Grammar Post #7

So in most of my essays I have problems with possesive nouns. I decided I better do a grammar post on this:

An Apostrophe is required, e.g. I cannot do that and That's the dog's kennel.
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_needed_to_form_possessive_nouns_and_contractions.

When we want to show that something belongs to somebody or something, we usually add 's to a singular noun and an apostrophe ' to a plural noun, for example:
the boy's ball (one boy)
the boys' ball (two or more boys)
Notice that the number of balls does not matter. The structure is influenced by the possessor and not the possessed.
http://www.englishclub.com/grammar/nouns-possessive.htm.

Elderly Abuse (Rough draft)

Understaffed Nursing Homes
As I walk down the hall to treat yet another resident, I cannot help but think that there are still twenty nine residents that need to be seen before the end of the night. Walking into the room it is obvious that the resident is lonely and just needs someone to talk to. While we talk all that is on my mind is how much needs to be done and how little time there is. Pass medication; perform treatments on wounds, call doctors, and best of all charting, charting, and more charting. The question is why anyone would trust forty six lives in one person’s hands and expect them to get all of these things done within twelve hours. Understaffed nursing homes are a huge conflict throughout the United States. With firsthand experience it is obvious residents’ needs are unable to be met, consequently dramatically affecting their lives negatively. Infected bedsores, medication errors, poor nutrition, neglect, and abuse can all be prevented if nursing homes provided adequate staffing and continuous training for employees.

Grammar Post #6

Since I'm writing my paper in an argumentative style I thought I should research more details about this style.

In persuasive or argumentative writing, we try to convince othersn to agree with our facts, share our values,accept our argument and conclusions, and adopt our way of thinking.
Elements toward building a good persuasive essay include:
Establishing facts to support an argument.
Clarifyng relevant values for your audience (perspective).
Prioritizing, editing, and/or sequencingthe facts and values in importance to build the argument
forming and stating conclusions.
"Persuading" your audience that your conclusionsare based upon the agreed-upon facts and shared values.
Having the confidence to communicate your "persuasion" in writing.
http://www.studygs.net/wrtstr4.htm

America the Beautiful: What We're Fighting For

This piece by Dinesh D'Souza is very special to me and helped me remember how lucky we are. I think it is something that we should all believe and should cherish what we have in this country. Our freedoms, our different cultures, the technology we have, the various opportunities we each have. It is wonderful to live in this country and I'm grateful for all of those that have made it the way it is.

Grammar Post #5

To or too.. This is something that Mike and I were just arguing about so I decided I'd research what the answer is.

Too is an adverb, and two different meanings give it two different distinct placements.
Too meaning excessively, to an excessive degree...
You worry too much.
Isn’t it just too obvious?
In these cases, the adverb too precedes an adjective.
Too meaning also, in addition.
Mike is coming too!

To is a particle. The infinitive in English consists of two parts: the particle to and the verb. Here are four infinitives:
to giggle to chuckle to snigger to laugh
If you see to before a verb, as above, it’s acting as part of the infinitive. Too never does that.
Gretchen snickered when Hannah said she wanted to order fish and chips.
To climb Mount Everest takes guts.
To used as a particle and too used to modify a following adjective can look deceptively similar:
Edna went to work.
Charles arrived too late. http://www.educationbug.org/a/to-vs--too.html

And yes I am right again :) Sorry Mike..

I'm Black, You're White, Who's Innocent?

In this piece by Shelby Steele she talks of the racism that goes on in our society. I didn't agree with this essay from almost the beginning. I think that there has been a lot of progression from back when there was more problems with this. Everyone has their own oppinion and can think for themselves but to me we are all people. Color should not be a deciding factor on who get's the job, or who commited the crime, etc. Maybe someday this problem will disolve but for now I guess we'll just have to live with ignorance.

Rough Draft for John Q

Heidi Schmutz
English 2010 M & W
06/29/2009

John Q and Heart Transplants
Each year thousands of adults in the United States would be saved if they were able to get a donated heart transplant. More than 2,200 heart transplants were performed last year in the United States alone. When the heart no longer can adequately work and a person is at risk of dying, a heart transplant may be indicated. It involves removing a diseased heart and replacing it with a healty human heart. Cardiac transplantation is recognized to be a proven procedure in appropriately selected patients (Heart). John Q is a movie that shows the problem many Americans have with getting proper health care. The producers of the movie show America’s health care problems by showing a boy who needs a heart transplant, and a father that will do anything to help his son get the help his son needs.
John Q is a movie based off of the trouble a man goes through to get health care for his son when he doesn’t have any insurance. Denzel Washington plays John Q. Archibald in the movie. Mr. Archibald is a factory worker that is having financial hardship because of the his cut back hours. The family is struggling when their son becomes terminally ill with heart failure. While the Archibalds have health insurance they are informed by the hospital administrator Rebbeca Payne, played by Anne Heche, that their health insurance doesn’t cover such an expensive procedure. As John Q. tries to raise the money himself he soon finds that there is no hope so he has to take his soon out of the hospital to die. John Q. snapped and decided that if he couldn’t raise the money the right way that he would force the doctors to operate on his son. He held the hospital hostige until somebody was able to give a heart transplant and the doctors operated (Williams). John Q Archibald is a desperate parent in the movie that knows he will only be able to get his son help by forcing the hospital to operate on him. This shows what many Americans face today.
In addition because of the great need for heart transplants, and the fact that it is a dangerous procedure, many people get screened out. The only patients that are able to have a heart transplants are the ones that have tried everything else and are sick enough to get one, but healthy enough to take the procedure. Since the heart transplant is the last result many doctors will try to do everything before issuing the need for a heart transplant. Although this screens out many people the patients that do receive the heart transplant do not have a very good life expectancy after 10-20 years (What). This shows that even though many people may need a heart transplant many doctors are not willing to do the procedure, and therefore the patient may die because of that small fact.
Some may say that John Q is an over exaggeration of what might happen if a desperate parent needs to get help for his son, and that there are many flaws to thinking that he can take hostage a hospital, but one has to think that if they were in John Q shoes what would be going through their minds at the time. The movie although dramatized depicts the problems that many Americans face not only with heart transplants but with many other health care issues. In some way people have to believe that there is a better way. When you watch a young child die because his parents don’t have enough health insurance to cover the cost of a surgery, one must think that the most valueable thing in that situation should be the child’s life, not the money needed to do the surgery.
"Heart Transplants: Statistics." American Heart Association. American Heart Association. 29 Jun 2009 .
Williams, Karl. "John Q Summary." Starplus.com. 27 Jun 2009 .
"What is a Heart Transplant?." Heart and Vascular Diseases. Sep 2009. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. 29 Jun 2009 .