Model Senate:
In the Model Senate Project, we decided on three curent, major issues that are occuring in our nation right now and wrote legislation on these issues. Each student was assigned the role of a US Senator and had to embody their characteristics and political beliefs. I was assigned Susan Collins Then we went onto learning about each of the three issues: immigration, climate change, and student college debt. We were then split into committees for which issue our Senator was going to be representing. Once in committee we paired with another Senator to write legislation regarding our respective issue. Written legislation chosen to be used on the Senate floor, one from each committee was used. During exhibition we went two days in committee where we gave speeches our Senator's position on the bill. Amendments for each bill were also written to get more Senators to vote. At the end of the second day, committees voted on the amended bill to see if it would make it out of committee to be voted on by the entire Senate floor. The third night of exhibition was when the entire Senate from all three committees voted on the amended bills and decided on if they should be passed.
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Legislation:
Speech:
Model Senate Reflection:
Three days after the final exhibition we are exhausted and saddened as the last project has finally ended.
Writing Goals:
Goal 1: Streamlining my sentences: I will work on making sure that all of my sentences get to the point and do not contain extra and unnecessary words. In my college essay, I wrote a sentence about how everyone has an inner critic or inner cynic and how it affects us mentally and physically. The original sentence went: ‘It’s something that everyone has hiding in the dark depths of their subconscious tricking us to think poorly about ourselves and kicks our confidence, along with ability to perform, to the curb,’. Yet this sentence was a little confusing and didn’t flow very well, it interrupted the paragraph that was in more than it added to it. In future writing, I need to simplify what I am saying so that my point is understood but in a shorter sentence. I can do this by reading my work outloud to myself to help identify if the sentence flow cleanly or if I need to rephrase.
Goal 2: Not repeating my idea: I will work on understanding when I have stated what my point is. In my writing, I tend to state and restate my idea to the point where I am just repeating myself. This makes for sloppy, repetitive work. In my “Habits of Highly Cynical People” seminar reflection I state an idea, then completely restate the idea a couple sentences later: ‘...all they want is for the information to be fed to them without having to think too hard about it,’ and ‘they don’t want to take the time to unpack the not-so-simple answers,’. This can be resolved by reading over my work thoroughly when I am proofreading. By doing this I will be able to catch where I am repeating myself and either simplify or completely delete the sentence entirely.
Goal 3: Strengthen topic sentences: I will work on strengthening my topic sentences so that my paragraphs have a really strong and intriguing start. I want to work on this because if you are reading an article and the beginning of the paragraph is not very interesting, you are less likely to finish the article due to lack of interest. In my “Habits of Highly Cynical People” seminar reflection, this is the beginning of one of my sentences: ‘Straightforward solutions to every situation are sought out without taking the time to address or understand the complex, and perhaps better, option,’. This topic sentence doesn’t make much sense and is not very attention grabbing. I will address this by making sure that my topic sentences are engaging while also setting up the theme of the next paragraph.
Goal 2: Not repeating my idea: I will work on understanding when I have stated what my point is. In my writing, I tend to state and restate my idea to the point where I am just repeating myself. This makes for sloppy, repetitive work. In my “Habits of Highly Cynical People” seminar reflection I state an idea, then completely restate the idea a couple sentences later: ‘...all they want is for the information to be fed to them without having to think too hard about it,’ and ‘they don’t want to take the time to unpack the not-so-simple answers,’. This can be resolved by reading over my work thoroughly when I am proofreading. By doing this I will be able to catch where I am repeating myself and either simplify or completely delete the sentence entirely.
Goal 3: Strengthen topic sentences: I will work on strengthening my topic sentences so that my paragraphs have a really strong and intriguing start. I want to work on this because if you are reading an article and the beginning of the paragraph is not very interesting, you are less likely to finish the article due to lack of interest. In my “Habits of Highly Cynical People” seminar reflection, this is the beginning of one of my sentences: ‘Straightforward solutions to every situation are sought out without taking the time to address or understand the complex, and perhaps better, option,’. This topic sentence doesn’t make much sense and is not very attention grabbing. I will address this by making sure that my topic sentences are engaging while also setting up the theme of the next paragraph.