Month: December 2018

For my first post this week I will be analyzing another travel guide blog. This blog post will be very similar to what I did in week one.

The blog post I will be writing about today is titled, “Travel Guide: 72 Hour in Copenhagen“, by user Hannah (link in title). I will just start out by saying that my favorite thing about this blog post is the layout. It is very neat, and all of the information is easy to find. The layout really allows the reader to coast through the post. She begins her post by telling the audience how many days she had spent in Copenhagen, Denmark. After this short introduction, the real travel guide begins. Hannah starts out with suggesting a place to stay in the city (an Air B&B). After this she moves on to recommend a place to eat. She names the “Café Bla”, which serves only vegan food, but then tells us that the warm food really helps fight off the cold she experienced in Copenhagen. So far I have enjoyed how she keeps her information short and simple for the reader, but stills finds a way to make it interesting. For the last part of her post, Hannah starts to list off places to visit. Her points of interest were the Tivoli Gardens, Nyhaven, and The Little Mermaid Statue. From this portion of the post I learned that the Tivoli Gardens was a theme park with rides, and a lot of food. Hannah says to her readers, ” you could easily spend all day there as there are over 30 places to eat, offering a range of cuisines from pizza to pasta to curry, and a light show in the evening”. She then gives her audience the best news by telling them that the lines for many of the rides are very short, meaning one could get on their favorite ride multiple times. The next place listed is Nyhaven. Hannah tells us that Nyhaven means “New Harbor”, and that is a port commonly known for the colorful buildings that are lined up next to one another. This is another spot where many restaurants are located for the tourists to try. The last place she mentions is The Little Mermaid Statue. She informs her readers that this statue is in honor of the author, Han Christian Andersen. It is meant to show him respect for his best selling novel. Hannah also tells us that some tourists are disappointed with the size of the statue, but that it should not stop anyone from visiting it. After her information on the statue, Hannah’s post ends with two questions for her readers. I for one would have ended with a small conclusion statement, but I still really liked her guide. I found her information very helpful and straight to the point. She also did a great job incorporating pictures into her post, and giving her audience a clear idea of what she was talking about. One technique from this post that I would like to adopt in the future is Hannah’s use of questions at the end. I think that is a great way to get your readers involved in the post! In conclusion, I personally have not been to Copenhagen, but after reading this post it is now on my bucket list.

For my second blog tour, I will be writing about Bahja’s final project posts.

Bahja’s final project is on relationships. The first post I decided to look at was the post about the meaning of relationships, and the different kinds of relationships. Bahja begins this post by telling the readers the definition of a relationship, and how many people may not know the true meaning of one. This information is then followed by the different kinds of relationships. The different types that Bahja states are family, friendship, romantic, casual, and professional relationships. After these types of relationships are told to the reader, Bahja will go into more depth about each kind of relationship by having a good size paragraph about each.

The next post I looked at was about friendships in school. This posts starts with Bahja telling the audience the impact school can have on the formation of different kinds of relationships. This introduction is followed by a paragraph about youth, and what friendships are like during those young years. Bahja gives us examples of how when we were we little, we would get excited about play dates, recess, and birthday parties with our friends. After this section about elementary/preschool friendships, Bahja moves onto middle school relationships. Bahja tells the audience that middle school is where kids become mean, learn to gossip, and only focus on popularity. This is the time where the friendships people believed would last forever, begin to fade. But this sort of behavior is bound to happen in middle school because people change. What comes after middle school? High school. Bahja has now led the audience to the section on high school relationships. It is explained that high school relationships are complicated because this is when people learn the true intentions of others. Bahja tells us how many friends are fake to one another, and are so caught up in boys, girls, and popularity that they fail to see their friendship with someone else slipping away. High school is a time where one can only wait for college. Bahja then begins describing college relationships, and how in the end, those relationships are the ones that last. This post is concluded by the idea that good friendships are hard to find, and that they play a very major role in our lives.

The last post I chose to look at was about healthy relationships. Bahja starts out confused with how to begin the post, but then gives the audience a quote from John Green about how to achieve more healthy relationships. Bahja then explains the quote and tells us that removing toxic people from your life will allow you to be happier, and help you form better relationships with better people. After this part of the post, Bahja moves forward to explain to the audience what a healthy relationship is. Many things define a healthy relationship such as, both parties are content with one another, both are there for each other in times of need, and both respect each other. Bahja concludes this post by helping the reader understand how crucial it is to let go of negative relationships, and allow yourself to be happy.

I really liked a lot of the techniques use so far in this final project. I believe that informational posts are always a plus. I learned a lot from this blog, and I hope that I can apply the teaching style Bahja used to some of my own posts.

For my first blog tour I will be writing about Arnella’s final project.

Arnella introduces us to her final project by stating that her regular blog will soon become her dance journal. She goes on to inform her audience that she is part of the John Marshall girls dance team. She then tells us readers a little background information about her ties to dancing. A big part of her introduction blog is trying to make readers understand how nerve racking and hard it was for her to go through the high school dance tryouts. I thought that this was a good technique to get the audience even more involved in the blog post. At the end of the introduction post, Arnella tells us about her success of being moved up from JV dance to varsity dance. Although she was very excited, she describes to us how she felt bad for another dancer whose spot had been taken by her.

Following the introduction, there is a post about dance drama. This post shifts from a happy/exciting introduction to a post including many disappointing events. First Arnella tells us about an incident that happened on Halloween where three boys dressed up in racist costumes, took a picture with the costumes, and then posted it all over social media. Like many others, Arnella was furious with this picture and thought that maybe her dance practice would take her mind off the negativity spread after this picture was posted. When Arnella got to her dance practice, things were not going very well. She learned that one of John Marshall’s very own dance members had posted a video showing her laughing at the racist picture. After this awful truth came out, everything went downhill for the dance team. Arnella then goes on to tell us that the dance team had lost a member due to the video posted, and has lost members before because of irresponsible decisions. She concludes this post by explaining how stressful things have gotten, and she is wondering is she should even continue being part of the dance team.

The final post that I  looked at was Arnella’s post about the perks of dancing. She begins with defending her statement that dance is a sport. To defend this, she gives her own opinion, and then moves to her evidence. She includes different links to sources that explain how beneficial dancing can be for your physical and mental health. She also states that another positive thing about dancing is that it encourages you to be social with others. It really allows the members to feel like they are part of a team/family. I found this post to be very positive, and informational for people who may not know a lot about what dancing can do for the body.

After reading a couple of Arnella’s final project posts, I found a couple good takeaways for myself. First, telling stories throughout the writing really enhances the post in a positive way. Second, explaining the morals of the stories is something I could try to start doing with my writing. Finally, putting things into perspective for the audience is very helpful for both the readers and the writer.