Instructions over and done...Roger that

The instructions are now submitted and turned in. This was a pretty good first project for this class. I thought the peer evaluations were very helpful, because they gave insightful types from a broad audience of potential viewers. Some class mates were completely oblivious about the topics of group members topics, while others were very knowledgeable about the topics.

The knowledgeable class mates were able to critic each other based on what they knew to be facts and what they thought were important. The not-so-knowledgeable class mates were the perfect test group. Their level of confusion could always be used to indicate how clear of unclear the instructions were. 

My Absolute Point of View

I thought the experiment with the poem we were talking about in class was very interesting. It just goes to show, that with the right amount of minds thinking, even the most random group of words make sense. It makes me think of paradigms. My psychology teacher put  five one six three two on the board and asked the class to recognize the pattern. It took a while for someone to get it. Everyone was trying to figure out  a mathematical algorithm or pattern that would fit. We were all thinking on the wrong paradigm. We should have noticed that the words were spelled out for a reason, they were in alphabetical order. It had nothing to do with math or numbers, we were missing the point that at the end of the day, they were merely words.

I try to think of myself as a very liberal person. I do not really believe in too many absolutes. I think that everything is a matter of perception or opinion. There is always another way of looking at the same thing. After all the only reason we believe the things we know are "facts" is because someone society believes to me smart, told us so.

In the time of Galileo people just KNEW the world was flat and the solar system revolved around the Earth, that has obviously been proven wrong. I wonder what we "know" now, will be proved wrong in the next 100 years.

Don't bore me w/ your introduction please...

I know I already blogged about instructions, but I have a few concerns that I wanted to discuss.

1. I never really noticed an introduction to the instructions. I do not know if it is just something I deemed as unimportant so I skipped it, or what. Because I never notice them it was hard for me to see their importance. After reading some of the examples in class however, I can see how they come into play. I think the class examples were entirely too long. This brings me to my second concern.

2. Now that I have agreed that introductions do have some merit, I do not understand why they have to be so lengthy. Maybe for some items where the introduction is used to give warning statements and pertinent background information, I can understand. My instructions is about how to tighten you glute muscles, I just do not feel like a lengthy introduction is necessary. I have a brief introduction prepared, but I hope it is enough.

I guess my concern is that I will appear slack, but in actuality, I feel as though my intro should be clear and concise due to the nature of my instructions and my audience. When people are trying to get workout tips, they do not want to read a long drawn out essay, they want to see pictures and get the step by step instructions right to the point.

We butchered those examples in class, and I do not want to be a hypocrite, so I will keep mine to the point, until other wise instructed.

Instructions are Tricky Creatures

During my sophomore year when I took my first IE class, there is a class called IE 210. This is a Human Factors class. During the lab we studied the importance of good DETAILED instructions. We watched the youtube videos about making a peanut butter sandwich based on instructions given by someone else. It was extremely difficult because so many times people do not give detailed directions that can be taken literally word for word. We leave stuff out mainly because we assume its "common sense". Good directions are written so that they can not be confused or misinterpreted. I am interested to see how we are going to study this topic in this Technical Writing class. I am just interested to see the approach Dr. Barnet is going to take. Instructions have to be tailored to the audience and they have to consider the fact that the user may be completely ignorant to how to perform the task. The only assumption that can safely be made is that the user has no idea how to complete the task.

Rhetoric

I really enjoyed the clips from "Thank You for Smoking". This was not my first time seeing this movie and if you have never seen it, it is definitely worth the hour and change it takes to watch it. This movie was a prime example of rhetoric. 

When I think of rhetoric I think of someone using/manipulating words to get the audience on their side. Sometimes the speaker's goal is not to persuade the audience to see it this way, but just to discredit the opposition. A goal is sometimes to distract from the obviously negative things they are supporting such as smoking.