Over the course of this semester I really enjoyed this class I am happy that I took it. I am a mass communications major and this class will help me with my future career one day in my future. I liked learning about media and how its presented in a variety of different ways. This course since it’s online taught me time management because you always gave us a weeks deadline to get all of the work done you assigned us for the week presented to us. I liked that because I never just did all my work for this course in one day I usually spread it out throughout the week so I had enough time to get all my work done. My thoughts on blogging, I honestly really enjoyed it. I made me feel like a real life blogger and I liked being able to present my opinions on the topic you assigned and it made me feel professional blogging. I personally think this course is perfect to be online because you set it up professional and organized and also easy for students to navigate through bolt and the other websites we used during this class. I don’t think you need to change anything about the course you give the perfect amount of work to do within a weeks time span. I like online courses personally because most professors give you a week to complete the work assigned to you and I like that because it taught me a lot of time management and I like that it gives me more responsibility to do my work on my own time rather than when you have class two or three times a week you have to do work right after class is done. I overall loved this course and really appreciate how organize and easy to navigate it was!!

Media literacy to me is the way we perceive technology and we use it everyday. Media literacy as a whole ha changed over the past 20 years because it enhanced through technology which weakened us as well for our communication skills. We are so used to just texting shortened words like “wyd?” or “what r u up to?” which weakens our vocabulary and people start to put “u” in an essay for school rather than just spelling the whole word out because they are so used to the way they text. Media itself made our communication worse as well because we are so used to just texting we barely ever talk on the phone or even know how to hold a conversation face to face. Media literacy can have a very negative effect or a very positive effect with how you look at it. I see both sides the lack of communication and vocabulary is by far a negative effect but there is a positive one as well. The positive side is media literacy as it has advanced through technology within the past few years is by far the internet and having information you need at the snap of your fingers. You can google anyone’s name and you will know everything about their lives within the first 5 minutes of searching them. You will know what they do for a living, where they went to school, where they are from, and even what they had for dinner that night. Pretty scary if you ask me.. but can also be a good thing. Your social media profile says and show a lot about the person you are which is good for employers and your own benefit. Another huge positive side is definitely knowing about whats going on in the world right away. Almost every time something happens it’s immediately on the internet for everyone to see. I think this good for major things in the news such as weather (major storms), the corona virus, politics, or even a famous person that passed recently. These are ways media literacy has improved our society and also have weakened it. Media literacy is getting your point across thoroughly through technology I would say but everyone looks at it differently.

Social media is very helpful but can also be very harmful. Social media helps us get to know news sooner about whats going on in the world we live in. On the other hand it could be used for more bad than good. The aspects that social media is both good and bad. The bad is that I feel like I can’t go through a 50 minute class without even touching my phone and as soon as it’s over I go on my phone right away. Also with the cell phone usage when I am having conversations with someone and my phone goes off I check it immediately and completely disregard what the person that I am talking to is talking about which is not right. For the good with social media is that I can find out anything about a person so quickly if I need an answer right then and there. This is helpful when doing interviews with someone you can look them up and see what type of person they are on the outside world and how they act over social media. Back to social media you find out things about whats going on all over the world so quickly, way quicker than it was decades ago. For example for the corona virus, we were informed on every social media platform as soon as it was discovered and we knew it was in the United States. If social media wasn’t here we would have found out about the disease weeks later rather than the day after it was discovered. Also for this about the corona virus there probably wouldn’t have been automatic travel bans there right away if we didn’t have social media to inform us on this right away. Same with weather such as big tropical storms like hurricanes. We wouldn’t know when it would hit certain area of the states at what time without it and we wouldn’t know if we needed to evacuate the area at a certain time. Overrall social media is 100% helpful to have in this world.

I picked this course because it goes hand and hand with my major. Last semester I recently chose my major in mass communications and I couldn’t be happier with my choice. Even though my concentration is public relations I am also interested in emergent media and I wanted to learn more about it and possibly change my concentration. This course also sparked my interest because now a days everyone is overly attached to their phones and can’t seem to even hold a conversation without picking up their phones (which I am also guilty for) but I wanted to learn about the world’s media. This course is very interesting to me so far, and I like how this course is online because I have only had one other online class and I like how I need to learn my time management with this course to keep up with doing my school work. The discussion posts are neat to see what everyone is interested in doing and why they took this course.

Blogging, is something I have heard of before but I have never quite done it myself. I am excited to begin blogging and use it over the course of this semester. Blogging in general to me can be awesome for people that would like to express their emotion but don’t always know how to. I have read blogs before from fashion and beauty ones and they are always very interesting and heart felt. A lot of the bloggers always try to capture the readers attention and it can be very inspiring to the readers as well. I am intriuged to see what blogging has instore for me this semester and to see if I really enjoy it after this course is over.

This is an example post, originally published as part of Blogging University. Enroll in one of our ten programs, and start your blog right.

You’re going to publish a post today. Don’t worry about how your blog looks. Don’t worry if you haven’t given it a name yet, or you’re feeling overwhelmed. Just click the “New Post” button, and tell us why you’re here.

Why do this?

• Because it gives new readers context. What are you about? Why should they read your blog?
• Because it will help you focus you own ideas about your blog and what you’d like to do with it.

The post can be short or long, a personal intro to your life or a bloggy mission statement, a manifesto for the future or a simple outline of your the types of things you hope to publish.

To help you get started, here are a few questions:

• Why are you blogging publicly, rather than keeping a personal journal?
• What topics do you think you’ll write about?
• Who would you love to connect with via your blog?
• If you blog successfully throughout the next year, what would you hope to have accomplished?

You’re not locked into any of this; one of the wonderful things about blogs is how they constantly evolve as we learn, grow, and interact with one another — but it’s good to know where and why you started, and articulating your goals may just give you a few other post ideas.

Can’t think how to get started? Just write the first thing that pops into your head. Anne Lamott, author of a book on writing we love, says that you need to give yourself permission to write a “crappy first draft”. Anne makes a great point — just start writing, and worry about editing it later.

When you’re ready to publish, give your post three to five tags that describe your blog’s focus — writing, photography, fiction, parenting, food, cars, movies, sports, whatever. These tags will help others who care about your topics find you in the Reader. Make sure one of the tags is “zerotohero,” so other new bloggers can find you, too.