated already underneath the image of the cottage. References for the most part are scholarly and useful. The article referencing back to one of Lanier's poem is broken.
 * I reviewed the article as well.The article should definitely include more details about the Sidney Lanier Cottage itself. I was surprised about how much information it lacked regarding this matter. Additionally, the layout could be better. I like your suggestion. Not to say that theirs were bad, but it could be improved. I suggest a picture of the inside be included. Instead of the leading section as Museum Today, Museum would be fine. Then you could have a link to the upcoming events instead of posting the hours like you suggested. Besides from that the article has a neutral tone. The information is considerable short and concise. --AmaniSensei (talk) 16:39, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Taliaferro County Courthouse
After reviewing my sandbox, I noticed that I included the national register reference back to back, which is repetitive, and unnecessary. My first sentence needs to be fixed. My comma should be removed after Crawfordville. This also was a lesson learned,to not move work from your sandbox unless it has been reviewed more than once. I'm also not sure why my references are dangling. Before finalizing my article, I will be contacting help from either my professor or someone from the help page. Returning back to training will probably answer my question in regards to referencing also.

Headers
An important factor of editing is choosing appropriate headers that differentiate relevant topics. The only words that should be capitalized are the first word and proper nouns.

Moving from Sandbox
After your work is moved from your sandbox, be alert of any new notifications. If Wikipedia work is removed, do not become discouraged, Professor Lucus can see all of your editing and contributions.

Headers are so important and so helpful to the reader! I think your journal utilizes the headers and subsections well. When it comes to moving your work to the live page, I'm glad Dr. Lucas can still see any deleted contributions. Have you had to deal with someone removing a contribution? I wonder if anyone in the class has dealt with this. --Sara Kathryn 02:42, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

June 28th, Digital Journalism
In order to succeed with Digital writing, the journalist should cope with the basics, which is simply, report. Giving evidence with your claims is effective in your writing.

Goals
I do not have a plan for a social Media platform. When I begin to write books, my audience will be young adult (teen books), and women (romance novels). My goal is for my audience to enjoy all of my books. They will all have meanings for each and every customer. My goal is to build a very large clientele, so the my funding will go towards a non-profit team. Each youth will have the opportunity to spend a summer enhancing their athletic skills for free. I find it important to give back to your community.
 * Great goals, but how will you implement them? —Grlucas (talk) 15:47, 8 July 2019 (UTC)

July 2nd, Understanding Citations/References
I was aware of the template button in the upper left hand corner; however, I thought the "Cite your Sources" button beside the sign your post would convert my URL into the appropriate format. I was completely wrong for thinking that. I feel much more relieved that Professor Lucas caught that ALL of my references were wrong. Sara mentioned that some of my URL's were difficult to access. So, right now i'm converting all of my URL's into the correct format for citations.

Professor Lucas gave some great advice in regards to editing my article. I'm also reverting to the original article to make all of my edits at once in my sandbox, rather than posting, and then editing. This will be better to focus on edits all at once, and also easier for the professor to review at once, instead of going back every minor edit that I make.

While doing research, I have progressed and found tons of historical articles on Taliaferro County Courthouse. Not only that, but there were also some interesting facts that can be added to the Crawfordville, Georgia article on Wikipedia in regards to it's education section and Historical content.

Hopefully this week, I will get a grip on everything, and get my Wikipedia article where it needs to be.


 * I am trying to get my Wikipedia article ready as well. I did not know about the template button but now I just saw it and i am thankful because this is something I needed to know for my work on Wikipedia. Ysabella Escalona (talk) 19:52, 3 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Your journals and articles look put together nicely. I'm going to start working on my Wikipedia too.-Acm2625 (talk) 16:16, 6 July 2019 (UTC)Acm2625


 * Good work. Your journal is a good place to practice referencing. —Grlucas (talk) 15:49, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Do you think that it is necessary to have a ===Today Section=== on my Wikipedia article that I’m contributing to?
 * Thank you for sharing your learning experience. I find it very encouraging that others run into challenges in editing wikipedia and overcome them. I am having a difficult time understanding how to add a map to the inbox for Amerson River Park.  It just occurred to me I should reach out to the teahouse group.  You continue to inspire!-Mightymize (talk) 17:35, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

July 11th, Field Trip
I haven't had a day off yet, which is preventing a field trip. I've been trying to get home to get pictures of the court house, plus more information from the Historical Society. One of my friends that still lives there was able to stop by and send a photo of the court house, so that I can update the existing one on Wikipedia. In addition, I will be going home this weekend, so maybe I'll gather some more important information for the courthouse.

This is the image, if anyone wanted to see a up close look of it.

July 11th, Adding links
This week has been hectic since the term is getting closer to the end. Week 7 consisted of adding appropriate links to our Wikipedia articles. I've went back and added links referenced back to supporting articles. You can easily link words by using the linking tool at the top of the formatting area. In my contributions, I've linked words like: Clock tower, Augusta, Superior Court and Gainsville. I figured that it would be helpful to link back to words or places that people may not be familiar with. This way the reader is able to easily access an article that supports it with evidence and explanations.


 * Proofreading? Revision? Links? References for support? These journal posts should be more than perfunctory. —Grlucas (talk) 13:40, 15 July 2019 (UTC)

Efforts
My efforts began by learning to navigate the Wikipedia page as well as our class dashboard. The Wikipedia dashboard is used for training, navigating the sandbox, and also where students can access help from a wiki expert. In regards to the discussions, I think I did a good job by discussing assigned topics with my classmates. I enjoyed absorbing all of the knowledge that I was interpreted from reading the assigned book.

My efforts also consisted of proofreading and editing different articles in my sandbox. While doing so, I noticed tons of information on Tattnall Square Academy. Not only that, but I identified that the article was not concise like we learned to be in training. I also tried to help my classmates in any manner that I could. My efforts also indicated that the references cited on the Macon Coliseum are poor and invalid. For example, the first reference appears to be a broken web page. To improve this article, I used more reliable sources that have valid information. Such as, information from the "about us" section on the Centreplex's web page to improve the content.

Another article that was a part of my efforts is peer reviewing Sidney Lanier Cottage. It is missing supporting evidence and reliable sources. Information in regards to chronology is not evident in the text. His educational experiences are not included. Scholarly sources on Galileo indicate all of the missing components. The article shares a lot about the founder but does not share a lot of information on the facility itself. I also discovered that there is not a wikipedia article for the historical Amerson Park.

Lastly, my efforts consisted of reading chapters of the Writing and Editing book by Brian Carroll. Every chapter gave a new objective to interpret and understand. Carroll employed objectives like “understanding the fundamentals of digital editing, optimizing content, and also thinking strategically”. Practicing to be concise and neutral played a vital role in editing Wikipedia.

Struggles
One of my biggest struggles is not being tech-savvy. I would always figure out doing things the correct way after the fact. For example, I failed to sign post correctly. It would also be a hassle for me to abide by the directions training clearly provided.I was aware of the template button in the upper left hand corner; however, I thought the "Cite your Sources" button beside the sign your post would convert my URL into the appropriate format. I was completely wrong for thinking that. I feel much more relieved that Professor Lucas caught that ALL of my references were wrong. Sara mentioned that some of my URL's were difficult to access. So, right now i'm converting all of my URL's into the correct format for citations.

It took a few days to understand that linking was not as hard as it seemed. I found out that if the linking is not correctly, then the word will be in a red font.After completing training once more, I was linking in no time. Another struggle that was discouraging is not having enough sources for my article. It was hard making time for a field trip when the probate court was open (all of the newspapers are kept here). Even if I was to get my hands on these papers, clerks would not have prohibited me to take them with me. In addition, there were limited articles online to access.

Another struggle of mine, was failure to add a citation, in a weekly manner. I had to go back and redo training so that I could complete the giving assignment. I also ran into an issue with adding citations for my Wikipedia article.My experience with adding citations has been a tough obstacle to overcome. I've never used wikipedia before this class so I'm being introduced to a lot of new material. Training has been a life saver during this course. Training cleared up a lot of mistakes that I have previous ran into during the duration of this Course. After reviewing training once more, I learned that it is easier to cite through the visual editor. On the Taliaferro County Courthouse Wikipedia article, I had added all of my references wrong.

Successes
Learning to be Ethical played a vital role in our Wikipedia lessons. During this course, we have learned to be concise during our editing process on Wikipedia. Chapter 6 introduces the idea of making Ethical Decision. Ethical Decision making employs that the writer should learn the preferences of their audience. Research consists of searching for where the audiences lives. For example, it would be bad ethical decision making if one was to discuss a children's outdoor facility down south to an international audience.

Developing concise content takes a lot of time. It's important to find out everything you need to know about your audience. Ethical editors are independent writers that develop their stories to be real. While doing so, they take their sources and treat them with a high amount of respect. Chapter 6 indicates understanding, developing, and picking the right type of audience for your content. Adding headers in my article and journal was also successful.

Peer Review
The article that I analyzed is the Sidney Lanier Cottage.The article has a neutral tone in each of the sections discussing Sidney Lanier Cottage. I recommended moving the second paragraph in the first section to the "history" content. Also, including more information on Sidney Lanier would be appropriate for this article. Something else I suggested would be deleting the museum hours from the "museum today" section, because it is stated already underneath the image of the cottage. References for the most part are scholarly and useful. The article referencing back to one of Lanier's poem’s is broken. SK gave some helpful feedback on ways to improve my article. She pointed out that my references were formatted wrong. I was not using the correct templates

Contributions to Wikipedia
Contributing to Wikipedia articles was similar to papers that required research. It is important that your references are from scholarly resources with reliable and neutral information. It is important to broaden


 * Good use of sub-heading. You were able to effectively breakdown your essay into individual points that can easily be followed rather than what a typlical essay would look like. My only suggestion is for you to cite & link more of the articles that you refer to in the essay.