14. English Improve Plan

     I think the most useful knowledge I learnt from this class is the ability to construct an essay in three different ways. Among all of these the argument essay is most helpful because it way to finding information, critical thinking and ideas to persuade others are really helpful for my future academic essay writing.
     I think the most important thing I want to learn after this class is to broaden my vocabulary and prepare some language test like TOEFL and GRE tests. It is much harder for Chinese students to do a good job than get a good score in ESL class. As its need shows I have to train myself better on reading, listening and writing skills. Besides these basic skills, the most important thing I want to improve is the critical thinking. This ability can make me understand and absorb high level academic information faster and more efficient. What's more, it is also the main point that GRE test want to figure out from a college student.
     To realize these goals. First, I get some test materials online and decide to keep training myself in the winter break. Second, I think expand my reading articles and increasing my reading amount should be very helpful  for my understanding of essay and critical thinking. Third taking a freshman writing class for next semester is necessary for my improving English skills. I think the basic to study anything good is to build good study habit which is still a hard part to me. I think a lot and make a lot of plans for this. And I am sure I will totally changed in the future.
     All the ideas above are the plans for my future English study. Although it is not well-planned. I have decided to schedule it better later. Hope I can get a great improve in the future.

13. Reading and Response #3

Fast Food's Biggest Customer: Not the Poor, But the Middle Class

(http://healthland.time.com/2011/11/07/fast-foods-biggest-customers-not-the-poor-but-the-middle-class/#ixzz1d1Yu9yUD)

     In the Paragraph, the author use the data of a research to show that not the middle class families are the most customs of fast food restaurant instead the poor class. It shows that the money spent on the fast food can not be afford by normal poor people and only if they get much more salary, they can visit the fast food restaurant frequently. Also it remind another opinion that fast food is impossible to be healthy for human.

     As a international student who have live in America for more than one year, I agree with these two ideas depended on my observation. First I  had to admire we are poorer compare to normal American because Dollar is 6.3 times equaled to our Chinese Yuan. As I live near a Burger King restaurant I have a lot of meals there. Although I have no discrimination to different people. I have to see the choices differs from each other among white people, Chinese students and some African Americans. Most of the white people choose the value meal as their dinner. On the other hand, Chinese students prefer several burgers because it causes more and have much more energy. For some African Americans, they only get an one dollar burger and a cup of water to fulfill their belly. I think this is a good example to confirm that people as poor as us can not afford the value meal which made us impossible to be included in the main customers of fast food restaurant.Also, I don't think fast food can get healthy enough as the low nutrition containment. What's more，a large amount of sugar and calorie has a great connection with the high rate of  obesity in America. 

    As a result even though fast food is pretty cheap, it is not cheap enough for all poor people to take. And I think all of people who treat fast food as a normal meal choice should change this habit slightly because too much fast food also cause a great increase of your waistline.

5. Cultural Values

Cultural value is one of the good expression of one country and one race. So it has a lot of different kinds of values among different countries. 

In my hometown we obey some values which build by old people that make our relationship better with each other and people live in harmony. Among all of these values I think modesty and respect to the old people are two very impressive values.

Because we have a large population even in the old time. There will be a lot of people with different abilities and advantages. Even you are good at some thing but there must be someone else who is better at it. If you are so proud with yourself and look down on others. You will be defeat and being humiliated at last. From these reasons our ancestors find it is better to be more modest to avoid unexpected embarrassment and comfort people around you.

We think the old people are the basic of the society today and they grow us up. That's why even they get old and be less helpful to build the society we still need to take much more care of their lives. Every one will get old one day and no one want to be ignored and discriminated after you serve all you can to the society in the past days. So we not only show respect to the olds, but also make our lives better in the future. Also we have a proverb that" you should listen the old mans' word". As we think the experience and knowledge of them can give us a lot of help and good suggestions that benefit us a lot. This is another reason we treat old man so important.

 

 

4. Future Goals

I had to say my aim for the first 10 years in the future is making money although it is very boring. My major now is mathematics which is the basic of all of economic area and doing business. Actually my future plan is not so clear. But I want to make some small decisions step by step to get my final goal. At first I think graduation is the most important thing to take into consideration. I think I can graduate in about one and a half year that means I will work even harder to reach it and choose more credits in a semester. I want to read master degree about some economic major like finance that will give me a broad vision on choosing the business I will do. They I think after master, I will find a job to be an employee at first. It is a big chance to let me learn more about the basic system of a company and how it works. What's more important is that I can learn many things about communicating with customers and keep a good relationship with my colleagues and boss. I think after I get familiar with all of these abilities and accumulate enough funds it's time to do business by myself and build my own company. The whole progress will be hard enough and full of challenge and I still have a lot of disadvantage to get rid of. I am very confident to this plan and very enthusiastic to realize it.

1. Self-Introduction

My name is Wenxiang Sun and I come from China. I am a transfer student who study Mathematics in College of Liberal Arts. I think the my favorite thing is doing sports for example running, basketball and so on because I think sports can not only build your body healthy but also make your mind strong enough to face every challenge in your life.
This semester I make big change in my daily plan which is doing sports in recreation center. Last semester I  live in Stadium View(an apartment which has gym inside) that I almost do not get out of it when I have no classes. That make me very lazy and less of doing exercise that make me very fat at last. But it totally changed from the beginning of this semester. Doing sports in Recreation Center give me a lot of energy to face my study and build myself a strong body. I am so happy to see these change.

3. An Important Person

I can still remember the voice of my high school English teacher. Her class was full of interest which left an unforgotten memory to me and all of my classmates. She looks a little weak when we saw her first time. She is a little short, but under her back glasses we can saw her confidential eyes. Her class is not as boring as the other teacher's. She always used little jokes and interesting stories to cheer us up from the heavy study burden.  She did not like the unchanged knowledge on the textbook. So she tried her best to find materials about science, literature and so on to increase our enthusiasm towards English that benefits us a lot. She is not only our teacher but also our adviser. In our country, advisers should take care all the aspects of their classes for example: attendance, schedule and plan... That is a large amount of work. Although she is very hard every day, she would take some time to communicate with us like private talk to make sure all of us are in good condition and work hard enough. Once she talked with me because I got a low score in the test before. I told her that I can not concentrate on study because I feel a little sick. She give me many suggestion about keep in healthy and even give me the medicine I need next morning. I feel very warm for what she has done for me. And study hard in English. I think all of our classmates will not forget what she told us and keep it in mind in the future.

2. University of Minnesota Life

I had to say I change a lot this semester. Instead stay in apartment all day, Recreation Center becomes the place I stay in most of time. Because not only I can doing exercise there but also study in it. This is an helpful  discovery because I can combine doing sports and doing homework which improve the efficiencies of both aspects. Every time you step into Recreation Center, the energetic color and all the people who are doing sports make you enthusiastic to do something. I haven't use gym before. So it is amazing to see so many training instruments in just one room. I feel a little awkward at first because I do not know how to use most of them. But the most helpful thing is there are "how to use" showing on each of them so that I can learn to use them quickly. I will sit outside the gym to study after a little time of exercise. Although it is tired, I can concentrate my mind and rest my body. This kind of life make me both exercise my brain and my body. I like it very much.
Another big change in the semester is doing job in university dining service. I had to say I just get the permission today and do not do it before. But it is still a big challenge for me. I have done a lot of students service before, instead, doing a real job is totally new thing for me. I can predict the hardness of it, on the other hand, I think I can come over it  and do a good job in the future.