How To Make The Best Blog Graphics (For Non-Designers) - CoSchedule Blog

How To Make The Best Blog Graphics (For Non-Designers) Blog As bloggers and content marketers, one of your biggest challenges is making sure that your blog posts not only read well, but also look awesome. You probably know why: Posts with better graphics are easier to read and get more shares. The problem is that you may not  have the budget, nor the skills necessary for creating blog post graphics from scratch.  You also like to do things yourself, or just don’t have the means to hire a freelance designer every time you need a new header image for a blog post. That puts you at a slight  disadvantage against your competitors who are already rocking great blog graphics. The good news is that you can learn to create your own blog post graphics fairly quickly. A handful of dollars in stock graphics, a few hours in Photoshop, and you will be on your way to making your blog look better in no time. How To Make The Best #Blog Graphics (For Non-Designers) via @puranjaycomIn this post, I’ll share with you the exact strategies I use to create visuals for my posts, right from start to finish. But first, a quick overview of why your blog actually needs more visuals. Why Your Blog Posts Need More Visual Content Human beings are visual creatures. Our brains process images 60,000 times faster than text. This is a crucial stat for bloggers and content marketers- it means readers are more likely to engage with your visuals than with your words. (Which also explains why infographics tend to be so successful). There are dozens of reasons why you need to add more graphics to your blog posts, but the five  most important ones I can think of are: Higher engagement: Articles with relevant images get 94% more page views than those without. Highlight crucial data: In-post graphics are a good way to highlight the most important data points within an article. If there is something you really want your readers to see, you’re better off putting it into a mini infographic than the main post body (especially considering how most visitors read just 20% of a Web page on average). Get more shares: Pages with pictures see 50% more shares. Create better post structure: In-post graphics are a great way to give better structure to your post by dividing the content into different sections- an oft-ignored benefit. More credibility: 67% of consumers consider detailed images to carry even more weight than customer ratings, reviews, and product descriptions. Recommended Reading:  10 Stunning Examples Of Visual Content Marketing Now that we know why we need visuals, let’s look at how we can create our own blog  graphics. The Building Blocks Of Awesome Blog Graphics You don’t need to know a lot to create your own blog graphics. In fact, this article assumes that your design skills don’t extend beyond cropping an image and adding a filter to it in Photoshop (explained below). That said, you can greatly accelerate the graphic-creation process by mastering a few simple Photoshop skills and building up a library of stock graphics that will serve as the ‘building blocks’ for all your visuals. Let’s look at each of these in detail. Essential Photoshop skills to create blog graphics. You don’t have to master Photoshop to create good looking designs. Being familiar with the interface and understanding a few basic skills will be more than enough. At the very least, you should know the following: Cropping, resizing and selecting images, or parts of images. Layers and how they work. Blending modes and Layer blending options. Creating simple shapes such as circles, rounded rectangles, etc. Using the font tool. Importing and using patterns, brushes, and shapes. Using grids and guides to lay out individual elements. All this shouldn’t take you more than a couple of hours of work to learn. Everything else you can learn along the way. There are only 7 things you need to know with Photoshop to create awesome #blog graphics.Choose your colors. Color is the non-designer’s Achilles heel. We either use too many colors, or often, too few- neither of which leads to desirable results. â€Å"What colors should I use?† is the number one question I get asked by non-designers (and the question I often find asking myself). For answers, follow the two step process below: 1. Pick one dominant color. Take a look at any popular website and you will see one thing in common: They all use a single dominant color everywhere. Facebook has its blue, TechCrunch is green and Snapchat is overwhelmingly yellow. All reports, blog posts, and visuals they put out follow the same color palette. For your own blog  graphics, follow the same strategy: Pick one dominant color (ideally, the same as your site color) and use it everywhere. Complement it with lighter variations of the same color when needed. You can always branch out and experiment with more colors of course (it would be a dull world if you couldn’t), but for simplicity’s sake, stick to one dominant color when you’re starting out. Recommended Reading:  Why Visual Brand Consistency Is Important 2. For additional colors, use the Google material design color palette. One of the harder things to understand as an amateur designer is how different colors work with each other and the subtle differences between, say, #FA4B00 and #F04800 (two hexadecimal numbers for different colors). The good news: You don’t have to learn all this on your own. By taking advantage of pre-existing, professional color palettes, you can jump right in and use proven colors in your designs. To start with, use the Google material design color palette. These are Google-approved colors for the Android UI. They look good and cover a huge range of colors. If you get tired of your ‘one dominant color’, pick a few shades from this palette and start experimenting. Pro Tip: Download the palette as a swatch and open it in Photoshop to get immediate access to all colors. Recommended Reading:  Color Psychology In Marketing: The Complete Guide Pick your fonts. After color, typography is the most widely misunderstood aspect of design. You’ve probably seen this in action yourself: flyers with Papyrus, memos written entirely in Comic Sans, and websites that use nothing but Times New Roman. Designers can talk for hours about kerning and line height and letter spacing, but as bloggers, we don’t really need all that. Instead, all we need to know is: What fonts look good. How to pick a good font pair. Here are the answers to these questions: 1. What fonts look good? Some good fonts are expensive (a single license of a professional font can cost upwards of $200), so I’m going to focus entirely on free fonts for now. Fortunately for us, high-quality free fonts have never been easier to find. Your first stop should be Google Fonts. This free font library will give you access to all the fonts you need. It can be overwhelming at first, so I suggest sticking to these tried and tested fonts, for now: If you need something beyond this selection, stop by Typekit.com and check out the fonts that come pre-loaded with a free account (only 25k pageviews/month though- not for you popular bloggers). Next, check out Typography.com and the nearly weekly giveaways at CreativeMarket.com. If you are willing to splurge, you can also check out some boutique font foundries at FontShop.com. 2. How should you  pair fonts? There are two guidelines to pairing fonts: Fonts from the same family go well together.  For obvious reasons, if two fonts are from the same family (say, PT Sans and PT Sans-Serif), they will look good together. Combine serif with sans-serif fonts.  For optimum results, combine a serif font with a sans-serif font. If your posts are long and wordy, use serif in the body text, sans-serif in the headings. For shorter posts (under 2,000 words- a majority of posts), use sans-serif in the body, serif in headlines. (In case you are wondering, serif fonts are those with the little horizontal bar at the edges. Sans-serif, obviously, are those without.) Instead of experimenting with different pairings, pick a few tried and tested combinations to start with. For inspiration, install WhatFont extension and see what fonts your favorite websites are using. Wired.com, for instance, uses Exchange, while Buzzfeed uses Proxima Nova for both headings and body text. Choose your images. Most bloggers turn to SXC.hu, Pixabay, or any of the countless other stock pictures websites for their image needs. Images here are free and easy to find, but also tend to be low in quality and poor in contextual relevancy. Plus, since they’ve been used by bloggers ad infinitum, they tend to look jaded and overused. Recommended Reading: Should You Use Stock Or Free Images For Blog Posts? Below, I’ve shared some of my favorite methods to get better images: 1. Buy stock images. With prices as low as $1/image, you really don’t have an excuse for not taking this route already. The picture quality is far superior and they all look ‘fresh’ to readers since they haven’t been used by every blogger in existence. You also don’t need resolutions wider than 640px for most images, which brings down initial purchase cost as well. If you do plan to modify the image, make sure that the image license permits it. Check out ShutterStock.com, Fotolia.com, BigStock.com, etc. to get started. But what if you don’t have $1 to spare? In that case, use option #2, below. With prices as low as $1/image, you really don’t have an excuse to use great images. #blogging2. Use free hero images. Startups need high quality images to build their sites. Thankfully, a number of designers and photographers have stepped up to the challenge and started offering stunning pictures for free. These are called ‘hero’ images, and for bloggers, they are (largely) untapped goldmines. Here are some sites to get you started: Unsplash.com, DeathToTheStockPhoto.com, LittleVisuals.co, Superfamous.com, and PicJumbo.com. The image quality here is incredible, but you can’t search by keyword, so be prepared to dig deep to find the right image. Some pictures (especially from Unsplash.com) have also been overused by startups. If it looks a little too familiar, it’s probably a good idea to not use it. If a stock photo seems a little familiar, its best not to use it. #blogging3. Try paid hero images. An alternative to stock image marketplaces is to buy splash or hero images from marketplaces like CreativeMarket. You can either buy images individually, or you can buy image packs of hundreds of images for as low as $10. Its a useful strategy if you want something more exclusive than what Unsplash.com or the others have to offer. Choose your shapes, brushes, patterns, and icons. Strong colors, bold fonts, and breathtaking stock imagery are good enough to make your blog stand out.  But to create blog  graphics, you will need a few extra building blocks- namely brushes, patterns, icons, and shapes. You can find thousands of these design elements online on sources both free and paid. The hard part is figuring out what to download, and where to download it. For a start, grab the following: 1. Patterns. A clean, subtle pattern can make the most ordinary design pop and sparkle. There are countless websites peddling patterns online, but for the most projects, you don’t need to look beyond SubtlePatterns.com. Start with the following patterns – Concrete Seamless, Crossword, Stardust, Squared Metal, Notebook, Triangular, and Mooning- and grab more as you learn how to use them. 2. Icons. You will use icons a lot in your blog graphics, mostly to visualize data and highlight key points. I suggest starting out at IcoMoon.io, then exploring free icon packs such as  Line icons, Modern UI icons, 350 Pixel Perfect icons, flat icons, and  3600 flat icons. To get something more exclusive, buy a set of icon packs from  CreativeMarket. 3. Brushes, shapes, and vectors. There is no telling what shapes, vectors, and brushes you will need in your graphics projects. Since our aim is to keep costs low, I suggest grabbing the ones listed below, then buying up separate design elements as needed. Start with the graphics library at Pixeden.com. Grab virtually all the free stuff you can, then head over to MediaLoot.com, PremiumPixels.com, Brusheezy.com, and GraphicHive.net. For paid alternatives, check out CreativeMarket.com and GraphicRiver.com. I also suggest buying some credits at a stock marketplace such as VectorStock.com. A contextually relevant vector image can make your designs really stand out. Also look to grab some of the ‘infographics packs’ at CreativeMarket. You can use elements from these packs to create your own mini-infographics inside posts. This concludes the basic building blocks of our blog  graphics project. Now let’s take a look at some strategies for putting these together to create header images and in-post graphics. The Non-Designers Guide to Creating Better #Blog GraphicsHow to Create Better Blog Graphics Start with your header images. Header images are more than just design filler. They give readers a glimpse of your post’s content, and show up in social media. In essence, these are the ‘anchor’ images for your post and offer readers an idea of what to expect not just from a post, but the blog as a whole. It’s easy to get lazy with header images. You might very well be tempted to stick a stock image from SXC.hu on top and call it a day. The problem is that such stock images not only look bad, but they also don’t get as many page views. The alternative: customized header images. Let’s look at a couple of strategies for creating these. 1. Use good stock images, add text and a color tint. One of my favorite ways to create better header images in a jiffy is to use a high-quality stock image, add some text (usually the post title, shortened for clarity) and a color tint, like this: Creating this is easy enough: Grab a picture from Unsplash.com and add some text in a font from the list above. For the color tint, add a color layer in Photoshop, fill it with a color from the Google Material Design color palette, then drag it beneath the base image layer. Change the ‘blend’ mode for the base image to ‘Multiply’, and you’re all set. 2. Add borders, shapes, and different fonts. Add some complexity to your header image by throwing in some shapes, borders, and font combinations. Try the elegant font + light base color + dark border combination: Or the color gradient + pattern + gradient filled text. In the example below, I’ve used a blue-pink gradient on top of the Triangular pattern fill from SubtlePatterns.com: An easy way to make the post title stand out is to enclose it within a shape, like this: Another personal favorite is to use a vector graphic against a solid background. Below, I’ve used the ‘camera’ icon from the ET-Line icons set: None of these styles are complicated or particularly hard to copy. Try recreating them in Photoshop to get a hang of things. For further inspiration, see the header image gallery at Canva.com. Create your in-post graphics. In-post graphics are a wonderful way to give additional structure to your posts and highlight key information. They are also highly sharable. I try to add at least a couple of graphics to all my posts. With a set of existing templates, it often takes less than 10 minutes to create unique graphics for every piece of content.

Market Analysis for Entry Strategy Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 4000 words

Market Analysis for Entry Strategy - Case Study Example This scenario was attributed to change in behaviour of the citizens of France and their attitudes towards alcohol product There was also evidence that the Wolf Blass wine, an alcohol brand that the company intended to export it to France could not perform better unless the company engages itself in advertising and other promotional tools especially marketing mix strategies that will give the competitive advantage over the other rival companies. The company should take advantage of globalization concept and engage itself in vigorous marketing strategies like the use of technology in exploring new markets within the target market in this case France. The use of on-line marketing will boost the chances of the company to explore more new and diverse markets within France. Also the company should emphasize on utilizing porter generic strategies in order to compete effectively with its rivals. The company should come up with ways of being overall low cost producer at the same time experiencing larger market share. Global events and competition affects almost all modern businesses and organisations are increasingly facing challenges as a result of the ever changing external and internal environments. The economic and political linkages involving the migration of money, products, and people across national boundaries together with ideas and values have increased the pace of change, ambiguity, uncertainty, and unpredictability. For companies to remain competitive and international in scope as well increasing there financial bases they need to embark on market entry strategies that will enhance good results in terms of exploring new markets 1.2 Company/product/market selected Wolf Company is an Australian company that deals with manufacturing and selling of a wide variety of alcohol products including Wolf Blass wine. Wolf Company is among the alcohol producing companies that have utilized the concept of globalization because of the saturated Australian market for alcohol

Design in its Golden Age Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Design in its Golden Age - Essay Example These rises were paralleled by a growth in export figures over the same period and by 1957 the world trade in manufactured goods exceeded that in primary produce for the first time ever " (Sparke, 1987). Such economical prosperity was mainly due to the rapid development of technology during and after the Second World War. Among the most significant achievements were creation of radar and work in aircraft production. For Sparke (1987) it was creation of the transistor, "which made possible the miniaturization of electronic equipment, including computers, which in turn were to play such a central role in the postwar period, both in the automation of production and in information retrieval". Manufacturing and trade expanded rapidly and soon achieved the international level. The outcomes allowed the consumers to buy more and more and the producers made their best to satisfy purchasers. Press and Cooper (2003) in the chapter "Design and consumer culture" argue that in the first part of the twentieth century the economy was organized on a national basis. Today people, commodities, and money circulate around the world. "The things we take for granted today - driving a Toyota made in England, foreign holidays, the overseas students with whom we study, our Levis made in the Philippines, bunches of flowers sold on New York streets that are grown in Africa, e-mail exchanges with friends in other countries - reflect a level of globalization that was unheard of a generation ago" (Press and Cooper, 2003). The number of choices grew and here the designers envisaged their major challenge: design became the means by which goods were distinguished. With the help of designers producers tried to make their product more desirable for the consumer. One of the most enduring images of design for consumer luxury was the image of American car in 50's, which combined the huge sweeping forms of streamlined luxury with chrome detail and space age tail fins. General motors' Designer, Harley Earl, was aimed to channel consumer spending towards a new car every year. "By 1953, everyone in the United States who really needed a car had already bought one, so the automobile companies realized that if they were to keep up their sales figures they would have to change their styling more often. The great idea was to use design features that were so extreme that they would date quickly" (Powell, and Peel, 1988, p.66). Press and Cooper (2003) provide their understanding of design. To them it "is a process by which a product is encoded with symbolic meaning both through product design and advertising design. This encoding aims to point towards a preferred reading of the product". As an example they give the Italian scooter, which encoded a preferred reading of it as a feminized form of transport. Press and Cooper (2003, p.15) quote sociologists Scott Lash and John Uny who explain, "we analyze, not so much knowledge - or information-intensivity in production, but design-intensivity and, with the decline of importance of the labour process, the growing importance of the design process". The combination of words "total design" appeared, the expression "form follows function" was turned into "design follows sales". Designers designed anything and everything in a new postwar world

Interviewed Couple Essay Example for Free

Interviewed Couple Essay The family is regarded as the basic unit of society and as such, good parenting is important in order to strengthen the family as an institution. Nevertheless, the situation of every family is different. There are important factors such as age, cultural, background, financial stability, etc. that must be carefully considered in assessing the parenting style in every family. Being the case, it is necessary that the situation of families are given due importance and the most effective way to be able to understand parenting styles is through the face-to-face interaction with parents. In relation to this, Henry and Tanya Pietrkowski were interviewed when it comes to parenting their daughter, Sophia. The interviewees are Henry and Tanya Pietrkowski who are the parents of a 14 years old teenager. The first part of the interview is about the family background of the couple that involves their respective ethnicity and religion. Tanya has a German-Jewish and Russian Jewish ethnicity. She pointed out that there was a conflict between the German and Russian sides of her family. She grew up in a small town Georgia wherein Jews are regarded as a minority. On the other hand, Henry came from a family of first-generation American Jewish. His parents emigrated from Poland and were Holocaust survivors. Henry grew up in the north side of Chicago. In this part of the interview, the ethnicity and religious background of the couple is given importance because the place and way by which they grew up have a substantial effect in their corresponding beliefs and values about parenting (McDermott 4). In addition, through the conversation of the interviewer with the couple it was established that their ancestors were immigrants from other countries and regarded as a minority in the American society. Tanya even explicitly stated that she experienced living in a small town in Georgia wherein Jews are a minority. In terms of parenting, the cultural background of the parents is important, especially when it comes to dealing with teachers that will be responsible in educating their children. The parents and the teachers should be able to understand each other in terms of cultural context in order for them to properly guide the education and behavior of the child (McDermott 4). The interview with the couple also gives emphasis with the respective lessons that they learn from their parents regarding parenting. The couple explained that their parents veered away from the parenting styles of their grandparents because the latter experienced a very difficult childhood, which is why in the case of Tanya, her parents chose to live in Georgia so that she will not experience the difficulties that they went through. Both the parents of the couple are disciplinarians. Nevertheless, they were still able to maximize their skills and talents even though their parents are not financial stable. Tanya’s father was an art professor, which make it easier for her to develop her singing, running, debating, and other skills because her father provided her with private lessons with his colleagues in the academe. Tanya’s father exemplified the ability of parents to give the necessary their children by means of supporting their interests, which eventually served as a huge help in maximizing their potentials as individuals (Heath 316). Unfortunately, Tanya admitted that her parents were not able to address the issues that they have during their childhood, which makes it difficult for them to instill the necessary values to her and her brother. Furthermore, Tanya and her mother also have disagreements on the way Tanya raised her daughter, especially when it comes to financial matters and the values that she teach her daughter. The problem of Tanya’s parents in teaching values to their children is brought about by unresolved childhood issues, which is discussed by Erik Erikson in the stages of development. Tanya’s parents were not able to properly go through the different stages of development, which is why their unresolved childhood issues still affects their parenting style (Elkind 9). Moreover, the disagreement between Tanya and her mother is also caused by the failure of the mother to properly develop into an adult that has the necessary financial stability and value fulfillment (Newman and Newman 317). The second part of the interview involves the conversation about the marriage of the couple and their decision to conceive a child. Based on the answer of the couple, they were only 13 months married when Tanya became pregnant. The couple already acknowledges the idea that they will become parents but they did not expect that it will happen very soon. However, even though the child came very early in their marriage the couple was able to fulfill their respective dreams of being married first and having a stable job before having a baby. In this situation, the couple was individually fulfilled before having a baby, which is essential in their growth process as adults and eventually has a good effect in their parenting (Simon and Lambert 91). The last part of the interview is about the parenting of the couple. It is clearly observable that the couple also wants the best for their daughter, in terms of her living a better life as compared to them. The couple has their own parenting style that is different from their parents because their experienced taught them their parents lack the necessary tending in the way they were raised (Taylor 34). Moreover, the couple also moved to a part of Chicago that has Jewish community in order for their daughter not to feel isolated. They also enrolled their daughter to a Jewish school in order for her to have a strong Jewish faith unlike them. The couple admitted that they do not have any specific parenting style for their daughter wherein they did not establish any parenting roles of rules that their daughter need to follow. The couple just goes with the flow of parenting but they believed that they were able to raise their children well because they listen to her, which is important in parenting. The couple advised other parents that the right way of parenting is by trusting one’s instinct, which is actually true in the most current studies that there is â€Å"no single recipe for successful parenting† because every family have different issues, backgrounds, beliefs, and values that must be considered in identifying the right parenting style (Maccoby 451).

Chlamydia :: essays research papers

Chlamydia Chlamydia is the most common sexually transmitted infection in the United States. It strikes about 4 million people a year in the U.S.. 100,000 women become infertile each year from a pelvic inflammatory disease (PID), which plugs up or scars the filopian tubes, so the egg can’t reach the uterus. 45% of sexually active teenagers are exposed to the disease at least once. Clamydia is caused by a bacterium, named chlamydia trachomatis. The pathogen enters the body through sexual activity, or when some comes in contact with the infected persons bodily fluids, such as blood, semen, or vaginal fluid. Chlamydia is often unnoticed because the symptoms are often inconspicuous or not present at all. When symptoms do arise, in men, it is usually a clear or white discharge from the penis or a swelling of the testicles, which can lead to infertility if left untreated. 75% of women with the disease show no symptoms. In those that do, it is usually a yellow discharge from the urethra, painful urination, or painful sex. Â ½ of all cases of pelvic inflammatory disease, which leads to an ectopic pregnancy in pregnant women, is caused by chlamydia. Ectopic pregnancy is the leading cause of death of pregnant teens in the inner city and poor neighborhoods. Chlamydia also causes conjunctitis. This is a swelling of the eyes which can lead to blindness. The bacteria also can lead to pneumonia. Although it is the most easily treated STI, most people in danger won’t get checked until complications show, and that is why the disease is spread so much. It takes about three weeks for most people to see symptoms. In that time, they have sexual contact with others and not know they are spreading it. This process goes on and on and some day it could turn into an epidemic. This is why it is called the "silent epidemic". Chlamydia s simple to cure. Physicians prescribe a one day course of an antibiotic, azithromycin, and it’s gone.

There Is Something Disturbing About the World

Perhaps the most disturbing character of all Is the thirteen year old Bryony Tallish, a precocious girl with the habit of traumatizing and romanticizes events that occur in her own life, leading to disastrous consequences. Cecilia and the Tallish parents are also a cause for concern, the former due to her lack of direction and purpose and the latter because of their absence and failure to fulfill their roles as head of house. Finally, the house that the family reside in can be seen to reflect them and their faults.Overall, Mclean presents a family that has deep robbers, which gives rise to many concerns. With absent parents and a sister that does little other than aimlessly smoke cigarettes, Bryony Totals can be viewed as a by- product of the poisonous environment in which she has grown up in. As her mother battles with depression and her father is in a senior position at the war office, she has had to grow up largely on her own, which perhaps contributes to her tendency to dramatist and fantasies everything, as she needs to create her own worlds In order to escape from her truthful lonely reality.Perhaps what concerns us the most forever, is when she dramatists events that she sees, or in the case of the incident at the fountain, which she only sees part of. Also, she links events that happen in the adult world to experiences she has had or read about whilst growing up. Bryony dreams that the Incident will precede a ‘proposal of marriage, which she then relates to her childhood, stating that ‘She herself had written a tale in which a humble woodcutter saved a princess from drowning and ended by marrying her,' a story plausible only in a fairy tale.This Is In stark contrast with what she refers to as her entering an arena of adult emotion and dissembling from which her writing was bound to benefit,' highlighting that even in the strange events she has seen, she feels that she can still profit, which disturbs the reader as she has a sordid sense of w hat Is right and wrong, instead of showing concern for her sister she views herself as a form of gladiator as she has entered an arena, Implicit that she will be her sister's savior. Another disturbing characteristic of Bryony is her flawed idea of what is right and what is wrong, which could be due to her solitary upbringing.She feels that the OFF intrusion into his private life. Her inability to cope with events is perhaps showcased most oddly when Lola coerces her into giving her the part of Rubella and Bryony feels that ‘her only reasonable choice would be to run away, to live under hedges, eat berries and speak to no one, and be found by a bearded woodsman one winter's dawn, curled up at the base of a giant oak,' showing that she deals with what goes on in her life by making into a play and basing her actions on what heroines or people in fairy tales would have done.Overall, Briton's delusions of grandeur coupled with her incessant capability to transform any event in her own life into a work of fiction leads to one being disturbed because of her warped visions of what is real and what transcends reality. The crumbling family can perhaps be attributed to the lack of a strong patriarchal or matriarchal figure in the family. Emily Tallish battles with what she calls her ‘monster' and Jack Tallish holds a senior position in the war office, and thus this family has little unity, as Betty the maid takes the role of surrogate mother for the children, doing what Emily Tallish no longer feels that she can do.Her opening description as being ‘inert' alerts us to how useless she is in this house, and her life is described as ‘invalid nullity highlighting how little she does. However, one must appreciate the fact that she has depression, brought on from Britons birth, and thus she cannot solely be criticizes as being a lazy character, as it is not her fault, however, her lack of desire to change things is a disturbing problem, and she takes a great deal of time Just to find her ‘dark glasses. Emily movements are described as being ‘slow and ‘awkward. Overall, Mclean shows a mother utterly failing to fulfill both her role as career for her children and as leader of the house in Jack Italian's perpetual absence, owing to his busy Job, and he is even late for Loon's homecoming meal, leaving the women to run the show, a disturbing situation in the patriarchal early 20th century society. Despite her privileged background and the chances she has been given, Cecilia Tallish has failed to achieve much at all thus far in her life.She graduated from Gorton with ‘a third' showing that her opportunity for a good start has been squandered. Whilst Cecilia does attempt to do something, she often fails, as her start on a family tree was ‘half-hearted' and she even states that ‘nothing was holding her back from leaving the house, other than the thought of packing a suitcase' which ‘did not excit e her,' showing her reluctance to make any changes to her otherwise boring life.Perhaps her reading of Claries can be seen as an interpretation of her own life, as Richardson novel tells the story of a girl whose attempts at something (virtue in this case) are continually thwarted by her parents, and for Cecilia Tallish, her tempts at starting a relationship with Robbie are thwarted, first by Bryony Tallish naming and thus condemning him as the rapist of Lola Quince, and then due to World War II.However, Cecilia does also have some desire to be independent, shown through her smoking her own cigarettes, which contrasted with the early 20th century that women had to be offered and could not possibly ask or smoke their own, yet she does both of these. She also shows some desire to live independently, as she ‘had a little money in her account' and ‘offers to help her find a Job' yet she labels all f her options as ‘unpleasing. Mclean presents to the reader a flawed pai r of siblings, who have been left to cope, in essence, without parents, and whilst Bryony has the activity and direction her older sister lacks, it is utilized negatively. Overall, despite her chances that other would have craved for is disturbing. Means's setting for the novel reflects the Tallish family, serving only to reinforce and highlight their inherent flaws.From the outside, the house is described as being ‘ugly and condemned as ‘chartless to a fault' and as a tragedy of wasted chances' perhaps ere referencing Cecilia Italian's lack of motivation and direction in life, shown by her failures to achieve much since arriving home from university and this could perhaps also foreshadow the tempestuous and ill-fated love between Cecilia and Robbie.The temple is shown to be in disrepair, as the exposed laths ‘showed through like the ribs of a starving animal,' referencing how the family is falling apart and their flaws are easily visible, also shown through the bu ilding having a ‘mottled, diseased appearance. Cilia's lack of purpose is reflected in the temple which ‘had of course o religious purpose at all' and was meant to enhance the ‘pastoral ideal' meaning that it had an artificial premise, which relates to Cilia's whim of staying home through the feeling that ‘she was needed' even though she does little to look after Bryony and when she does there are selfish motives coursing through her actions, as seen when she strokes Bryony and gets comfort from it.Her other motive that she was required to help her mother is also shown to be false, as she does nothing to aid her other than putting flowers in Uncle Clime's vase, and even that is eventually broken. Means's tendency for his architecture to be flawed can be seen to display the family within the walls, a family in disrepair that is completely and utterly ‘a tragedy of wasted chances,' disturbing when considering all the opportunities the characters have been given which have been ruined by themselves or others.Overall, Mclean presents a disturbing set of characters, all in a toxic environment which serves only to exacerbate their already prominent flaws, leaving the reader disturbed as a collection of flawed individuals in an environment such as this will only lead to catastrophic consequences.

Recasting a Paragraph in the Past Tense Exercise

This recasting exercise will give you practice in using the appropriate past-tense forms of regular and irregular verbs. Instructions The following paragraph has been adapted from Memorandum, an essay by E.B. White (One Mans Meat, 1944). Rewrite Whites paragraph, eliminating the phrase ought to wherever it appears and putting the italicized verbs in the past tense. Follow the example below. Example Original SentenceI ought to knock the wedges out from the frames of the pier, put a line on the frames, and tow them in on the high water.Sentence Recast in the Past TenseI knocked the wedges out from the frames of the pier, put a line on the frames, and towed them in on the high water. Memorandum I ought to take up the wire fence round the chicken range today, roll it up in bundles, tie them with six-thread, and store them at the edge of the woods. Then I ought to move the range houses off the field and into the corner of the woods and set them up on blocks for the winter, but I ought to sweep them out first and clean the roosts with a wire brush... I ought to add a bag of phosphate to the piles of hen dressing that have accumulated under the range houses and spread the mixture on the field, to get it ready for plowing... On my way in from the range I ought to stop at the henhouse long enough to climb up and saw off an overhanging branch from the apple tree. I shall have to get a ladder of course and a saw. When you have completed the exercise, compare your work with the revised paragraph below.​ Memorandum  (Recast in the Past Tense) I  took  up the wire fence  round  the chicken range today,  rolled  it up in bundles,  tied  them with six-thread, and  stored  them at the edge of the woods. Then I  moved  the range houses off the field and into the corner of the woods and  set  them up on blocks for the winter, but I  swept  them out first and  cleaned  the  roosts  with a wire brush... I  added  a bag of phosphate to the piles of  hen  dressing that  had  accumulated under the range houses and  spread  the mixture on the field, to get it ready for plowing... On my way in from the  range  I  stopped  at the henhouse long enough to climb up and saw off an overhanging branch from the apple tree. I  had  to get a ladder of course and a saw. Related Revision Exercises Recasting a Paragraph in the Past Tense II: From In the Heart of the Heart of the Country by William GassRecasting a Paragraph in the Past Tense III: From  Appalachian Wilderness  by Edward Abbey