I realize at this point that I haven't really talked much about my major. I've made many mentions to it, and maybe gave it a title, but not really discussed it. I'll be doing that now, and also touching on where people post discussions or articles in my field of interest.
What do students learn to do?
So far I've been discovering that students who study Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences are learning how to recognize, diagnose, and treat communication disorders. They learn how to work with people who have difficulties communicating, whether that be because of a communication disorder or hearing loss. They can go into either audiology, and work with hearing, or speech pathology, and work with speech production.
What do people who get degrees in SLHS go on to do for work?
People generally take one of two paths in the program itself. They can take the audiology route or speech pathology route. If one were to go into audiology, they deal with the ear and hearing. This includes doing tests on newborns to detect hearing loss as early as possible. If a hearing loss is detected, they can work with the child and parents in the treatment of that. They will help them with either a cochlear implant, hearing aids, body mics, etc.
If a person were to take the Speech Pathology route in the SLHS program, they would work more in speech production. They could work with children who stutter, either in schools as a speech therapist, or in a private practice. This is the same for any type of speech impediment. They could also work in accent reduction for people who want to lessen their native accent when they speak English. Speech pathologists can go into a variety of job types, and either start their own practice or work with a hospital, school, or existing company.
So why am I interested in it?
To be honest, I had no intention of going into speech pathology at all when I was younger. I wanted to either be a mechanical engineer or a pediatrician. That changed a little after congresswoman Gabby Giffords was shot in the head. I watched a documentary they did on her, and while she was going through therapy, they had a music therapist come in to work with her. I immediately thought that was what I wanted to do. It wasn't until I realized I didn't know how to play any instruments other than my voice that I realized I probably should find something different to do....
I still wanted to do some sort of rehabilitative therapy, but I didn't know what to do other than music. It wasn't until I took sign language my junior year of high school that I realized I wanted to do speech pathology. I had fallen in love with Deaf Culture, and I wanted to work with children who were deaf and learning to speak orally. I realized that I wanted to keep my interest in the medical field, and my interest in speech production and hearing and utilize that in the Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences field.
Leaders in the SLHS field:
One of the main voices for SLHS is ASHA, which is the American Speech, Language, and Hearing Association.
Some leading doctors in the world of Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences that I have found are Dr. John Rosenbek, Dr. Daniel Boone, and Dr. Gary McCullough.
Journals for SLHS Publications:
The first scholarly journal I found for SLHS is the Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research.
Another publication journal is the American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology.
I also found the American Journal of Audiology and the Journal for Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools.
Sunday, February 28, 2016
My Interviewees on Social Media
We're supposed to creepily stalk the people we're interviewing at this point, right? No? well.....oops. I did. And I'm about to tell y'all about it. Because I looked at the difference between their professional presence on their published pieces and their presence on social media.....should be interesting...
Linda Norrix:
Ok....Dr. Norrix has practically left a nonexistent digital footprint outside of her published articles. She has a facebook account, but her last post was in 2012. It was her only post.. She's great though. I think it's funny how she doesn't have any other type of social media, but she works with electronic equipment all day long. It's hard to compare how she speaks over social media vs. how she speaks in her research articles. She's very proper and knowledgeable in her articles, and I don't know how she would compliment that because of her personality, but I would be interested to actually find something.
Carole Wymer:
Carole Wymer is a funny sort of lady. She doesn't seem to enjoy social media all that much, because the only thing she has an account on is facebook (well, that I found). She doesn't even use that very much. Her posts are few and far-between, and for the most part they aren't related to SLHS at all. She's just having fun posting pictures and random quotes. It's interesting how she doesn't have anything online relating to her profession other than the informational videos I talked about in the last blog post.
Yoel Ben-Avraham "SocialMedialconCollage" 6/5/2009 via flickr. Attribution-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic licensing.
Linda Norrix:
Ok....Dr. Norrix has practically left a nonexistent digital footprint outside of her published articles. She has a facebook account, but her last post was in 2012. It was her only post.. She's great though. I think it's funny how she doesn't have any other type of social media, but she works with electronic equipment all day long. It's hard to compare how she speaks over social media vs. how she speaks in her research articles. She's very proper and knowledgeable in her articles, and I don't know how she would compliment that because of her personality, but I would be interested to actually find something.
Carole Wymer:
Carole Wymer is a funny sort of lady. She doesn't seem to enjoy social media all that much, because the only thing she has an account on is facebook (well, that I found). She doesn't even use that very much. Her posts are few and far-between, and for the most part they aren't related to SLHS at all. She's just having fun posting pictures and random quotes. It's interesting how she doesn't have anything online relating to her profession other than the informational videos I talked about in the last blog post.
My Interviewees as Professional Writers
Now that I've found out a little about my interviewees as people, and their professional back ground, I need to find out who they are as writers in their field. I'll be finding examples of their writing online and examining them.
Interviewee Numero Uno: Linda Norrix
Linda Norrix was probably my best choice in interviewee for this project because she has a plethora of published research articles online. Jackpot! She has lots of articles relating to pediatric audiology, and a number of other hearing-related articles. She's quite the established research article...writer...person.
Examples:
The first example I found of Dr. Norrix's work is a research article entitled "Audiometric Thresholds: Stimulus Considerations in Sound Field and Under Earphones". This article is about a study done on adults to test how FRESH noise obtains hearing thresholds, and how using narrowband noise can have some pitfalls. The results apparently showed that using FRESH noise was appropriate, but narrowband noise results were progressively inaccurate as the hearing loss increased.
The second example I found of Dr. Norrix's writing was also a research article, and this one was entitled "Auditory Neuropathy Spectrum Disorder: A Review". This article was written to help people understand ANSD. It was merely created to inform people and doctors of exactly what goes on with ANSD and how to work with someone who has been diagnosed with ANSD. It contains many different pieces of information intended to educate healthcare professionals.
Interviewee Numero Dos: Carole Wymer
I had a harder time finding publications from Ms. Wymer, mainly because she is a professor and not a researcher. To the best of my knowledge at this point, the only real published examples of writing by Ms. Wymer are episodes of an informative video series called Talking Matters!
Examples:
The first example of Carole Wymer's writing work was a video called "Typical Speech and Language Development". This video seems to be primarily geared toward either parents, or students who are studying Speech, Language, and Hearing sciences here at the U of A. It's informative in diagramming exactly what speech and language development should generally look like.
The second example I found was a video entitled "Speech and Language Disorders". This video seems more geared toward SLHS students because it talks about the definitions of speech and language. That doesn't remove the parts of it that seem geared toward parents, though. It also details some of the more common speech and language disorders and brings up a string of "characteristics that may be a concern".
Differences between the two?
There are many differences between the writing examples of my interviewees. Dr. Norrix has written many research articles which are formatted a lot like a lab report. It details the purpose of an experiment, discusses the procedure, presents the results, and concludes with a discussion of the results. Ms. Wymer, on the other hand, has made movies that are informative for her student and parents. It is much less professionally based, and doesn't make me feel like I'm sitting in science class.
Interviewee Numero Uno: Linda Norrix
Linda Norrix was probably my best choice in interviewee for this project because she has a plethora of published research articles online. Jackpot! She has lots of articles relating to pediatric audiology, and a number of other hearing-related articles. She's quite the established research article...writer...person.
Examples:
The first example I found of Dr. Norrix's work is a research article entitled "Audiometric Thresholds: Stimulus Considerations in Sound Field and Under Earphones". This article is about a study done on adults to test how FRESH noise obtains hearing thresholds, and how using narrowband noise can have some pitfalls. The results apparently showed that using FRESH noise was appropriate, but narrowband noise results were progressively inaccurate as the hearing loss increased.
The second example I found of Dr. Norrix's writing was also a research article, and this one was entitled "Auditory Neuropathy Spectrum Disorder: A Review". This article was written to help people understand ANSD. It was merely created to inform people and doctors of exactly what goes on with ANSD and how to work with someone who has been diagnosed with ANSD. It contains many different pieces of information intended to educate healthcare professionals.
Interviewee Numero Dos: Carole Wymer
I had a harder time finding publications from Ms. Wymer, mainly because she is a professor and not a researcher. To the best of my knowledge at this point, the only real published examples of writing by Ms. Wymer are episodes of an informative video series called Talking Matters!
Examples:
The first example of Carole Wymer's writing work was a video called "Typical Speech and Language Development". This video seems to be primarily geared toward either parents, or students who are studying Speech, Language, and Hearing sciences here at the U of A. It's informative in diagramming exactly what speech and language development should generally look like.
The second example I found was a video entitled "Speech and Language Disorders". This video seems more geared toward SLHS students because it talks about the definitions of speech and language. That doesn't remove the parts of it that seem geared toward parents, though. It also details some of the more common speech and language disorders and brings up a string of "characteristics that may be a concern".
Differences between the two?
There are many differences between the writing examples of my interviewees. Dr. Norrix has written many research articles which are formatted a lot like a lab report. It details the purpose of an experiment, discusses the procedure, presents the results, and concludes with a discussion of the results. Ms. Wymer, on the other hand, has made movies that are informative for her student and parents. It is much less professionally based, and doesn't make me feel like I'm sitting in science class.
OpenClipartVectors "Ear Hearing Listening" 10/13/2013 via Pixabay. Public Domain Licensing.
My Interview Subjects
In this blog post I'm going to present a lot of information about two of my interview subjects. I've already done two of my interviews, so those are the people I'm going to write about. I have an interview coming up (I hope) with someone who I'm actually extremely excited to talk to (probably more than anyone else), but she hasn't gotten back to me about which day she wants to Skype.
My First Interview Subject
Name: Linda Norrix, PhD
What she does, and who she does it for: Clinical Assistant Professor at the University of Arizona, and a Pediatric Audiologist at Tucson Medical Center.
Level of degree, and where from: PhD from the University of Arizona
Years in the field: 14
Professional Website(s):
-http://slhs.arizona.edu/bios/linda-norrix/
-http://drkevintblake.com/linda-norrix-ph-d-ccc-a-clinical-associate-professor-university-of-arizona-speech-language-and-hearing-sciences-information-related-to-auditory-processing-disorder/
-https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Linda_Norrix/publications
Date, Time, Location of Interview: Thursday, February 25, at 1:15pm in the Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences Building, Room 405D
Interview Questions:
1. In your own words, how would you describe what it is that you do?
2. What are the most common genres you regularly write in?
3. Since you're writing reports, is the audience you're writing for generally a pediatrician?
4. Since you're writing to pediatricians and the families that want the information you're providing, do you find it difficult to find a balance between writing for a professional and a family member?
5. Which writing genre do you think is your favorite?
6. Do you struggle with time management while you're writing reports or articles?
7. Have you seen a big change in the way doctors write reports in your field during the course of your career?
8. What tools do you rely on while you're writing?
9. Where do you get the templates you use for writing clinical reports?
My Second Interview Subject
Name: Carole Wymer
What she does, and who she does it for: Clinical Assistant Professor at the University of Arizona
Level of degree, and where from: Master's Degree from the University of Arizona
Years in the field: almost 9 years
Professional Website:
http://slhs.arizona.edu/bios/carole-wymer/
Date, Time, Location of Interview: Thursday, February 25, at 2:00 over the phone
Interview Questions:
1. In your own words, what exactly is it that you do?
2. What genres do you find yourself using in your profession?
3. Who do you write for?
4. Do you ever find it difficult to combine the writing style you use for your reports?
5. Has the style of writing that you use while writing your reports changed over the course of your career?
6. What tools do you use when you're writing, verses the tools that your students use?
7. Do you think that access to the internet has changed how you write?
8. What would a student need to be preparing for or need to know when entering your field, in terms of writing?
MFA Bulgaria "Bulgarian journalist Gabriela Naplatanova taking an interview" 3/10/2008 via Wikimedia. Attribution 2.0 Generic licensing.
My First Interview Subject
Name: Linda Norrix, PhD
What she does, and who she does it for: Clinical Assistant Professor at the University of Arizona, and a Pediatric Audiologist at Tucson Medical Center.
Level of degree, and where from: PhD from the University of Arizona
Years in the field: 14
Professional Website(s):
-http://slhs.arizona.edu/bios/linda-norrix/
-http://drkevintblake.com/linda-norrix-ph-d-ccc-a-clinical-associate-professor-university-of-arizona-speech-language-and-hearing-sciences-information-related-to-auditory-processing-disorder/
-https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Linda_Norrix/publications
Date, Time, Location of Interview: Thursday, February 25, at 1:15pm in the Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences Building, Room 405D
Interview Questions:
1. In your own words, how would you describe what it is that you do?
2. What are the most common genres you regularly write in?
3. Since you're writing reports, is the audience you're writing for generally a pediatrician?
4. Since you're writing to pediatricians and the families that want the information you're providing, do you find it difficult to find a balance between writing for a professional and a family member?
5. Which writing genre do you think is your favorite?
6. Do you struggle with time management while you're writing reports or articles?
7. Have you seen a big change in the way doctors write reports in your field during the course of your career?
8. What tools do you rely on while you're writing?
9. Where do you get the templates you use for writing clinical reports?
My Second Interview Subject
Name: Carole Wymer
What she does, and who she does it for: Clinical Assistant Professor at the University of Arizona
Level of degree, and where from: Master's Degree from the University of Arizona
Years in the field: almost 9 years
Professional Website:
http://slhs.arizona.edu/bios/carole-wymer/
Date, Time, Location of Interview: Thursday, February 25, at 2:00 over the phone
Interview Questions:
1. In your own words, what exactly is it that you do?
2. What genres do you find yourself using in your profession?
3. Who do you write for?
4. Do you ever find it difficult to combine the writing style you use for your reports?
5. Has the style of writing that you use while writing your reports changed over the course of your career?
6. What tools do you use when you're writing, verses the tools that your students use?
7. Do you think that access to the internet has changed how you write?
8. What would a student need to be preparing for or need to know when entering your field, in terms of writing?
Sunday, February 21, 2016
Brutally Honest Self-Assessment
Well, I'm gonna lay out exactly how I feel about my project. No worries, I won't cuss or anything...maybe...(I'm kidding, I don't swear, but sometimes I wish I did.)
How do I feel about my project?
Honestly? I hate it. I hate everything about it. I love the story and I enjoyed researching it, but I feel like I was so emotionally involved in the story and how much I enjoyed learning about it that I had the HARDEST time staying objective. I also hated that I couldn't use my "essay voice" because I think it's so fun to use long words. It's one of my favorite things. I used to read dictionaries for fun. So I feel like I hit a 'happy medium' point for vocabulary use when you compare my real voice vs my essay voice. Which SUCKS. I don't feel like it is entertaining to read, but I couldn't for the life of me figure out how to make it entertaining and informative at the same time. I ended up just taking out huge chunks of texts which probably did more harm than help. But I couldn't figure it out. I really needed to let myself be loose with it, and I couldn't do it. It's weird though, because I don't have much trouble making these blog posts sound like myself at all....*shrug*
What were my project's "weak ankles"? (please tell me you got the Hercules reference..)
The timeline was definitely underdeveloped I feel like. I couldn't find anything stating what the budget ended up being, and I couldn't find any information to find out if the proposed budget was actually used, so it was difficult to say things turned out in any way. I also feel like the voice was poorly constructed. I definitely should've made it more entertaining, but I struggled with that (see the above rant for evidence in case you forgot).
Jeepers Misther you're really strong! (strong points of the project )
I feel like the convention use is pretty strong. I tried to follow exactly what a QRG is, including the rhetorical questions. I even used them to help structure my project. I would've probably struggled more with the conventions of a video essay.
How were my time management skills?
I. Suck. So. Bad. At. Time. Management.
Literally the worst part of the project for me. I feel like I didn't put in nearly the amount of time that I should've and it's hit me like a ton of bricks. I hate that I hate my project, but I do. I hate that I have been scrambling to finish on the weekends when I'm supposed to be having fun. I've screwed myself over so many times for this project.
BUT.
I'm excited to try and do better for the next project. It's been actually kinda nice to have an actual challenge. And even though I feel like I failed in a lot of it, I know I'm becoming better. That's a nice feeling in and of itself. I'm happy that I've had this learning experience even though it's been hard to recognize how crappy I've been recently. I enjoy the opportunity to get better.
PublicDomainPictures "Sunrise Sky Blue Sunlight Clouds Dawn Horizon" 7/21/2013 via Pixabay. Public Domain licensing.
How do I feel about my project?
Honestly? I hate it. I hate everything about it. I love the story and I enjoyed researching it, but I feel like I was so emotionally involved in the story and how much I enjoyed learning about it that I had the HARDEST time staying objective. I also hated that I couldn't use my "essay voice" because I think it's so fun to use long words. It's one of my favorite things. I used to read dictionaries for fun. So I feel like I hit a 'happy medium' point for vocabulary use when you compare my real voice vs my essay voice. Which SUCKS. I don't feel like it is entertaining to read, but I couldn't for the life of me figure out how to make it entertaining and informative at the same time. I ended up just taking out huge chunks of texts which probably did more harm than help. But I couldn't figure it out. I really needed to let myself be loose with it, and I couldn't do it. It's weird though, because I don't have much trouble making these blog posts sound like myself at all....*shrug*
What were my project's "weak ankles"? (please tell me you got the Hercules reference..)
The timeline was definitely underdeveloped I feel like. I couldn't find anything stating what the budget ended up being, and I couldn't find any information to find out if the proposed budget was actually used, so it was difficult to say things turned out in any way. I also feel like the voice was poorly constructed. I definitely should've made it more entertaining, but I struggled with that (see the above rant for evidence in case you forgot).
Jeepers Misther you're really strong! (strong points of the project )
I feel like the convention use is pretty strong. I tried to follow exactly what a QRG is, including the rhetorical questions. I even used them to help structure my project. I would've probably struggled more with the conventions of a video essay.
How were my time management skills?
I. Suck. So. Bad. At. Time. Management.
Literally the worst part of the project for me. I feel like I didn't put in nearly the amount of time that I should've and it's hit me like a ton of bricks. I hate that I hate my project, but I do. I hate that I have been scrambling to finish on the weekends when I'm supposed to be having fun. I've screwed myself over so many times for this project.
BUT.
I'm excited to try and do better for the next project. It's been actually kinda nice to have an actual challenge. And even though I feel like I failed in a lot of it, I know I'm becoming better. That's a nice feeling in and of itself. I'm happy that I've had this learning experience even though it's been hard to recognize how crappy I've been recently. I enjoy the opportunity to get better.
Local Revision: Variety
I read the portion about sentence variety in Rules for Writers, so I can now use that to revise my draft and evaluate my sentence variety in my project.
Is there variation in my sentence structure?
At this point I feel like there is a moderate amount of variety in my sentence structure. It doesn't have too many redundant sentence forms, but there are a few. I don't like how I phrased some of my sentences, in that they don't flow very well with the next one. I have varied some of my sentence openings, and I definitely have differences in sentence structures. It has come a long way though. I had a plethora of compound sentences in the beginning that were bordering on run-on sentences. I had to shorten some to make them easier for the reader to digest. (See what I did there? Reader's Digest? ....at least I think I'm funny...)
How're my paragraph structures doing?
My paragraphs are kinda struggling, seeing as they are either too long or too short. I'm definitely going to go through to split them up really quickly. I personally feel like in a situation like this a short paragraph will do me more favors than a long one. The transitions between my paragraphs in each section flow fairly well, and each paragraph flows from its topic question. I tried to link the topic questions in an order that made sense as well.
Shall we take a look at vocabulary?
I have always been proud of my vocabulary usage. I have enjoyed writing papers in the past because I've used them as an excuse to utilize the full range of words I have access to. Unfortunately this class is not the place for that. We are supposed to have our real voice present in our papers, and I've never had to do that. I have rewritten sentences in the past to the point that they sound like they sound like I'm 3-4 times my age. In this project I've had to tone that WAY down, and I still don't feel like I've toned it down enough, but I just don't know how to. I've done the best I can for where I'm at right now. The variety is doing pretty well I feel like. The use of synonyms was useful and, I feel like, well done in this project because I wasn't being monotonous and repetitive. That is probably a strength. The weakness here is that I didn't use many different points of playful or entertaining language in the way that I could've. Definitely something I need to work on.
Prerana Jangam "Dictionary Language" 4/3/2013 via pdpics. Public Domain licensing.
Is there variation in my sentence structure?
At this point I feel like there is a moderate amount of variety in my sentence structure. It doesn't have too many redundant sentence forms, but there are a few. I don't like how I phrased some of my sentences, in that they don't flow very well with the next one. I have varied some of my sentence openings, and I definitely have differences in sentence structures. It has come a long way though. I had a plethora of compound sentences in the beginning that were bordering on run-on sentences. I had to shorten some to make them easier for the reader to digest. (See what I did there? Reader's Digest? ....at least I think I'm funny...)
How're my paragraph structures doing?
My paragraphs are kinda struggling, seeing as they are either too long or too short. I'm definitely going to go through to split them up really quickly. I personally feel like in a situation like this a short paragraph will do me more favors than a long one. The transitions between my paragraphs in each section flow fairly well, and each paragraph flows from its topic question. I tried to link the topic questions in an order that made sense as well.
Shall we take a look at vocabulary?
I have always been proud of my vocabulary usage. I have enjoyed writing papers in the past because I've used them as an excuse to utilize the full range of words I have access to. Unfortunately this class is not the place for that. We are supposed to have our real voice present in our papers, and I've never had to do that. I have rewritten sentences in the past to the point that they sound like they sound like I'm 3-4 times my age. In this project I've had to tone that WAY down, and I still don't feel like I've toned it down enough, but I just don't know how to. I've done the best I can for where I'm at right now. The variety is doing pretty well I feel like. The use of synonyms was useful and, I feel like, well done in this project because I wasn't being monotonous and repetitive. That is probably a strength. The weakness here is that I didn't use many different points of playful or entertaining language in the way that I could've. Definitely something I need to work on.
Local Revision: Pronoun Usage
I have been looking at my pronoun use because of the last post and have come to some conclusions. This has led me to a few conclusions that I'm about to discuss in like 2.6 seconds.
How do I use pronouns?
Well, considering the fact that I can count the pronouns I used in my project in my hands, I'd say I don't use them very much. I can't decide if this is effective or not though. I hope it's a good thing, because I simply refer to a person by their name to ensure the audience knows who I'm talking about. I feel like this is important because I used smaller paragraphs, and if I start talking about someone else, the audience needs to be able to follow that. I can see how that would be a problem though.
Do I ever speak directly to the audience?
I treated my QRG a lot the same as a blog post in the sense that I use questions to head my sections. I think this is a way of talking to the audience, because who else would I be talking to if I'm asking a question in the middle of a piece of writing? Like right there, I just used a question and it's obviously directed at the person reading this post. I feel like there are other instances where I could probably better involve the audience in the story I'm telling, or talk more directly to them, but I haven't quite figured out how to do that with a QRG.
Ananian "Two young people demonstrating a lively conversation" 2/26/2014 via Wikimedia. Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported licensing.
How do I use pronouns?
Well, considering the fact that I can count the pronouns I used in my project in my hands, I'd say I don't use them very much. I can't decide if this is effective or not though. I hope it's a good thing, because I simply refer to a person by their name to ensure the audience knows who I'm talking about. I feel like this is important because I used smaller paragraphs, and if I start talking about someone else, the audience needs to be able to follow that. I can see how that would be a problem though.
Do I ever speak directly to the audience?
I treated my QRG a lot the same as a blog post in the sense that I use questions to head my sections. I think this is a way of talking to the audience, because who else would I be talking to if I'm asking a question in the middle of a piece of writing? Like right there, I just used a question and it's obviously directed at the person reading this post. I feel like there are other instances where I could probably better involve the audience in the story I'm telling, or talk more directly to them, but I haven't quite figured out how to do that with a QRG.
My Pronouns
Now it's time to make a list of all the pronouns in my project! ....fun....
Pronouns Present and Participating:
ClkerFreeVectorImages "Crowd Mass Auditorium People Demonstration" 4/11/2014 via Pixabay. Public Domain licensing.
Pronouns Present and Participating:
who (children)
who (child)
their (therapist)
they (therapist)
who (Craig Coleman)
who (speech-language pathologists)
his (Craig Coleman)
who (Ann Packman and Mark Onslow)
Local Revision: Passive and Active Voice
I'll be looking at the passive or active usage of verbs in my project and placing those into their respective columns. And there might even be two different columns for active voice, if you're lucky;) (I'm kidding, there will be two columns for active voice anyway, just trying to keep things interesting....)
Passive verbs:
used
Active (Specific) verbs:
Submitted
Provide
treated
treatment
stuttering
published
stutters
treatment
stuttering
tracking
restricting
limits
branch out
doubles
states
providing
creation
exploration
quoted
stating
Active (General) verbs:
Require
Going
Gain
be
doing
involves
receive
select
is
wrote
expressing
are
passing
signing
providing
requires
passed
limit
expresses
says
called
response
are
Based on this.....:
So what I got from analyzing that was that my verbs are about even between specific and general, but I have almost no instances of passive voice, which is nice I think. I probably could benefit by making more of my words specific rather than general and kina vague. It would probably be both more convincing, and sound more like I know what I'm talking about.
Passive verbs:
used
Active (Specific) verbs:
Submitted
Provide
treated
treatment
stuttering
published
stutters
treatment
stuttering
tracking
restricting
limits
branch out
doubles
states
providing
creation
exploration
quoted
stating
Active (General) verbs:
Require
Going
Gain
be
doing
involves
receive
select
is
wrote
expressing
are
passing
signing
providing
requires
passed
limit
expresses
says
called
response
are
Based on this.....:
So what I got from analyzing that was that my verbs are about even between specific and general, but I have almost no instances of passive voice, which is nice I think. I probably could benefit by making more of my words specific rather than general and kina vague. It would probably be both more convincing, and sound more like I know what I'm talking about.
geniusvv "Run Material Photography Silhouette Portrait" 2/16/2015 via Pixabay. Public Domain licensing.
Local Revision: Tense Usage
I will now proceed to place all of my verbs into lists. These lists will be past tense, present tense, and future tense. Probs gonna shorten that to 'Past', 'Present', and 'Future' though..
Past:
Submitted
treated
published
usedx2
wrote
passed
called
quoted
Present:
Going
Gain
be
doing
stutteringx2
stutters
involves
tracking
restricting
receive
limits
is
expressing
are
passing
doubles
signing
states
providing
requires
creation
exploration
expresses
says
are
stating
Future:
Require
Provide
Going
Gain
treatment
treatment
receive
select
branch out
limit
creation
exploration
response
Which tense do I use most often?
Apparently I have an affinity for using the present tense, closely followed by future tense.
What does that do for me?
I feel like using verbs in the present tense places the reader more in the story and involves them with what I'm saying. It makes it seem like something that matters now rather than something that did happen and no longer need attention placed on it.
Do my tenses flow?
I personally feel like my tenses flow really well. I don't feel any jarring between them. I suppose that could be up to interpretation, but I've always felt like I was fairly good at using the correct tense in the correct place and at the correct time. I'm pretty sure it makes sense.
What about my use of Present tense?
I used plenty of present tense. Especially since it was the tense I used the most. I'm definitely not afraid to place things in the present tense. I feel like it's an important part of any piece of literature to utilize the 'here and now'.
RondellMelling "Smart Child Clever Intelligent Glasses" 9/13/2013 via Pixabay. Public Domain licensing.
Past:
Submitted
treated
published
usedx2
wrote
passed
called
quoted
Present:
Going
Gain
be
doing
stutteringx2
stutters
involves
tracking
restricting
receive
limits
is
expressing
are
passing
doubles
signing
states
providing
requires
creation
exploration
expresses
says
are
stating
Future:
Require
Provide
Going
Gain
treatment
treatment
receive
select
branch out
limit
creation
exploration
response
Which tense do I use most often?
Apparently I have an affinity for using the present tense, closely followed by future tense.
What does that do for me?
I feel like using verbs in the present tense places the reader more in the story and involves them with what I'm saying. It makes it seem like something that matters now rather than something that did happen and no longer need attention placed on it.
Do my tenses flow?
I personally feel like my tenses flow really well. I don't feel any jarring between them. I suppose that could be up to interpretation, but I've always felt like I was fairly good at using the correct tense in the correct place and at the correct time. I'm pretty sure it makes sense.
What about my use of Present tense?
I used plenty of present tense. Especially since it was the tense I used the most. I'm definitely not afraid to place things in the present tense. I feel like it's an important part of any piece of literature to utilize the 'here and now'.
My Verbs
I went through and wrote down all of the verbs I used in my QRG (and some adverbs because I got ahead of myself but oh well, what's done is done) and put them in a list. I will copy them to this blog post. Then I'll make a list of the ones I repeated.
My List of Verbs:
Submitted
Require
Provide
Going
Gain
be
treated
doing
treatment
stuttering
published
used
stutters
treatment
involves
stuttering
tracking
restricting
receive
limits
select
branch out
is
wrote
expressing
are
passing
doubles
signing
states
providing
requires
used
passed
limit
creation
exploration
expresses
says
called
response
are
quoted
stating
Any Repeated Verbs?
stuttering/stutters x3
requires x2
stating/states x2
are x2
Wellcome Library, London "The face of a bearded man expressing anger. Etching in the c." 10/24/2014 via Wikimedia. Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licensing.
My List of Verbs:
Submitted
Require
Provide
Going
Gain
be
treated
doing
treatment
stuttering
published
used
stutters
treatment
involves
stuttering
tracking
restricting
receive
limits
select
branch out
is
wrote
expressing
are
passing
doubles
signing
states
providing
requires
used
passed
limit
creation
exploration
expresses
says
called
response
are
quoted
stating
Any Repeated Verbs?
stuttering/stutters x3
requires x2
stating/states x2
are x2
Local Revision: Wordiness
We were asked to pick the wordiest paragraph of our project, so I grabbed the one I thought sounded like an 80-year-old English professor. I'm having a really hard time not being wordy because I want to make sure I sound like I know what I'm talking about, and it sucks. I hate this part. Pretty sure my project still sounds like an essay but I don't know how to fix it. Anyway, I changed my wordy paragraph and made it easier on the eyes.
The Chosen One (Paragraph):
The Much Improved Version:
The Chosen One (Paragraph):
"Rather than simply providing a rebate for speech therapy in general, there is a stipulation on the budget proposal requiring the use of the Lidcombe Program for the treatment of stuttering. Were the budget proposal to pass, it could potentially place a halt on the creation of new treatment avenues, or the exploration of others in existence."
The Much Improved Version:
"Instead of providing a rebate for speech therapy in general, the budget proposal requires that the Lidcombe Program be used for the treatment of stuttering. If it passed, it could limit the creation of new, or exploration of other treatment avenues."
Why the change?
The revision of my wordy paragraph makes it not sound like I'm trying to sound pompous or like I'm writing a scholarly essay. I'm supposed to be writing in an entertaining way, and as I still feel like my project is a little lacking in that regard, this paragraph, which was especially bad, is much improved.
ClkerFreeVectorImages "Panda Confused" 7/28/2014 via Pixabay. Public Domain Licensing.
Friday, February 12, 2016
Peer Review 2
I have loved this week and being able to see what my peers have been up to. Doing the second peer review was....hard though. I have a hard time being critical of other people. Obviously it was in a constructive way....but still. We had to do it, and then write reviews however.
Who and what did I review?
The first project I reviewed was David Klebosky's because he is the only one who did a different genre than me. Here is a link to his project, and here is a link to my review of it.
The second project I reviewed was Kelly Reager's QRG, because she did a project of the same genre as me. Here is a link to her project, and here is a link to my review of it.
What did I learn?
Boy do I have a long way to go... I have been extremely impressed with my classmates and it has been both inspiring and discouraging. I have a long way to go, but I know I can work on my draft until it meets the precedent that I've seen set by my peers.
What are the weaknesses of my project?
Well for one, it's way too short. I need to add more details, more facts, and more of a hook. It's not as interesting as it needs to be, and it needs to have more information. I feel like I could expound upon MANY of the things I left open-ended, and I kinda have an idea of how to go about it. I need to hyperlink sources to it though.
Now it's time for strengths:
I feel like the information I do have so far is a strength. I don't have very many because it's not even close to par. But I'm going to build on what I do have to make it into a strength instead of a weakness. I also like the picture I have, and I feel like my ability to cite pictures has improved to the point where it will help me on my project. I plan on improving it by a wide margin in order to have more strengths to speak of.
Who and what did I review?
The first project I reviewed was David Klebosky's because he is the only one who did a different genre than me. Here is a link to his project, and here is a link to my review of it.
The second project I reviewed was Kelly Reager's QRG, because she did a project of the same genre as me. Here is a link to her project, and here is a link to my review of it.
What did I learn?
Boy do I have a long way to go... I have been extremely impressed with my classmates and it has been both inspiring and discouraging. I have a long way to go, but I know I can work on my draft until it meets the precedent that I've seen set by my peers.
What are the weaknesses of my project?
Well for one, it's way too short. I need to add more details, more facts, and more of a hook. It's not as interesting as it needs to be, and it needs to have more information. I feel like I could expound upon MANY of the things I left open-ended, and I kinda have an idea of how to go about it. I need to hyperlink sources to it though.
Now it's time for strengths:
I feel like the information I do have so far is a strength. I don't have very many because it's not even close to par. But I'm going to build on what I do have to make it into a strength instead of a weakness. I also like the picture I have, and I feel like my ability to cite pictures has improved to the point where it will help me on my project. I plan on improving it by a wide margin in order to have more strengths to speak of.
ahtibat-stock "Man Scared Face Reference" 5/14/2010 via Deviant Art. Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Licensing.
Tuesday, February 9, 2016
Peer Review 1
Now that we've (hopefully) created our first drafts, we can review and improve them. We just peer-reviewed them, which was extremely helpful. I reviewed Tianna's project, which can be found here. The rubric I made for it can be found here.
What did I learn from it?
Reading Tianna's project actually sparked a few ideas on how I can set up my project more effectively and avenues I can take to present information that I hadn't tried before. I'm really behind on my project, and that was made extremely obvious when I read Tianna's project. Her information is incredibly detailed and made me feel like I don't know as many things about my controversy as I should. I do like the picture on my project at least ...XD
2 bad things, 2 good things:
A few things that Tianna did that I would like to avoid included form mostly. Her graph seemed slightly random in its appearance, so I would like to structure mine very carefully. She also (this sounds picky and no one else would probably have an issue with it) made one of her paragraphs super long, and I had a hard time with it because it was full of facts and I don't do numbers well. With it being long, I was automatically put on defense because it was going to bombard me with facts.
SHE HAD SO MUCH GOOD INFO. I need to find more useful facts, and I had a few ideas of how to do that while I was reading. I also liked how she placed the complimentary opinions one after the other so you can understand both sides at once instead of having it be spaced out.
What did I learn from it?
Reading Tianna's project actually sparked a few ideas on how I can set up my project more effectively and avenues I can take to present information that I hadn't tried before. I'm really behind on my project, and that was made extremely obvious when I read Tianna's project. Her information is incredibly detailed and made me feel like I don't know as many things about my controversy as I should. I do like the picture on my project at least ...XD
2 bad things, 2 good things:
A few things that Tianna did that I would like to avoid included form mostly. Her graph seemed slightly random in its appearance, so I would like to structure mine very carefully. She also (this sounds picky and no one else would probably have an issue with it) made one of her paragraphs super long, and I had a hard time with it because it was full of facts and I don't do numbers well. With it being long, I was automatically put on defense because it was going to bombard me with facts.
SHE HAD SO MUCH GOOD INFO. I need to find more useful facts, and I had a few ideas of how to do that while I was reading. I also liked how she placed the complimentary opinions one after the other so you can understand both sides at once instead of having it be spaced out.
petersnoopy "Kim Jong-Un Clapping" 5/18/2012 via Geografi-Tjek. Attribution Share-Alike 2.0 Generic Licensing.
Draft of Project 1
Alrighty classmates. So this last week was rough and I didn't get very far in my draft, but I figured I would post what I have so far. I'm going to obviously keep working on it, but here is what I've done at this point.
Sunday, February 7, 2016
My Sources
I've compiled some sources of information about my controversy, and will be presenting them in this blog post. Secretly it's just so I have a place to go to in order to find all my sources in one places and make sure they're legitimate, but that's beside the point.
What's behind curtain number one?
My first source is a podcast from the podcasts about stuttering known as StutterTalk. It is the longest running podcast about stuttering, and it is a non-profit organization. The author of this particular article is Peter Reitzes and he is joined in the podcast by Peter Dhu. Both have been involved in the speech and hearing community for a long time, and Peter Dhu is recognized as having ties to the Australian government and past experience in positions involving speech pathology, including being the consumer representative for Speech Pathology Australia. He is a very reliable source of information since he knows what he's talking about.
The podcast was posted on April 13, 2015, and was written just after the release of the budget proposal. Due to that, it is probably not as colored with opinion as something that was published after a larger amount of people had talked about it. One of the only things that happened around the time of publication was Hilary Clinton's confirmation that she would be running for president in the 2016 election. I don't see how that would affect my topic, however.
During the course of the podcast, Mr. Dhu discusses the release of the budget proposal and the likely thinking behind the proposal from Speech Pathology Australia. He adds a perspective from them and Lidcombe that supports their decision in making the proposal.
The Two of Sources (get it? like the ten of spades? Nothin? Yeah..not my best work.):
My second source is from the ASHA Leader Blog, and it is an article titled "Another View on Speech Pathology Australia’s Stuttering Treatment Proposal". This is a very respectable blog from the American Speech-Language Hearing Association. It is edited and led by people in authority in the Speech-Language and Hearing World.
The author of the article is Ann Packman, PhD, SLP, who is a senior research officer for the Australian Stuttering Research Centre. She has 30 years of experience in stuttering as a clinician, teacher, and researcher. She has the background to have a very knowledgeable opinion.
The article was published on March 13, 2015. It was not a very eventful time, other than the fact that North Korea tested missiles while the US was going through military drills with South Korea.
This article is the first I have found to explain exactly why the Lidcombe program was chosen to be the sole source of therapy provided for through the new budget proposal. It represents a perspective in full support of the budget change and allows the reader to understand fully why children's options are being limited to the one program. The statement made in the article about Australia researching and testing multiple types of therapy and discovering this one to be the best, definitely throws a positive light on Speech Pathology Australia's choice.
I wonder what source three could be?
My third source is from a website called Stuttering U. It is the website of a program that hosts a 3-day summer camp for children who stutter. They also host a 2-day training camp for speech pathologists to learn some more up-to-date treatment methods. This could be both bad and good for my project considering the people who host the website must be emotionally involved in the issue considering they spend so much time with the children who stutter. They are very informed, however, so it could end up being a mix of information and opinion that comes from the website.
The author of the article is Greg Coleman, who is a co-director of Stuttering U. He is a board certified specialist in fluency disorders. He also is the coordinator of the ASHA special interest group on fluency disorders. He is well-learned, therefore has legitimately formed opinions on fluency disorders such as stuttering. He wrote the article on March 9, 2015, which is around the same couple days as my last source.
This article is used at the end as a petition against the passing of the proposed budget. It is riddled with opinion and reasons as to why the proposal shouldn't be passed. These reasons include the fact that limiting the choices in therapy for children using medicare will limit a clinicians ability to choose which type of therapy will be most beneficial to a patient. The entire article is completely against the proposal.
Source numero four:
My fourth source is an official posting by Speech Pathology Australia about the budget proposal. It comes directly from them, therefore it is a reliable source.
The written document was authored by Ronelle Hutchinson, who is the manager of policy and advocacy at Speech Pathology Australia. Her role in the authoring of this document is purely professional. She has worked in many positions, but all involve the professional side of medicine or business, rather than a clinical side. She has probably seen many instances in which a child goes through speech therapy, but has never done it herself. She is probably well versed in the goings on in this world by now, but has never done so herself. Her opinion is therefore a professional one that doesn't hold much bearing in any of the emotional sides of this issue.
Since the publication is directly from the same people who made the budget proposal, it definitely represents their opinions. It spells out the gist of the budget proposal and a small dose of what it will entail. It argues for the passing of the proposal.
Source 5:
Source 5 is a post on Stutter Musings on Tumblr. It is not a scientific journal, therefore can only be used as a source when presenting people's opinions. It was written by someone named Jack, who stutters and is a Speech-Language Pathologist. There is not even a last name to look up, so I feel like I've hit a dead end with this one. His opinion is purely here to include information about what people are saying online about the topic. The article was published on March 12, 2015. It provides some basic information about the topic of discussion. It serves as the only publication I've chosen to research that isn't written by someone well educated in the matter of the budget proposal.
What's behind curtain number one?
My first source is a podcast from the podcasts about stuttering known as StutterTalk. It is the longest running podcast about stuttering, and it is a non-profit organization. The author of this particular article is Peter Reitzes and he is joined in the podcast by Peter Dhu. Both have been involved in the speech and hearing community for a long time, and Peter Dhu is recognized as having ties to the Australian government and past experience in positions involving speech pathology, including being the consumer representative for Speech Pathology Australia. He is a very reliable source of information since he knows what he's talking about.
The podcast was posted on April 13, 2015, and was written just after the release of the budget proposal. Due to that, it is probably not as colored with opinion as something that was published after a larger amount of people had talked about it. One of the only things that happened around the time of publication was Hilary Clinton's confirmation that she would be running for president in the 2016 election. I don't see how that would affect my topic, however.
During the course of the podcast, Mr. Dhu discusses the release of the budget proposal and the likely thinking behind the proposal from Speech Pathology Australia. He adds a perspective from them and Lidcombe that supports their decision in making the proposal.
The Two of Sources (get it? like the ten of spades? Nothin? Yeah..not my best work.):
My second source is from the ASHA Leader Blog, and it is an article titled "Another View on Speech Pathology Australia’s Stuttering Treatment Proposal". This is a very respectable blog from the American Speech-Language Hearing Association. It is edited and led by people in authority in the Speech-Language and Hearing World.
The author of the article is Ann Packman, PhD, SLP, who is a senior research officer for the Australian Stuttering Research Centre. She has 30 years of experience in stuttering as a clinician, teacher, and researcher. She has the background to have a very knowledgeable opinion.
The article was published on March 13, 2015. It was not a very eventful time, other than the fact that North Korea tested missiles while the US was going through military drills with South Korea.
This article is the first I have found to explain exactly why the Lidcombe program was chosen to be the sole source of therapy provided for through the new budget proposal. It represents a perspective in full support of the budget change and allows the reader to understand fully why children's options are being limited to the one program. The statement made in the article about Australia researching and testing multiple types of therapy and discovering this one to be the best, definitely throws a positive light on Speech Pathology Australia's choice.
I wonder what source three could be?
My third source is from a website called Stuttering U. It is the website of a program that hosts a 3-day summer camp for children who stutter. They also host a 2-day training camp for speech pathologists to learn some more up-to-date treatment methods. This could be both bad and good for my project considering the people who host the website must be emotionally involved in the issue considering they spend so much time with the children who stutter. They are very informed, however, so it could end up being a mix of information and opinion that comes from the website.
The author of the article is Greg Coleman, who is a co-director of Stuttering U. He is a board certified specialist in fluency disorders. He also is the coordinator of the ASHA special interest group on fluency disorders. He is well-learned, therefore has legitimately formed opinions on fluency disorders such as stuttering. He wrote the article on March 9, 2015, which is around the same couple days as my last source.
This article is used at the end as a petition against the passing of the proposed budget. It is riddled with opinion and reasons as to why the proposal shouldn't be passed. These reasons include the fact that limiting the choices in therapy for children using medicare will limit a clinicians ability to choose which type of therapy will be most beneficial to a patient. The entire article is completely against the proposal.
Source numero four:
My fourth source is an official posting by Speech Pathology Australia about the budget proposal. It comes directly from them, therefore it is a reliable source.
The written document was authored by Ronelle Hutchinson, who is the manager of policy and advocacy at Speech Pathology Australia. Her role in the authoring of this document is purely professional. She has worked in many positions, but all involve the professional side of medicine or business, rather than a clinical side. She has probably seen many instances in which a child goes through speech therapy, but has never done it herself. She is probably well versed in the goings on in this world by now, but has never done so herself. Her opinion is therefore a professional one that doesn't hold much bearing in any of the emotional sides of this issue.
Since the publication is directly from the same people who made the budget proposal, it definitely represents their opinions. It spells out the gist of the budget proposal and a small dose of what it will entail. It argues for the passing of the proposal.
Source 5:
Source 5 is a post on Stutter Musings on Tumblr. It is not a scientific journal, therefore can only be used as a source when presenting people's opinions. It was written by someone named Jack, who stutters and is a Speech-Language Pathologist. There is not even a last name to look up, so I feel like I've hit a dead end with this one. His opinion is purely here to include information about what people are saying online about the topic. The article was published on March 12, 2015. It provides some basic information about the topic of discussion. It serves as the only publication I've chosen to research that isn't written by someone well educated in the matter of the budget proposal.
The Big Event
"H-h-h-h-hey are y-y-you gonna get up?", a little voice whispers as you feel a gentle tug on your sleeve from a little hand. You slowly roll to your side on your bed to face your 3-year-old boy who is gazing up at you with his bright, hopeful, curious eyes. You can't help but smile at one of the best things to ever happen to you.
Since he's filled your life with so much joy, and because he's your absolute world, you want him to have the best life he can possibly have. The only problem is, he stutters. You know it doesn't change who he is, but other kids can be mean, and he won't ever feel like he can communicate with the world if he can't communicate how he's feeling. You want to put him through speech therapy, but where do you start? Can you afford it? What if the Australian government said they could financially help you put him through speech therapy, but only if they got to choose his therapy program? What would you do?
I've been researching the debate this parent would be going through in their head regarding Australia's recent budget proposal for providing Medicare benefits for children going through speech therapy, as long as they are a part of the Lidcombe program. I'll be discussing in this blog post the main event that sparked this debate.
So what did start it all?
My topic is very easy to narrow down to one single, prompting event. It all began when Speech Pathology Australia came out with their proposal for the 2015-2016 budget.
Since he's filled your life with so much joy, and because he's your absolute world, you want him to have the best life he can possibly have. The only problem is, he stutters. You know it doesn't change who he is, but other kids can be mean, and he won't ever feel like he can communicate with the world if he can't communicate how he's feeling. You want to put him through speech therapy, but where do you start? Can you afford it? What if the Australian government said they could financially help you put him through speech therapy, but only if they got to choose his therapy program? What would you do?
I've been researching the debate this parent would be going through in their head regarding Australia's recent budget proposal for providing Medicare benefits for children going through speech therapy, as long as they are a part of the Lidcombe program. I'll be discussing in this blog post the main event that sparked this debate.
So what did start it all?
My topic is very easy to narrow down to one single, prompting event. It all began when Speech Pathology Australia came out with their proposal for the 2015-2016 budget.
Analysis of my Rhetorical Situation
At this point, I guess it's about time to analyze the rhetorical situation surrounding me and this project. You can't really get very far in writing if you don't have a reason for writing or someone to write it to, etc.
Who is the audience?
Considering my genre is a QRG, people only read if they are interested. Therefore my audience will be people at least moderately involved in the speech, language, and hearing sciences community. Either that or they are at least slightly interested in learning more about it. Since this is a school assignment, people other than those in the SLHS world will be reading it. Therefore I cannot include terms specific to this topic without giving at least a basic explanation of what the crap I'm talking about. I feel like this is true for most pieces of writing though..
People interested in this topic may be reading scientific journals about SLHS or things related to that. They might possibly be involved in social media discussions on Speech, Language, and Hearing as well. Specifically, people who read my assignment could possibly be interested in either the study of stuttering, or have a stutter themselves. I feel like those people with a stutter who live in Australia, or have a child with a stutter, will be very involved in reading about this topic.
Since readers could possibly already have formed an opinion on the subject, it will definitely be important to keep my opinion out of the piece. People involved in the political aspect of the actual budget proposal could be reading in order to find out what kind of news is circulating about it. Regardless of their involvement in the budget itself, it would be important for me to include as many facts as possible. Parents want to know exactly what is going on, especially if it affects the education of their child who may have a stutter.
What is my purpose?
Well, aside from the fact that I'm going to be getting a grade out of this...
I want to make sure people understand the importance of the issue. I can't show my opinion, but I can stress exactly the type of impact either result of this situation would have on the community. I want to make sure it is clear who would be gaining in each scenario, and who would be losing. I don't want to sway people's opinions in any way, but I want them to feel strongly enough about the issue to want to form an opinion for themselves.
I want to make sure that the terms of the budget change are clear. If it's unclear exactly what the budget change would entail, then it's not doing the reader much good to read about it. Especially since it's in Australia, so it doesn't really have an impact on American speech pathology research. It won't be changing anything here, but over there it could be a huge difference. The other thing to consider is the fact that the budget has yet to be submitted. The budget for 2014 was submitted in September of 2015. Regardless of whether the department of treasury in Australia has made a decision regarding the proposal, it has yet to be published.
What about the author? (spoiler: it's me)
First of all, I love stuttering. Well, I wish it didn't exist because it makes people's lives difficult, but I'm fascinated by it. I feel like in order to write a good piece of ....well....anything.. you have to be interested in it first. And am I interested in the stuttering treatments in Australia?? You betcha! One of my best friends stutters, and it's been fascinating to be able to see the perspective of someone who stutters, rather than just reading about how researchers feel, especially when I know him as a person, so I know more how he feels about it and how it affects him than other people who might ask him about it. I want to go into speech pathology, so the results of the passing of this budget proposal would affect my career. I am not merely interested in the topic because it sounded like a good topic to write about, I want to know what the world is doing in regards to what I want to do with my life.
Who is the audience?
Considering my genre is a QRG, people only read if they are interested. Therefore my audience will be people at least moderately involved in the speech, language, and hearing sciences community. Either that or they are at least slightly interested in learning more about it. Since this is a school assignment, people other than those in the SLHS world will be reading it. Therefore I cannot include terms specific to this topic without giving at least a basic explanation of what the crap I'm talking about. I feel like this is true for most pieces of writing though..
People interested in this topic may be reading scientific journals about SLHS or things related to that. They might possibly be involved in social media discussions on Speech, Language, and Hearing as well. Specifically, people who read my assignment could possibly be interested in either the study of stuttering, or have a stutter themselves. I feel like those people with a stutter who live in Australia, or have a child with a stutter, will be very involved in reading about this topic.
Since readers could possibly already have formed an opinion on the subject, it will definitely be important to keep my opinion out of the piece. People involved in the political aspect of the actual budget proposal could be reading in order to find out what kind of news is circulating about it. Regardless of their involvement in the budget itself, it would be important for me to include as many facts as possible. Parents want to know exactly what is going on, especially if it affects the education of their child who may have a stutter.
What is my purpose?
Well, aside from the fact that I'm going to be getting a grade out of this...
I want to make sure people understand the importance of the issue. I can't show my opinion, but I can stress exactly the type of impact either result of this situation would have on the community. I want to make sure it is clear who would be gaining in each scenario, and who would be losing. I don't want to sway people's opinions in any way, but I want them to feel strongly enough about the issue to want to form an opinion for themselves.
I want to make sure that the terms of the budget change are clear. If it's unclear exactly what the budget change would entail, then it's not doing the reader much good to read about it. Especially since it's in Australia, so it doesn't really have an impact on American speech pathology research. It won't be changing anything here, but over there it could be a huge difference. The other thing to consider is the fact that the budget has yet to be submitted. The budget for 2014 was submitted in September of 2015. Regardless of whether the department of treasury in Australia has made a decision regarding the proposal, it has yet to be published.
What about the author? (spoiler: it's me)
First of all, I love stuttering. Well, I wish it didn't exist because it makes people's lives difficult, but I'm fascinated by it. I feel like in order to write a good piece of ....well....anything.. you have to be interested in it first. And am I interested in the stuttering treatments in Australia?? You betcha! One of my best friends stutters, and it's been fascinating to be able to see the perspective of someone who stutters, rather than just reading about how researchers feel, especially when I know him as a person, so I know more how he feels about it and how it affects him than other people who might ask him about it. I want to go into speech pathology, so the results of the passing of this budget proposal would affect my career. I am not merely interested in the topic because it sounded like a good topic to write about, I want to know what the world is doing in regards to what I want to do with my life.
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