Proposal/Storyboard Reflection

Backpack Free Write

Chapter 3 - Question 1&3

1. Cat Deeley must have an ethos that connects with a wide array of people whose ages could be from 7-95. These people trust her because she is someone famous on a family friendly TV show. One product that Cat could have that makes her benefit from her endorsements could be her humor that she uses on the show. People will remember her by the humor and notice her when she shows up on her endorsements. Margaret Cho’s ethos is that she pokes fun at ethics and gives up her ethical appeal since she is a comedian. If people saw that she did something nice outside of her comedy, they might think that she isn’t such a mean person after all, and it is only comedy. Johnny Depp has multiple Ethos since he is an actor. He plays different roles in films that are suited for people of different ages, but he is always good at it. A product that might benefit him and his ethos is by dressing up as his characters and visiting people at different events. Lady Gaga has very strange ethos. She is “out there” and unique. She attracts the younger generation with her new ideas that she is trying to spread through her music. Bill O’reilly’s ethos is credible. He is a conservative news figure that a lot of people agree and disagree with. He knows he’ll have people that disagree with him, but he gets the news to people anyway. One thing that would help his endorsements is if he had that one feature that everybody talked about. Marge Simpsons is known by a lot of people. She is from one of the most popular animated series off all time. She can get more endorsements by someone wearing t shirts of her or her hair. Jon Stewart has a lot of people very sad right now since he is leaving the daily show. He would give the news to people in a very funny and humorous way, making fun of many politicians.

3. Some aspects of my social media page show me commenting nice things back onto my friends. This makes it look like I am a nice guy to them, but I am really being extremely sarcastic to them. If analyzing my ethos, I would have a very causal relationship with this person because they are my close friends, and my tone would be extremely sarcastic. This tone may not be appropriate in school or at a workplace, but on Twitter when talking to my friends it is appropriate.

Group Work

Group work can either be really good and helpful, or it can be really bad. Communication in group work is very essential. Some key points to communication between group members is to have a layout before you start whatever project you will be doing. If you first lay out all the rules and roles that each member has, it will be much easier to see who is doing their work correctly and who is doing their work incorrectly. Last semester my teacher had told us to write rules down on when we have to meet during the week and other things along those lines. We had certain days where we would meet and all group members would have to attend those meetings. If a group member missed more than 4 meetings, he or she would be removed from the group and have to do a presentation on their own. Thankfully, my group was very hard workers and we didn't have a problem with this. Another crucial part to good group communication is to make clear what each member is supposed to do, before the project is started. This makes it easier for each group member to know what he/she is supposed to do. It is also crucial to set dates on when things are supposed to be turned in so that the whole group is on the same page and can get work done more efficiently. Some problems that I see when working with a group is having a lazy or untrustworthy group member. A group can be made up of 4 people and 3 of those people can be the hardest working people, who get their work done correctly and on time, but the 4th doesn’t do a thing. These 3 people are punished because their group member, who was assigned by a teacher, didn’t do what they were supposed to. I can also see a single member of the group doing all the work while nobody else in the group does anything. They get the praise of what this member has done but they themselves put very little time or effort into it. I think the best strategy for problem solving within a group is to not create a problem to begin with. The group needs to lay the foundation of their project before it even begins. By doing this you can hold your group members accountable for their work.

Reflection on My Project Pitch

I thought that during my speech I accomplished a few things that I had worked on prior to giving my speech. One of these included my use of eye contact with the class. I had really made it a priority to keep eye contact with my peers as I gave my speech, and to not read off of the slides. I wanted the slides to be there only if I forgot what I was supposed to say next, but fortunately I didn’t run into that problem. Another thing I tried to accomplish was the use of my hand gestures. Last semester my teacher had told me that I needed to work on the hand gestures while giving a speech. I had asked my roommate to watch my speech and tell me if I was using enough hand gestures, or if I was over using the hand gestures and kind of forcing it. I thought that my strengths throughout the speech were the use of hand gestures, eye contact, my tone, and the topic that I chose. I feel like I was able to catch the attention of my peers by using such an intriguing topic such as the Lexington Humane Society. It really seemed to me that they were genuinely interested in what I was saying. Some of my weaknesses were when I paused and took a while to think of what I was going to say next. When I had rehearsed my speech I had a comfortable 4 minutes and 50 second speech, but while giving my speech it seemed that I didn’t even reach 4 minutes. I think I sped through my speech and didn’t take my time in giving it because I was afraid to go over 5 minutes.In my future speaking opportunities I want to be more confident while giving my speech. I am not saying that I was not confident while giving my speech, but there were parts of the speech that I felt like I spoke very quietly because I was nervous or because I wasn’t sure which direction I was going with a point. I thought overall I did a good job in giving my speech and presenting the information to my classmates.

Presentation Free Write

In Class Writing

Critical Issues Writing

Journal Post 1/20-1/26

Tuesday 1/20

Notes: Walking outside of Whitehall after class I noticed a group of people smoking cigarettes. They were talking about a video game called World of Warcraft. The group of people were made up of 4 males and 1 female. The female was the only one in this group that was not smoking a cigarette.

Reflection: I understand the point of cigarettes calming you down, but with all the new scientific evidence that relate it to cancer why do people still harm their bodies like this? There are different supplements that these people can use to rid themselves of cigarettes and make their lives healthier. It’s not my place to tell them what to do, but I would hope that they get rid of this habit for their own good.

Wednesday 1/21

Notes: Wednesdays are the best days: mac and cheese day at ovids. I was waiting in line for my mac and cheese when I overheard a couple (I think) in front of me bashing the mac and cheese. They were using foul language saying how they don’t give enough portions and that it isn’t nearly as good as it was last year. I don’t know how good it was last year since this is my first year on campus

Reflection: I didn’t really understand why they were in the mac and cheese line if they disliked it so much. I respect other people’s opinions, but these two were just wrong. The mac and cheese is just too yummy to dislike. At first glance I feel that these two are just negative people. I don’t see the need to complain so blatantly about something so simple as mac and cheese.

Thursday 1/22

Notes: I am in the student center talking with the dining office about my plan. I overhear two girls talking about how they are planning to switching to the 85 meal plans for the semester and two guys talking about how they are going to increase to the unlimited meal plan. Each of the pairs of people talked about the pros and cons of each meal plan they were going to purchase. Why they needed more meals, or why they need less meals.

Reflection: The main thing I took away from these two conversations were that both pairs waited til the last minute to change their meal plan. What made them want to switch it this semester and not last semester. What could’ve happened that they needed change. Did they need to spend less money because tuition is so expensive, or were they always hungry and needed more food than they already had. It was very cool that I got to “eavesdrop” on two sets of people that had different intentions about changing their meal plan.

Friday 1/23

Notes: I went to the JC after class on Friday to play some basketball. While I was waiting to play I overheard a conversation between two friends arguing about whether Lebron or MJ was a better basketball. They were using factual information on the topic and other different ways of expressing their view on the subject.

Reflection: I was really intrigued in this conversation because its a debate you hear often as an NBA basketball fan. I thought the guy that was talking about Lebron being better was 100% right. I did have some speculation on the facts he was using. He kept trying to boost Lebron’s stats by a couple percentage points. It was one of the more interesting conversations I heard doing this journal since I was somewhat interested in the subject.

Sunday 1/25

Notes: I went to Tin Roof during the day with my roommate and a couple friends to watch the Duke game, since Coack K was going for win 1000. We were at a booth and the UK fans behind us were bashing on Duke and Coach K. They obviously still had some resentment from the famous Christian Laettner shot.

Reflection: I thought what they were saying about Coach K was uncalled for. He is the greatest coach in College Basketball history and most people have the utmost respect for him. I do love UK basketball, but there are times when the UK fans need to learn that Duke is a good and legitimate program ran by one of the greatest coaches in all of sports.

Sunday 1/25

Notes: Once I got home from Tin Roof, I started to do homework and went to the library to meet my study group for my history class. During our study session there was a group of girls that were being extremely loud and obnoxious. They kept talking about their night and how awful it was at whatever party they went to. This complaining was directed towards other girls at the party. It got old real quick and we soon moved to a new location.

Reflection: The library is a place where people can go and talk and hang out, but there are times when people need to turn their volume down. It seemed as if these girls had had this problem once before. I want to know why they went to this party if they had known that this other group of girls was going to be there. They had said they talked about it before the party but ended up going anyway. Isn’t it just easier to avoid conflict than to get involved with it directly?

Monday 1/26

Notes: We had a s’mores night in the basement of our dorm tonight and there were quite a bit of people there. A conversation I heard was between two of the RAs in the dorm. They were arguing about whether water or milk was better in hot chocolate. They both said positive things about their own preference, but some of those positive things could be seen as negatives to the other side.

Reflection: How did these two RAs get their preference for hot chocolate. Was it what their moms made after a cold day in the snow, or did they learn to have a specific preference by what was made at their school and such. What sparked this debate in the basement tonight?

In Class Coffee Free Write

In Class Free Writing

Behind The Noose Short Film

I think this documentary was really good. I enjoyed it because it had the reality of what police officers could face in situations like these. Yes I know, these situations don't happen often, but it is a possibility. I thought that the music that was paired with short was very fitting. The music gave the short a little more suspense than it already had. There were a few points that I thought were a little unrealistic about the short I had watched. When he was searching through the buildings there was a body hanging but he somehow missed it, which I don't understand. They could've put the body in a more secluded place where it would've been understandable that he missed the body. The short went from very sunny day to a pitch black night within a matter of two minutes. I think the short was overall very good and entertaining, but it could've been more realistic at a few points.


 Link to Article

Primary Research Survey

For my primary research I decided to do the survey I submitted on blackboard. I handed out the survey to various members in my dorm. I didn’t know what to expect when handing this survey out. I thought I’d receive various different answers about the survey and what students knew about Wildcat Service Dogs. I had 37 participants in this survey The survey questions I asked were:

1. Do you have pets at home?
1. Yes
2. No
2. Do you know anything about wildcat service dogs?
1. Yes
2. No
3. If your answer was yes to question 2, please explain what you know.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

4. Would you like to learn more information about the program?
1. Yes
2. No
5. Would you consider joining the Wildcat Service Dog Program?
1. Yes
2. No
3. Don’t have enough information
6. Do you know anybody who is a part of the program?
1. Yes
2. No

For the 1st question I received 29 “yes” answers and 8 “no” answers. I asked this question to see if it would relate to question number 5 in determining if there is any relation in people that have pets wanting to be a service dog trainer or not.  

The second question I received all “Yes” answers form the 37 participants.

The third question I had a lot of similar answers. The three most common answers were; “They are trained by students here at UK”, “They are dogs that help students with disabilities”, and “Anybody can become a trainer”.

The fourth question I was surprised about. Only 19 of the 37 participants wanted to know more about the Wildcat Service Dog program. I think they said “no” because the figured I’d send them emails about it and be that annoying survey guy nobody likes.

The fifth question was what I had expected. I had 31 students say “yes”. I thought that those who had pets would be more likely to want to become a part of the Wildcat Service Dog program. Of the 29 students who had pets, 25 of them would want to join the program.  There were also 6 students who didn’t have pets that also wanted to join the program. I did not have any students say they “did not have enough information”.

The sixth question I only received one “yes” answer. The girl said she knew somebody from her hometown that was a part of the program. I think many of the “no” answers are because many of the students in my dorm are freshmen and don’t know too many upperclassmen here at UK.

Reflection on the Blog Posts

When we were first assigned the blog posts I was very uninterested in them. I thought they were a waste of time and given to us for busy work. I would write them just for the sake of the grade and not really care what the information I was looking up actually was. It was hard choosing a topic that I actually wanted to learn about, but once we were put into groups I instantly loved the topic. The Wildcat Service Dogs and service dogs in general are so fascinating. I actually enjoy doing the research (to an extent). I have learned so much from the 3 blog posts a week. The blog posts are a great idea. Like I said earlier I didn’t understand what the point of doing them was, but now that we are actually starting to get into writing and directing our documentary, they are a great source and easy reference. I don’t need to keep looking up different items to put into the documentary. Everything I have already researched is summed up into a nice little paragraph or two. If I need more information from a specific source, I know where to find it. I can also use my group member’s blog post to retrieve and look for information I didn’t find. Overall I am pretty happy on how the blog posts have helped in terms of research. What I wasn’t a fan of was how repetitive some blog posts got to be. The information I was finding was very similar to other blog posts I had done. It was tough finding new information that wasn’t completely boring. These blog posts will be a big help to me when doing the documentary in the near future.

Pros and Cons of Service Dogs

The article I’m writing about is titled “Pros and cons of getting a service dog. The article can be found online at doggoestocollege.com. The article was written and published by doggoestocollege.com.

The are many pros and cons to service dogs. The first pro is the main reason service dogs exist: assistance with one’s disability. The dogs are there to help their owners get through everyday activities in life. Service dogs help their owners achieve greater independence. Without their service dogs many owners couldn’t do regular activities and could feel restricted on what they can and can’t do. Dog’s that can help to detect medical alerts can actually be the difference in if the individual (owner) can get a drivers license or not. Happiness is right in front of the individual at all times. Sometimes people with disabilities can become depressed or unhappy, but it is pretty hard to become unhappy with a loving and caring dog next to the individual. Service dogs give some owners a piece of mind. Knowing that someone or something is there for you at all hours of the day can be really comforting to some people. Although there are many pros of having a service dog, there are also a lot of cons. One problem that a lot of service dog owners run into is the denial of entering some public places. There is a federal law granting all service dogs to be allowed into public areas, but some public place owners still don’t let the dogs in. They question whether the validity of their service dog is true. Another concern that many service dogs owners have is the constant remarks and questions they receive throughout the day. A lot of people are very curious about service dogs and want to know more about them. It isn’t that these people are doing anything wrong, but the owners are asked these questions very often which can get annoying. Many people with disabilities have to learn not to be self conscious about their disability. With a service dog it is obvious that this individual has a disability and can really harm him or her knowing that people are staring at you because of your disability.

It was really interesting to see that there are some cons of owning a service dog. Most people know of the good that service dogs do. They help their owners with many simple tasks throughout the day, that without the service dog they wouldn't be able to do so. What I want to know is, How are some public space owners allowed to not serve those with service dogs? I had read in a previous article I wrote about that they are only allowed to ask two questions, “Is this a service dog?” and “What is this service dog trained for?”. They aren’t allowed to ask any other questions regarding the validity of the service dog. I could further my research on this specific example on looking up what happens to the individuals who don’t grant access to service dogs. Are they fined, or is there a harsher penalty? 


Link to Article

Seizure Alert and Response Dogs

The article I am writing about today is titled “Seizure alert/response dogs” and was written and published by the website servicedogcentral.org. In my earlier blog post titled “Service Dog in the Yearbook” I learned that some service dogs are trained to predict epileptic seizures. I found this very interesting and thought I’d look further into it.

The article starts off by talking about how many dogs are actually able to predict seizures. Only fifteen percent of dogs are able to predict seizures before they occur. Usually these predictions can be made around 10-20 minutes before the seizure happens, giving the dog an opportunity to notify friends or family. This is the seizure alert dog. The seizure response dog helps the individual when a seizure occurs. Some of the tasks these dogs help with are clearing vomit from the individual’s airway (gross I know, but very crucial), operating a K-9 phone, helping the individual balance if needed, and other activities that help the individual survive for some time before help arrives. These two dogs combined are simply called “Seizure Dogs”. Nobody knows how the dogs know when a seizure will occur. There are two theories: “(1) that the dog is able to smell minute changes in the person's biochemistry, possibly in their blood chemistry or (2) that they are able to detect fine motor changes imperceptible to human eyes”. This ability to detect seizures is natural and only occurs in some dogs, but not others. Dogs can be trained to detect seizures, but without knowing when a seizure will happen, there is no way of training. For most seizure alert dogs it takes them close to six months before they can accurately start predicting when their owner will have a seizure.

This to me is beyond amazing. It is unbelievable to think that dogs can predict when an individual will have a seizure of some sort. It’s also crazy to think about how these dogs are trained to respond to an individual having a seizure. How are these dogs taught to help individuals experiencing a seizure? How do you train them to turn the body over so airways aren’t blocked, or to call on the K-9 phone? I could research this using the internet, but talking to a trainer that trains these types of dogs would be much more satisfying.


Link to Article

Guide Dogs Bring More Than Sight

The article I am writing about is titled “ Guide dogs bring more than sight” and was found at the Academic Search Complete database from the University of Kentucky library website at http://eds.b.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.uky.edu. The article was written by Allison Gray and was published as a newspaper article by USA Today.

The article starts off talking about Deni Elliott, a legally blind woman who wanted not just a service dog, but a best friend. She didn’t care what type of dog it was, what color it was, its gender, or its size, but she did care about its personality. Deni and her dog, Alberta are among 7,000 guide dog pairings. These pairings are more than just a guide dog and their owner, its like a marriage. Alberta went through a lot of training to become a guide dog, and it first started with a year and half program with puppy raisers. These puppies will be trained in crowded areas to see how they handle people, and will be tested on how they react to little distractions like a coin falling to the ground. These dogs can be much more than just guide dogs. A college student was too shy to eat in the cafeteria, but once she received her service dog she was no longer shy. Other service dogs can help owners with peanut allergies smell if there are any traces of peanuts in the food they eat.  Many legally blind people like Deni prefer guide dogs rather than canes. Deni says, “My world now is as big as a guide dog can sense, which is a whole lot bigger than the arc of a cane”.

This article was cool to look at and read. I was fascinated about how dogs are trained to sniff out the slightest bit of peanuts to help their owner. I was curious about the 7,000 pairing number. Is that number just based off of legally blind people, or does it include others that have service dogs as well? If I wanted to pursue this question towards my research I could easily find out how many total service dogs are active today by doing a couple quick google searches. 


Link to Article

Service Dog in the Yearbook

The article I found is titled “Service Dog Gets His Own Photo in the Middle School Yearbook”. I found this article on the online database the UK library provides at http://eds.b.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.uky.edu. The article was written by Samantha Grossman and published by time.com.

The article first talks about the odd new face in the yearbook at Hector Garcia Middle School; a dog! The dog’s name is Taxi and he is a service dog to a young lady Rachel Benke. Rachel has been suffering from epileptic seizures for her whole life and had a corrective brain surgery when she was six. The surgery reduced the amount of seizures she has, but she still experiences them today. The reason Taxi is so important to Rachel is because Taxi can sense when Rachel will have a seizure “up to an hour and a half before it occurs”. Once Taxi senses she will have a seizure, he alerts her teachers and or parents, whoever is around. Taxi is with Rachel every single day at school, and the thought of adding Taxi to the yearbook started as a joke. Taxi has saved Rachel’s life twice already. One time occurred when Rachel was on  trampoline and the other, when she was in a pool.

When I first read the title it automatically caught my interest. What could’ve been so special about this dog that he got a spot in the school yearbook? Its really a cool story. The fact that Taxi can predict when Rachel has a seizure is mind blowing to me. How is Taxi able to predict when this happens? What type of training can allow a dog to be able to do this? I could further my research to look into service dogs that are primarily for seizure patients, instead of service dogs in general.


Link to Article

About Wildcat Service Dogs

The article I’m writing about today can be found at wildcatservicedogsuk.webs.com. The article is titled “About Us” and was written and published by the Wildcat Service Dog Team.

The article starts off saying that the Wildcat Service Dog organization is relatively new to the University. All Wildcat Service Dogs are trained by college students for up to two years. The trainers of Wildcat Service Dogs must attend weekly training sessions.The WSD (Wildcat Service Dogs) program was started in 2011 when Katie Skarvan got a service dog to train. She brought the dog to many classes and she received many questions pertaining to the dog. Another student named Jennifer Hamilton then received a training dog as well and the program took off from there. The service dogs are being trained to help individuals with disabilities accomplish everyday tasks. Service dogs help with many tasks: opening doors, turning off lights, retrieving dropped items, and many more. Puppy raisers at the university receive their dogs when they are 8-12 weeks old and keep them for close to two years. The trainers are responsible for teaching the puppies simple obedience commands such as sit, stay, and other commands. To become a WSD trainer there are many things one must do. Some of them include attending orientation meetings, classes for humans, training classes, as well as many more. For the students that aren’t ready to become a puppy trainer, they can become puppy sitters. The puppy sitters watch the dogs while the trainers are busy with labs that the dogs aren’t allowed in. The Wildcat Service Dogs are only used for the basic training and are then given to a much more advanced training program.

I enjoyed learning more about this organization. I had only known that one could become a puppy trainer, but I had no clue that one could become a puppy sitter. I really want to be involved in the puppy sitting. The article doesn’t specifically say what things will get you selected to become a trainer. What are the attributes or qualities do they look for? Does an individual wanting to become a puppy trainer have to have any prior experience with animals? To further my research I could look at the link provided in the article and find more information about service dogs in general. 


Link to Article

5 Best Therapy Dog Breeds

The article I’m writing about today is called “5 Best Therapy Dog Breeds”. The article was written and published by Therapy Dog Certification and can be found at Therapydogcertification.com.

This article tells us which breeds of dogs are best for therapy. The first dog breed that is good for therapy is the German Shepherd. The German Shepherds are known for their loyalty and intelligence, as well as their hard working ability. Although German Shepherds are great dogs for training programs, it is very tough to find the ideal German Shepherd. The second dog is the labrador retriever. The labs are very smart dogs and are not aggressive. The dogs are extremely obedient and are very friendly with people and other dogs. Labs are one of the friendliest dogs there is and most people, if not all, love them. The third dog is the greyhound breed. The greyhounds are very obedient and calm to their owners. Greyhounds do not bark for the most part and they love to run. If their owner wants to take them on a run, they will be more than happy to go. The fourth breed of dog is the Beagle. Beagles are fun, small, and loyal which makes for the ideal therapy dog. Beagles look very friendly which helps create friends and doesn’t put people off. The last breed of dog is the Rottweiler. Rottweilers have everything that is needed for a therapy dog. They are smart, strong, calm, and very powerful. The stereotype of rottweilers being mean is true, but it is just because the are protective of their masters. Most all dogs are good candidates for therapy dogs, but these five are your best bet.

I was shocked when I saw Rottweilers in the five best therapy dogs. I wouldn't have guessed that they would be included because they are known as being mean and vicious. They can also be calming to some people. I’m a dog lover and I know that all dogs have a sweet side, but I just didn’t picture the Rottweilers to be in the top 5. I noticed that labradors are number two on the list and not number one. What makes them worse than the German Shepherds? I’ve noticed that most the service dogs on campus are Labrador Retrievers. I could further my research by asking the trainers why the service dogs are labradors and not German Shepherds. Is it because the ideal German Shepherd is hard to find, or is it just the program’s preference or previous experience with the dogs?


Link to Article