Chapter One

     How important and frequent is knowledge-making during my day-to-day life? Currently in my Writing 101 class, the first chapter has covered posing questions, reading rhetorically, surface learning, deep learning, and telling the difference between knowledge-getting compared to knowledge-making. For context, knowledge-getting is receiving or learning information via schooling or other resources. Knowledge-making, on the other hand, is when someone poses their own question to analyze. Personally, I feel that on a day-to-day basis I mostly experience knowledge-getting. Therefore, I’ve decided to try out knowledge-making by posing my own question and diving deep into my experiences to determine how prevalent both are in my life. 

    Thinking back to some great stories of my life, some of the memories I hold dear to me have involved knowledge-making in some way. For example, one important memory that just came to mind was when I encountered a hummingbird in my front garden. A few years ago, I had decided to venture outside to look for caterpillars on the milkweed I had planted when I heard a little chirp noise beside me. Looking up, I made direct eye contact with a tiny green hummingbird that was just hovering beside me out of curiosity. After he flew around me for a bit then left, I ran inside and looked to google to help me answer all the questions I had in my head. What kind of hummingbird was that? How can I attract hummingbirds to my yard? What is the relationship between hummingbirds and people? 

 

    People ask questions to better understand the world around them. Since I started doing research on hummingbirds, I’ve had a handful of other hummingbird sighting in my front yard. Whether or not it has anything to do with the hummingbird friendly flowers I’ve planted for the hummingbird feeders I’ve put up, I’m not sure. Yet, hummingbird information is not present in any curriculums taught in schools. Knowledge-making is a great way for people to venture away from curriculums and dive deep into personal inquiries, which occur almost constantly. College knowledge-making is a bit different though, as students begin to ask deep questions that help make the Earth a better place. Yet, whether the question has an impact on the world or not, it’s still a form of knowledge-making. Thinking deeply about it has led me to realize that I use knowledge-making more than I think I do. It’s even in the title of my blog... how do I vanquish my writer’s block? That question will be answered at some point in the near future.

The Writer's Introduction

    

I’ve always found it difficult to write about myself. Not because there isn’t a lot to write about, but there are so many things that make up who I am and I’m not sure what to include or what to not include. This is one of the reasons for my writer’s block, which is my tendency to overthink what I need to write about. To solve this issue, I find that the best starting place is listing the main subject for my writing, which in this case is my name, and then writing about whatever comes to mind in the moment. I will be using this method for my following introduction…

Hello, my name is Maddelena Baggio, but I go by Maddy. My family consists of my mom, dad, twin brother, and my dog. I am a freshman at North Central College majoring in Graphic Design. When it comes to art, it is more than just a hobby to me. From the colors in a sunset to a small flower blossoming in the spring, I find myself being surrounded by art wherever I am. Throughout my life, I have come to realize that art isn’t just drawing and painting, but also colors, shapes, textures, and so much more. Similar to what I have learned in my Writing 101 class thus far, art and designs serves multiple purposes. Most importantly, it's about connecting with an audience and diving deep into life's questions. This is what I love about art, that there is so much more to it than what meets the eye. Yet, my love of art hasn’t been with me my entire life. 

My artistic journey began when I was four years old, scribbling on a magnetic drawing board. Since then, I’ve loved doing any type of art including painting, sketching, ceramics, digital, watercolor, and so on. Throughout middle school, I figured that art was going to be just a hobby. Yet, once I reached high school, I realized that I was now at a point in my life in which I needed to start deciding on what I wanted to do as a job. Countless times, I have heard the saying that if you love what you do then you’ll never work a day of your life. Therefore, I figured why not make art into more than just a hobby. I do not know yet where my art career will take me, but I am excited for the journey regardless.