Friday, December 4, 2009

First Draft of Group Work

Summary

Social Network Responses
The course outcome that social networking relates to is "Diversity, Identity, and Differing Perspectives." There is a relationship there that allows the individuals to express their personal identity and observe diversity among others. There are many course outcomes to this class, and the project that we picked (Social Networking) combines many of these together. Academic skills is something that is important in social networking because there is a lot of work that goes behind the scenes that people don’t know about. The diversity is important because people can express themselves through social networks.

We all decided that we wanted to do social networking as the focus for our group because social networking are part of our every day lives, and we wanted to learn more about them and how they help or take away from us. We all (Brooke, Julia and Laura) use facebook on a daily basis, which is a very popular social network.

OUR definition of a community is: People who live close or together and work together to make the place that they live a better place to be.

A social network can also be an academic community. It is a group of people all doing the same thing and working with the same goals and ideas.

On Merriam-Webster Dictionary online, it defines a community as a unified body of individuals. When you combine that with the word "academic" you get a group of people working together in an academic way.

Hamman’s Definion : (1) a group of people (2) who share social interaction (3) and some common ties between themselves and the other members of the group (4) and who share an area for at least some of the time.

Summary of Social Network Theory:

“A social network is a social structure made of individuals (“nodes”), which are tied by one or more specific types of interdependency such as friendship, kinship, sexual relationships, beliefs, knowledge or prestige,” (diigo.com). “Nodes” are the individual actors within the networks and “ties” are the relationships between the actors. So basically, the nodes are the people who are participating in the social network and the ties are the reasons that they are involved. In the 1930’s, social networks began to really take off. J.L. Moreno studied small social networks like classrooms and work groups while a group of Harvard students studied a group of interpersonal relations at work. There is a program called Social Network Analysis (SNA) and it is used for mass surveillance. They used it to examine whether or not US citizens were political threats and to study patterns of how HIV and AIDS are spread through social networks. The power of social networks is very great and can be useful with many different aspects of our world today.

Social Networks and Group Formation:

Social networks are one of the most crucial things in internet and design. They are used in society, the workplace, and for technology. The first social networks were researched in the late 1940s. Mark Granovetter and Linton C. Freeman were two people that published two important articles before the big internet boom. They wrote about social networking and how they believed whether it was based on weak or strong ties. Centralization in a network is something that is also very important. Degree of a point, control and independence are three very crucial things to have in a network. Knowing these things is very important in modern WebPages and sites. Researchers recognize that humans becoming able to make individual choices and ideas affect the progress and changes of a network. Keeping this in mind, a person could apply social networking towards a web creation, but since it is based on human systems it would be hard to predict the outcome of the network itself.

Physical Place and Cyber Place:

“Computer networks are social networks.” Computer supported social networks bringing more people together. Our world functions in networks, whether it is simply one person to another or even in the larger business companies. Social networks are giving people an opportunity to communicate with a larger range of peers. Communities now have less boundaries and more people involved. People and companies are also able to connect with more than one group, which allows our networks to grow. E.M. Foster examined the opportunities and transformations afforded by communication networks that are computerized. There are many positives to computerized communication networks such as, broader bandwidth, wireless portability, globalized connectivity, and personalization. Yet, there are also negative aspects to it such as, increased surveillance and less privacy. Through computers, our local communities are going beyond the neighborhood. People are now able to communicate with one another no matter where they are at.

LINK to Personal Pages and Blogs:

Julia Matthews

https://sites.google.com/a/csumb.edu/julia-matthews/about-me

http://jmatthews91.blogspot.com/

Brooke Keith

https://sites.google.com/a/csumb.edu/brookemarie/

http://brooke-keith.blogspot.com/

Laura Bockman

https://sites.google.com/a/csumb.edu/laura-bockman-s-site/

http://lbockman.blogspot.com/

CITATIONS:

Singh, Shiv. September 9, 2007. Social Networks And Group Formation. http://www.boxesandarrows.com/view/social-networks

Definition of "community" found on Merriam Webster's Dictionary Website

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/COMMUNITY


Wellman, Berry. Febuary 2001. "Physical Place and Cyber Place: The Rise of Personalized Networking."
http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/%7Ewellman/publications/individualism/ijurr3a1.htm

Monday, November 30, 2009

Fall Break

Thanksgiving Reflection:

My fall break was very relaxing. I really needed a break from school and stress from midterms. I have been sick for a long time, and being sick away from home is not fun. I spent a lot of time at the doctors over break, but I came back healthy. I did some school work: I had a big math packet full of word problems, so I went to my high school math teacher who is really good at explaining for help. Other than that, I didn't really have any other school work that I needed to do. I spent a lot of time with my family, I am very close with my brother and sister, so seeing them was very nice. My brother is a very good cook, so coming home to real home cooked food was amazing. Thanksgiving was great, I ate so much and everything was delicious. A lot of things have changed since I first moved here in August. I think I have become much more outgoing, and my people and social skills have definitely improved. I have a close bond with my roommate, and the people I have met here in Monterey Bay are really amazing! Living away from home helps me be independent, and it helps me learn to make choices on my own. Coming home makes me realize how much I love my family and it's nice to see them, but also nice to come back to school when break is all over.

Saturday, November 14, 2009

Which Book Would I save?

If i had to save one book, it would be "My Sister's Keeper" By Jodi Picoult. I would save this book becuase out of all the book i've read, this one is by far my favorite. My personal likes about this author are every story she writes has a very suspensuful buildup and a great ending. I dont have any dislikes about her. Its worth saving because it has a lot to relate to and it is a great story. It teaches you to love your family.

http://www.amazon.com/MY-SISTERS-KEEPER-Jodi-Picoult/dp/1439163855/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1258241232&sr=8-5

(amazon sighting)

Thursday, October 22, 2009

Condor concerns may not stop plans for Salinas Valley turbines.

Condor concerns may not stop plans for Salinas Valley turbines.


The Ventana Wildlife Society did a recent study The study says that there is a small strip of land between Gonzales and King City that holds a small threat to condors and renewable energy. Many people hope that this leads to development in Wind power in monterey county. These reports suggest that turbine construction shoud be banned in south of King City. This report has opened many people's eyes, now people just need to take it into effect and use it properly to make a difference.

Sunday, October 18, 2009

"Monterey Bay Aquarium 25th Anniversary"

A lot of work went into making the bay aquarium 25 years ago, and so people come together today to recognize these people and their hard work. Each month, students get in for free on the 20th of each month, but this month, October, everybody gets in for free becuase it is the actual anniversary. The marine life get special snacks on this day to celebrate, and visitors can enjoy complimentary cake, too. The aquarium is located on Cannery Row. Days they are celebrating the anniversary are this Saturday, Sunday and Tuesday. The event lasts all the way from 930 AM to 6 pm! I am going this tuesday, so it should be really exciting!!!

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Majors

The major project that we did in groups was actually a lot more fun than I thought it was going to be. The girls that were in my group were Kristine, Anna and Leila. They were all very nice and were great contributions to a group. When we split up the work, they all pulled their own weight and did what was needed to be done to get it done. We met a few times to prepare the presentation, and then we met the morning of the presentation to discuss and prepare what parts were going to be said by which group member. We planned mostly by text messaging and facebook where we were going to meet and what time: Peet's coffee was typically our meeting spot. On the presentation day, we were getting pretty nervous. We tried not to let our nerves get to us though because we knew the material and what we were going to say. We ended up doing fine and the final product was a success. I enjoyed listening to all of the other groups. Surprisingly not every group picked liberal studies like I thought it was going to be, so I ended up learning about what other majors have to offer and what kind of work goes into each major. I learned about biology, kinesiology, Creative writing, business, and many many others. All of the other persenations were very put together: they used a lot more slides that my group did but we still said all the information. One thing our group could have done better was add a bit more information in. Although we said a lot of the information, there were more things that could have been added to make it more in depth about each of our majors. If I were to do this again, there are a couple of things that I would change. I would make sure that the group was more organized with meeting and being on time. Being on time is something that is very important in a group. Each part of the material should be divided up evenly and everybody should do their part in the group to make it even. Factors that are not in my control but that I could change are other people’s work. You cannot control the work that other people do, but you can do it all at the same time and kind of help each person in the group out. My group would divide the work up, but then do it all at once and give each person a hand with everything. This way everybody in the group learns something about everybody AND every part of the presentation or project that is being done. Each person contributes and each person benefits from doing this. This is my idea of a good way to do a group project. Overall, I liked doing this project. I believe it was successful in delivering information to the class about the two majors we chose.

Monday, October 5, 2009

Current Event

New Members in Pacific Grove City Council and "an acting mayor"

The pacific grove council had realized quickly that their mayor was going to recieve bad news. She informed the team that her family was moving out of town and she was going to have to resign in 2 days. After hearing this, they realized that they needed to make a council member as mayor. Carmelita Garcia was appointed the new mayor, after a big dispute between other members. (they ended up making it a coin toss). After the two people left, they needed two new councilmembers, so there were a bunch of new canidates for that. If the council cannot make a descision of two new canidates, Garcia will make the choices.

http://www.montereycountyweekly.com/archives/2009/2009-Oct-01/pacific-grove-city-council-reconfigures-with-two-new-members-and-an-acting-mayor/1/@@index