Final Reaction Blog

Talking about freedom will be a class to remember. From the different perspective we took to learning, to having all of our assignments be blogs to help us build a resume.

And the first thing I want to talk about is the two movies we watched in class. I had seen bits and pieces of both “Gone With the Wind” and “in the Heat of the Night” at home with family but was never interested. Both are timeless and influential in their own ways and in their own time. They are also a preservation of their time, educating people about the period they were set in more than any textbook or lecture. “In the Heat of the Night” shows the prevalence and extent of racism in the 60’s as well as the turning of the populous starting to accept African Americans. “Gone With the Wind” romanticizes the slave owning south a little but as long as you can get past that the movie continues to show future generations what the 19th century and civil war looked like for the majority of Americans.

We had tests and presentations, but the most important part of this class was the blog we all made. Instead of having boring papers, homework, and quizzes, we were set to discuss the topics we covered in class with the world. We were free to express our opinion and share it. For me personally, the shorter, more opinion-based writing really made me think about my understanding and take on our lectures and presentations. Another important part of our blogs is that they can be used as a future reference and a preservation of our freshman year. I will be interested to look back on our blogs in the years to come and see the changes in our writing and as people.

In my opinion, the most important takeaway from this class is our use of AI. Being able to practice and understand our use of AI instead of feeling like we were cheating on an assignment has been influential not only in this class but my whole semester. Understanding how to use AI and everything that can be achieved with it has helped me brainstorm, study, spell check my papers, research, and many more. Learning to properly use AI has been an invaluable skill and will help me as AI continues to grow.