 |
| United States Navy. "US Navy". 5-28-10 via Wikipedia. Public Domain. |
And with that, au revoir.
Wednesday, August 12, 2015
Victory Lap
We made it! Finally. Now on to a great Fall semester.
Final Project
August 12, 2015
Dear Professor Bottai and Classmates:
I've taken some pretty good English/composition classes in my life so I definitely already understood a lot of the ideas about writing that were emphasized in this course. However, I think this course had a much bigger focus on the technical components of writing as well as rhetorical analysis, neither of which I've really ever focused on in great detail.
During this course, I've learned more about paying attention to the details of writing, which weren't necessarily a big concern for me before. I think that's twofold because I learned about technical details but also about paying attention to the genre and my audience and what I want them to get out of my writing. Most of this learning happened in my blog posts like Analyzing My Audience and QRGs: The Genre. As a reader, I think I'm more conscious of the writer's intentions when I'm reading other people's works. That's really interesting because it feels almost like I'm double conscious; I'm reading the work and getting something from it, but I'm also cognizant of what I'm supposed to get from it and I'm actively assessing that as I'm reading it.
Being aware of these things as a reader has definitely helped me to be more conscious as a writer. For instance, in Questions About Controversy preparing for Project 3, I really started to understand the process of choosing a topic. Brainstorming 25 question was easy because I just started spouting things off to myself about the gender gap and what I might want to know. But then in the blog post Narrowing My Focus, it was a tough process trying to boil that 25 question list down to just 3 things but doing so helped me see how laser focused writing really is. I mean out of all of those 25 questions, I picked three and that was enough to keep me researching and writing for hours. The good part about it was that when it came time to craft a thesis statement, I knew which questions I was answering and so it was easy for me to take those questions and come up with a thesis statement about them.
Another thing that really allowed me to grow during this course was the peer review process. I think the peer review process for this class was difficult for me because it wasn't face to face. It's hard to convey my ideas about a piece by writing about it, and similarly, it's a little harder to understand what people are trying to do with their writing when they're not there to read it to me. I think that second point might have been a good thing though because it made it easier for me to identify parts of people's pieces where the language was unclear and where they could have tweaked a couple things to make it easier to understand. I never really recognized that peer reviews did anything for me until I had to write blog posts reflecting on my drafts and how the peer reviews had helped.
Outside of this course, I actually talked to a lot of my friends about the gender gap and what it means while researching and writing Project 3, which was really cool because it showed me that my writing doesn't have to stay on the page. If I can write about real things that actually matter, then writing becomes a vehicle that helps me reach new levels of understanding. This was doubly helpful because they often gave me unofficial peer reviews and suggested things that I could do better to improve my writing, which was super helpful during revisions.
I don’t always like revising my writing, and I was forced to approach the revision process for each essay. But once I started, I realized I was actually getting a lot of value out of it. The revision questions that I had to answer for blog posts reflecting on my drafts for Project #1, Project #2 and Project #3, really made me stop and think about what I was doing in my writing and whether or not it was what I wanted to be doing. Questions like "what was the purpose and audience or your original paper? how did it achieve that purpose or reach that audience?" were really new to me and I think that considering these things after I had finished a draft really helped me identify what changes I needed to make to improve my writing based on factors like audience and genre.
I definitely never gave thought to the fact that reading and writing in different genres are completely unique things. It really surprised me how much changes when genre changes: audience, tone, purpose, language and even format. After having gone through this course I think I'm much better equipped to assess what genre I'm working within and then read/write accordingly.
But even though I’m better equipped to be a good writer, I still have to work on getting my pieces done in a timely matter. I think that if I were to take another composition course, I would try to write my pieces sooner. Instead of waiting until the deadline was approaching to start getting things down on paper, I think it would make more sense and make me more successful to start early and get all of my ideas down into a piece of writing and then from there I could tweak it and alter it until it was really quality college writing.
College writing fits into my life now because I'm in college and college students have to write a lot of things. Later, I think writing will play a pretty big role in my life because I'll have to communicate my ideas to a lot of people and it can't all be face to face. Especially in being a business major, language is really crucial to the things I'll be involved in and effective writing will help me to express my ideas clearly to my associates. In order to get really good at this, I need to remember to pay attention to the details.
I learned to pay more attention to the details through reading about them in this course. Much of this knowledge came from the Clarity #1, Clarity #2, Punctuation #1, and Punctuation #2 assignments, where I had to read chapters from Rules For Writers and reflect on the way I could take the technical things I had just read about and apply them to my writing. It really opened my eyes to all of the little nuanced things that can be done to make a really good piece. I had always thought that some people were just naturally awesome writers and others weren't.. and that still might be true, but now I know there's a guide for those of us who aren't as naturally talented.
I don’t know if I’m exactly talented, but I’m sure that my writing is better when I put more time into it. Going through this course really reminded me that I do procrastinate a lot, which isn't necessarily a great thing at all, but it's true and I've started to find some good ways to work with (although the best way is to just do things earlier). Even more than that, my experiences in this course showed me that writing can be improved, just like anything else, with some time and some focus. I think when my work doesn’t meet standards, it’s because I rushed through it and didn't take the time to reflect on the experience or the process that I went through. This happens from time to time and I've come to accept it, but I know that I should really work on allotting sufficient time for myself so that I can really produce some good work.
Having completed this course, I definitely am better equipped to analyze texts through close reading and critical thinking while considering their purposes, audiences, and contexts. I can write essays that develop analyses with evidence drawn from texts I've read, although I think I still have a lot of room for improvement in that section. I've definitely learned to research, read, write, and revise writing in a variety of different areas, which will be helpful as I go on to work in courses outside of first-year composition. I don't think I've really mastered the conventions of scholarly research. Scholarly research to me just seems really overly formal and it doesn't always yield pertinent information. For instance, all of the scholarly articles I found about the gender gap were from over 40 years ago, so those could only help me so much when I'm writing about the gender gap in 2015. But finally, I'm definitely able to create multiple, meaningful revisions of writing, and I think that's really what matters. As long as I can take something I've written and find ways to make it better, I think I'll be alright.
Sincerely,
Tripp Twyman
Reflection on Open Letter Draft
This is where the magic happens...
I reviewed Brandon's Draft and Mark's Draft.
Who specifically, is going to be reading this essay? Or who am I trying to reach with my argument? (My instructor, my classmates, members of my academic community, members of the local community, etc.)
My professor and my classmates will be reading this essay. Although there isn't really an argument, it's more of an assessment of my writing and the way that it has progressed. With this in mind, I think I can avoid going into too much detail about the assignments that I worked on in this course and instead focus more on my actual writing.
What biases might my readers have? Am I respecting their opinions while also achieving my own purpose?
I don't think they have any major biases. Some of them might think that the class was significantly easier than I thought it was, others might think the opposite. So I think as long as I make sure to emphasize that everything I'm saying is my own than I should be okay with respecting their opinions.
What are their values and expectations? Am I adequately meeting those expectations?
I think they all value English to some extent so I should make sure not to completely insult English composition and rhetorical analysis, but other than that I don't think they'll come in with many expectations besides wanting to understand my writing experience a little better. With that in mind, it shouldn't be too difficult to meet those expectations because I've already put a good amount of work into getting content for my draft, and now it's just a matter of turning that draft into an actual letter.
How much information do I need to give my audience? How much background information or context should I provide for them without insulting their expertise?
I don't think I need to give them much information about the course, but they'll probably need some background information describing my experiences as a writer leading up to this course and how they've changed upon the course's completion. I don't think background on my personal experiences would insult their expertise at all, but too much background about this specific course could definitely leave them feeling belittled.
What kind of language is suitable for this audience?
I think I can be pretty casual. My classmates are all college students so they shouldn't be expecting some super formal letter, and then my professor does have the right to expect a little bit more formality but again, it's a letter. With that said I'm going to try not to be exceedingly casual, although I definitely want the letter to have a calm, relaxed feel when they read it.
What tone should I use with my audience? Do I use this tone consistently throughout my draft?
Casual. A casual tone is definitely the way to go and I plan on using it throughout the letter. I also want to make sure that my writing is descriptive so that they really get a good idea of what I'm saying, but it should be descriptive in a pleasantly informative sense.
Reviewing Mark and Brandon's letters really helped me to see what I wanted to convey and what format would be good. I was debating having it be a really long paragraph, but after reading through Mark's draft and being able to jump from paragraph to paragraph so easily, I knew that the shorter style would be the best way to go.
 |
| Wesley Nitsckie. "A Thinking Man". 3-3-11 via Flickr. CC A-SA 2.0. |
Who specifically, is going to be reading this essay? Or who am I trying to reach with my argument? (My instructor, my classmates, members of my academic community, members of the local community, etc.)
My professor and my classmates will be reading this essay. Although there isn't really an argument, it's more of an assessment of my writing and the way that it has progressed. With this in mind, I think I can avoid going into too much detail about the assignments that I worked on in this course and instead focus more on my actual writing.
What biases might my readers have? Am I respecting their opinions while also achieving my own purpose?
I don't think they have any major biases. Some of them might think that the class was significantly easier than I thought it was, others might think the opposite. So I think as long as I make sure to emphasize that everything I'm saying is my own than I should be okay with respecting their opinions.
What are their values and expectations? Am I adequately meeting those expectations?
I think they all value English to some extent so I should make sure not to completely insult English composition and rhetorical analysis, but other than that I don't think they'll come in with many expectations besides wanting to understand my writing experience a little better. With that in mind, it shouldn't be too difficult to meet those expectations because I've already put a good amount of work into getting content for my draft, and now it's just a matter of turning that draft into an actual letter.
How much information do I need to give my audience? How much background information or context should I provide for them without insulting their expertise?
I don't think I need to give them much information about the course, but they'll probably need some background information describing my experiences as a writer leading up to this course and how they've changed upon the course's completion. I don't think background on my personal experiences would insult their expertise at all, but too much background about this specific course could definitely leave them feeling belittled.
What kind of language is suitable for this audience?
I think I can be pretty casual. My classmates are all college students so they shouldn't be expecting some super formal letter, and then my professor does have the right to expect a little bit more formality but again, it's a letter. With that said I'm going to try not to be exceedingly casual, although I definitely want the letter to have a calm, relaxed feel when they read it.
What tone should I use with my audience? Do I use this tone consistently throughout my draft?
Casual. A casual tone is definitely the way to go and I plan on using it throughout the letter. I also want to make sure that my writing is descriptive so that they really get a good idea of what I'm saying, but it should be descriptive in a pleasantly informative sense.
Reviewing Mark and Brandon's letters really helped me to see what I wanted to convey and what format would be good. I was debating having it be a really long paragraph, but after reading through Mark's draft and being able to jump from paragraph to paragraph so easily, I knew that the shorter style would be the best way to go.
Tuesday, August 11, 2015
Draft of Open Letter
It's time!! Here's my first copy of the letter.
BEFORE YOU READ IT, you should know that it's a very rough draft. I'm still looking for some more specific examples from my own writing that I could either quote or hyperlink to but other than that I think it's pretty straight forward. I left this draft pretty much in the same format as the Reflection on My Writing Experience post because it seemed really fluid. I'm still reading over it to see if I might rearrange some of the statements or add transitions to make it flow better as a letter. How do you feel about the length? I feel like if it's a letter then it might be a little shorter, although I recently saw Lupe Fiasco's Open Letter to White Supremacy and it's pretty long so I guess length isn't actually a big concern. Questions? Comments? Affirmations?
Here it is. I hope you like it!
BEFORE YOU READ IT, you should know that it's a very rough draft. I'm still looking for some more specific examples from my own writing that I could either quote or hyperlink to but other than that I think it's pretty straight forward. I left this draft pretty much in the same format as the Reflection on My Writing Experience post because it seemed really fluid. I'm still reading over it to see if I might rearrange some of the statements or add transitions to make it flow better as a letter. How do you feel about the length? I feel like if it's a letter then it might be a little shorter, although I recently saw Lupe Fiasco's Open Letter to White Supremacy and it's pretty long so I guess length isn't actually a big concern. Questions? Comments? Affirmations?
 |
| Eliot Fintushel. "Einstein Letter". 12-23-07 via Wikipedia. CC A-SA 3.0. |
Here it is. I hope you like it!
Considering Types
Looking at the five types of argument explained in Writing Public Lives, I can see how some would work well for my project and others would not.
Position
I don't think this would work because I'm not really "defend[ing] a specific policy, position, or idea in a controversial debate"; if anything, I'm trying to make the gender gap a controversial debate so that more gets done about it. Maybe in a few years, once it's a bigger deal and there are actually more parties involved, I could write a position argument defending my favorite point of view, but I think for now to write a position piece would be to assume more people are interested than there actually are.
Casual
I believe this is the way to go. I hope to highlight "one set of causes for a particular problem" in my project and I think that the casual argument will allow me to do that without taking too much time and energy to address other things. Especially since there isn't really a widespread active opposition to the movement for equality, I think that a casual argument would allow me to make my point without making a fuss.
Evaluative
I think this could be an effective form of argument for my project because I could definitely "evaluate specific public policies and proposed solutions" in my description of the gender gap and how it is affecting our society. Title IX would be one of those policies/solutions that I would reference, but I think I want to make more of a statement than an evaluative argument would make.
Proposal
I'm not proposing anything in this piece. I was thinking about proposing a solution to the gender gap but I changed that and now I'm more worried about the gap itself and spreading awareness. With that purpose, the proposal (if any) is that people should tell their friends and family about the gap and how they're worried about what will happen if it continues to exist.
Refutation
I definitely don't think refutation is the way to go because I'm not refuting anything. If anything, I'm describing the problem and providing evidence for why we should work towards change. In a refutation I would have to bring up "harmful public effects", but I only want to focus on the gender gap and the way it is holding us back.
 |
| Found Animals Foundation. "Cat Argument 3". 8-29-11 via Flickr. CC A-SA 2.0. |
I don't think this would work because I'm not really "defend[ing] a specific policy, position, or idea in a controversial debate"; if anything, I'm trying to make the gender gap a controversial debate so that more gets done about it. Maybe in a few years, once it's a bigger deal and there are actually more parties involved, I could write a position argument defending my favorite point of view, but I think for now to write a position piece would be to assume more people are interested than there actually are.
Casual
I believe this is the way to go. I hope to highlight "one set of causes for a particular problem" in my project and I think that the casual argument will allow me to do that without taking too much time and energy to address other things. Especially since there isn't really a widespread active opposition to the movement for equality, I think that a casual argument would allow me to make my point without making a fuss.
Evaluative
I think this could be an effective form of argument for my project because I could definitely "evaluate specific public policies and proposed solutions" in my description of the gender gap and how it is affecting our society. Title IX would be one of those policies/solutions that I would reference, but I think I want to make more of a statement than an evaluative argument would make.
Proposal
I'm not proposing anything in this piece. I was thinking about proposing a solution to the gender gap but I changed that and now I'm more worried about the gap itself and spreading awareness. With that purpose, the proposal (if any) is that people should tell their friends and family about the gap and how they're worried about what will happen if it continues to exist.
Refutation
I definitely don't think refutation is the way to go because I'm not refuting anything. If anything, I'm describing the problem and providing evidence for why we should work towards change. In a refutation I would have to bring up "harmful public effects", but I only want to focus on the gender gap and the way it is holding us back.
Reflecting on My Writing Experiences
Reflection reflection reflection. That's the name of the game. This time I'll be thinking about my own writing experiences.
Reflect on:
1. Your assumptions and ideas about writing before taking your first-year composition courses...
I've taken some pretty good English/composition classes in my life so I definitely already understood a lot of the ideas about writing that were emphasized in this course. However, I think this course had a much bigger focus on the technical components of writing as well as rhetorical analysis, neither of which I've really ever focused on in great detail. But other than that, I pretty much had the same assumptions and ideas about writing.
2. The most important lessons you have learned as both a reader and a writer as a result of taking your first-year composition courses...
I think (as I mentioned in #1) that I've learned a lot more about paying attention to the details of writing, which weren't necessarily a big concern for me before. But again, I think that's twofold because I learned about technical details but also about paying attention to genre and my audience and what I want them to get out of my writing. As a reader, I think I'm more conscious of the writer's intentions when I'm reading other people's works. That's really interesting to me because it feels almost like I'm double conscious; I'm reading the work and getting something from it, but I'm also cognizant of what I'm supposed to get from it and I'm actively assessing that as I'm reading it.
3. The ways you brainstormed, narrowed down topics, and worked on thesis statements...
In the blog post preparing for Project 3, when I was thinking of questions to answer in my writing, I really started to understand the process of choosing a topic. Brainstorming 25 question was easy because I just started spouting things off to myself about the gender gap and what I might want to know. But then in the blog post "Narrowing My Focus", it was a tough process trying to boil that 25 question list down to just 3 things but doing so helped me see how laser focused writing really is. I mean out of all of those 25 questions, I picked three and that was enough to keep me researching and writing for hours. The good part about it was that when it came time to craft a thesis statement, I knew which questions I was answering and so it was easy for me to take those questions and come up with a thesis statement about them.
4. The peer-review process, including what you offered and what you received...
I think the peer review process for this class was difficult for me because it wasn't face to face. It's hard to convey my ideas about a piece by writing about it, and similarly, it's a little harder to understand what people are trying to do with their writing when they're not there to read it to me. I think that second point might have been a good thing though because it made it easier for me to identify parts of people's pieces where the language was unclear and where they could have tweaked a couple things to make it easier to understand.
5. Individual or small-group process, including what you offered and what you received...
We didn't have any small-group processes that I can remember, outside of the peer review groups but I already wrote about that. However, I think we all offered a lot (some of us with different timing than others) and we all got a lot of value out of it at the same time.
6. The discussions you had about your paper with people who were not in your class...
I actually talked to a lot of my friends about the gender gap and what it means while researching and writing Project 3, which was really cool because it showed me that my writing doesn't have to stay on the page. If I can write about real things that actually matter, then writing becomes a vehicle that helps me reach new levels of understanding.
7. How you approached the revision process for each essay....
I was forced to approach the revision process for each essay. But once I started, I realized I was actually getting a lot of value out of it. The revision questions that I had to answer for the revision blog posts really made me stop and think about what I was doing in my writing and whether or not it was what I wanted to be doing. Questions like "what was the purpose and audience or your original paper? how did it achieve that purpose or reach that audience?" were really new to me and I think that considering these things after I had finished a draft really helped me identify what changes I needed to make to improve my writing.
8. Your understanding of reading and writing in different genres...
I definitely never gave thought to the fact that reading and writing in different genres are completely unique things. It really surprised me how much changes when genre changes: audience, tone, purpose, language and even format. After having gone through this course I think I'm much better equipped to assess what genre I'm working within and then read/write accordingly.
9. What you would do differently if you were to take you first-year composition courses again...
I would try to write my pieces sooner. Instead of waiting until the deadline was approaching to start getting things down on paper, I think it would make more sense and make me more successful to start early and get all of my ideas down into a piece of writing and then from there I could tweak it and alter it until it was really something good.
10. How college writing fits into your life now and how it will fit into your major and future career...
College writing fits into my life now because I'm in college and college students have to write a lot of things. Later, I think writing will play a pretty big role in my life because I'll have to communicate my ideas to a lot of people and it can't all be face to face. Especially in being a business major, language is really crucial to the things I'll be involved in and effective writing will help me to express my ideas clearly to my associates.
11. What did you learn (from a specific writing assignment, from a specific experience, or from the semester as a whole?
I learned to pay more attention to the details. Much of this knowledge came from the Clarity and Punctuation assignments, where I had to read chapters from Rules For Writers and reflect on the way I could take the technical things I had just read about and apply them to my writing. It really opened my eyes to all of the little nuanced things that can be done to make a really good piece. I had always thought that some people were just naturally awesome writers and others weren't.. and that still might be true, but now I know there's a guide for those of us who aren't as naturally talented.
12. Did the choices you made, or writing experiences you had, reinforce something you already knew about yourself or about writing?
They reinforced the fact that I procrastinate a lot. Which isn't necessarily a great thing at all, but it's true and I've started to find some good ways to work with (although the best way is to just do things earlier). But even more than that, my experiences in this course showed me that writing can be improved, just like anything else, with some time and some focus.
13. If you did not gain as much from a particular project as you had hoped, what are the possible reasons for that and what might you do differently the next time?
I think it would be because I rushed through it and didn't take the time to reflect on the experience or the process that I went through. This happens from time to time and I've come to accept it, but I know that I should really work on allotting sufficient time for myself so that I can really produce some good work.
14. Think about the course objectives listed on your syllabus as you consider your success in the class. What course objectives did you meet? What objectives are you still working on?
The course objectives are as follows.... students will be able to:
I think after completing this course, I definitely am better equipped to analyze texts through close reading and critical thinking while considering their purposes, audiences, and contexts. I can write essays that develop analyses with evidence drawn from texts I've read, although I think I still have a lot of room for improvement in that section. I've definitely learned to research, read, write, and revise writing in a variety of different areas, which will be helpful as I go on to work in courses outside of first-year composition. I don't think I've really mastered the conventions of scholarly research. Scholarly research to me just seems really overly formal and it doesn't always yield pertinent information. For instance, all of the scholarly articles I found about the gender gap were from over 40 years ago, so those could only help me so much when I'm writing about the gender gap in 2015. But finally, I'm definitely able to create multiple, meaningful revisions of writing, and I think that's really what matters. As long as I can take something I've written and find ways to make it better, I think I'll be alright.
 |
| Brocken Inagloy. "Total Internal Reflection". 12-31-07 via Wikipedia. CC A 2.0. |
1. Your assumptions and ideas about writing before taking your first-year composition courses...
I've taken some pretty good English/composition classes in my life so I definitely already understood a lot of the ideas about writing that were emphasized in this course. However, I think this course had a much bigger focus on the technical components of writing as well as rhetorical analysis, neither of which I've really ever focused on in great detail. But other than that, I pretty much had the same assumptions and ideas about writing.
2. The most important lessons you have learned as both a reader and a writer as a result of taking your first-year composition courses...
I think (as I mentioned in #1) that I've learned a lot more about paying attention to the details of writing, which weren't necessarily a big concern for me before. But again, I think that's twofold because I learned about technical details but also about paying attention to genre and my audience and what I want them to get out of my writing. As a reader, I think I'm more conscious of the writer's intentions when I'm reading other people's works. That's really interesting to me because it feels almost like I'm double conscious; I'm reading the work and getting something from it, but I'm also cognizant of what I'm supposed to get from it and I'm actively assessing that as I'm reading it.
3. The ways you brainstormed, narrowed down topics, and worked on thesis statements...
In the blog post preparing for Project 3, when I was thinking of questions to answer in my writing, I really started to understand the process of choosing a topic. Brainstorming 25 question was easy because I just started spouting things off to myself about the gender gap and what I might want to know. But then in the blog post "Narrowing My Focus", it was a tough process trying to boil that 25 question list down to just 3 things but doing so helped me see how laser focused writing really is. I mean out of all of those 25 questions, I picked three and that was enough to keep me researching and writing for hours. The good part about it was that when it came time to craft a thesis statement, I knew which questions I was answering and so it was easy for me to take those questions and come up with a thesis statement about them.
4. The peer-review process, including what you offered and what you received...
I think the peer review process for this class was difficult for me because it wasn't face to face. It's hard to convey my ideas about a piece by writing about it, and similarly, it's a little harder to understand what people are trying to do with their writing when they're not there to read it to me. I think that second point might have been a good thing though because it made it easier for me to identify parts of people's pieces where the language was unclear and where they could have tweaked a couple things to make it easier to understand.
5. Individual or small-group process, including what you offered and what you received...
We didn't have any small-group processes that I can remember, outside of the peer review groups but I already wrote about that. However, I think we all offered a lot (some of us with different timing than others) and we all got a lot of value out of it at the same time.
6. The discussions you had about your paper with people who were not in your class...
I actually talked to a lot of my friends about the gender gap and what it means while researching and writing Project 3, which was really cool because it showed me that my writing doesn't have to stay on the page. If I can write about real things that actually matter, then writing becomes a vehicle that helps me reach new levels of understanding.
7. How you approached the revision process for each essay....
I was forced to approach the revision process for each essay. But once I started, I realized I was actually getting a lot of value out of it. The revision questions that I had to answer for the revision blog posts really made me stop and think about what I was doing in my writing and whether or not it was what I wanted to be doing. Questions like "what was the purpose and audience or your original paper? how did it achieve that purpose or reach that audience?" were really new to me and I think that considering these things after I had finished a draft really helped me identify what changes I needed to make to improve my writing.
8. Your understanding of reading and writing in different genres...
I definitely never gave thought to the fact that reading and writing in different genres are completely unique things. It really surprised me how much changes when genre changes: audience, tone, purpose, language and even format. After having gone through this course I think I'm much better equipped to assess what genre I'm working within and then read/write accordingly.
9. What you would do differently if you were to take you first-year composition courses again...
I would try to write my pieces sooner. Instead of waiting until the deadline was approaching to start getting things down on paper, I think it would make more sense and make me more successful to start early and get all of my ideas down into a piece of writing and then from there I could tweak it and alter it until it was really something good.
10. How college writing fits into your life now and how it will fit into your major and future career...
College writing fits into my life now because I'm in college and college students have to write a lot of things. Later, I think writing will play a pretty big role in my life because I'll have to communicate my ideas to a lot of people and it can't all be face to face. Especially in being a business major, language is really crucial to the things I'll be involved in and effective writing will help me to express my ideas clearly to my associates.
11. What did you learn (from a specific writing assignment, from a specific experience, or from the semester as a whole?
I learned to pay more attention to the details. Much of this knowledge came from the Clarity and Punctuation assignments, where I had to read chapters from Rules For Writers and reflect on the way I could take the technical things I had just read about and apply them to my writing. It really opened my eyes to all of the little nuanced things that can be done to make a really good piece. I had always thought that some people were just naturally awesome writers and others weren't.. and that still might be true, but now I know there's a guide for those of us who aren't as naturally talented.
12. Did the choices you made, or writing experiences you had, reinforce something you already knew about yourself or about writing?
They reinforced the fact that I procrastinate a lot. Which isn't necessarily a great thing at all, but it's true and I've started to find some good ways to work with (although the best way is to just do things earlier). But even more than that, my experiences in this course showed me that writing can be improved, just like anything else, with some time and some focus.
13. If you did not gain as much from a particular project as you had hoped, what are the possible reasons for that and what might you do differently the next time?
I think it would be because I rushed through it and didn't take the time to reflect on the experience or the process that I went through. This happens from time to time and I've come to accept it, but I know that I should really work on allotting sufficient time for myself so that I can really produce some good work.
14. Think about the course objectives listed on your syllabus as you consider your success in the class. What course objectives did you meet? What objectives are you still working on?
The course objectives are as follows.... students will be able to:
- Analyze texts through close reading and critical thinking.
- Deploy strategies to analyze texts considering their purposes, audiences, and contexts.
- Write essays that develop analyses with evidence drawn from the texts you read.
- Practice research, reading, writing, and revision strategies that can be applied to work in other courses and in different professions.
- Use the conventions of scholarly research, analysis, and documentation to practice research as a process.
- Create multiple, meaningful revisions of writing and suggest useful revision to other writers.
I think after completing this course, I definitely am better equipped to analyze texts through close reading and critical thinking while considering their purposes, audiences, and contexts. I can write essays that develop analyses with evidence drawn from texts I've read, although I think I still have a lot of room for improvement in that section. I've definitely learned to research, read, write, and revise writing in a variety of different areas, which will be helpful as I go on to work in courses outside of first-year composition. I don't think I've really mastered the conventions of scholarly research. Scholarly research to me just seems really overly formal and it doesn't always yield pertinent information. For instance, all of the scholarly articles I found about the gender gap were from over 40 years ago, so those could only help me so much when I'm writing about the gender gap in 2015. But finally, I'm definitely able to create multiple, meaningful revisions of writing, and I think that's really what matters. As long as I can take something I've written and find ways to make it better, I think I'll be alright.
Revisiting My Writing Process
After going through this whole course, it's time to look back and see how my writing process has changed.
After looking back at what I said about my writing process in the beginning of this course, I think I'd still agree with most of what I described. I'm definitely a procrastinator, but I do see the value in starting early and I've definitely seen how getting an early start can make the workload much more manageable. But I do think I've learned a few things about my writing process over the past few weeks.
I've learned that I don't always know what I want to say right when I sit down to write. Sometimes I even have to write out an entire piece focusing on the wrong thing before I figure out what I should really be writing about. I think this is good; it's a process. But what I need to remember is that if I wait until the last minute, I'm clipping my own wings. But regardless, I really do think that the best way to me to get all of my ideas out is to just come up with something and then start writing because most of my best papers started as one thing and then transformed as I put them into words.
Another thing I learned about my own writing process is that I produce more under stress, but I also produce much better final drafts after I've had time to sit down to reread and revise my work. With that said, I think I want to find a way to put myself under some sort of artificial stress so I can produce something early on in the time I have to work on a project. That way I'll have the rest of the days to relax and tweak things until it's just right.
I think in the next couple years of college, I want to get really good at finishing pieces of writing well before they're due. If I can handle that, then I'll be able to touch them up as needed to make sure that they're all great, but first I have to get good at creating them in a timely fashion. I think the reason that I'm not so great at that right now is because I tend to fill my schedule to the brim with classes and jobs and other commitments and so there's always something more pressing than working on writing (until the very last minute), but if I could find a way to change that (hopefully this semester) then I think all of my writing will go a lot smoother.
I don't actually plan on working in a profession that will require a lot of writing, unless I go into law. So I need to make sure I can communicate quickly, efficiently, and effectively through my writing.
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| Ken Whytock. "21st Century Writing Processes". 6-1-11 via Flickr. CC A-NC 2.0. |
After looking back at what I said about my writing process in the beginning of this course, I think I'd still agree with most of what I described. I'm definitely a procrastinator, but I do see the value in starting early and I've definitely seen how getting an early start can make the workload much more manageable. But I do think I've learned a few things about my writing process over the past few weeks.
I've learned that I don't always know what I want to say right when I sit down to write. Sometimes I even have to write out an entire piece focusing on the wrong thing before I figure out what I should really be writing about. I think this is good; it's a process. But what I need to remember is that if I wait until the last minute, I'm clipping my own wings. But regardless, I really do think that the best way to me to get all of my ideas out is to just come up with something and then start writing because most of my best papers started as one thing and then transformed as I put them into words.
Another thing I learned about my own writing process is that I produce more under stress, but I also produce much better final drafts after I've had time to sit down to reread and revise my work. With that said, I think I want to find a way to put myself under some sort of artificial stress so I can produce something early on in the time I have to work on a project. That way I'll have the rest of the days to relax and tweak things until it's just right.
I think in the next couple years of college, I want to get really good at finishing pieces of writing well before they're due. If I can handle that, then I'll be able to touch them up as needed to make sure that they're all great, but first I have to get good at creating them in a timely fashion. I think the reason that I'm not so great at that right now is because I tend to fill my schedule to the brim with classes and jobs and other commitments and so there's always something more pressing than working on writing (until the very last minute), but if I could find a way to change that (hopefully this semester) then I think all of my writing will go a lot smoother.
I don't actually plan on working in a profession that will require a lot of writing, unless I go into law. So I need to make sure I can communicate quickly, efficiently, and effectively through my writing.
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