English 120 Reflection Paper

Over the course of the semester, my main goal was to become a more precise writer and develop my identity as a writer. According too, the Portfolio Letter assignment sheet, becoming a better writer consists of precise planning, draft and revising. It also includes understanding a variety of academic genres by examining the basic characteristics that defines each type. In order too efficiently meet my goal of becoming a better writer, it was very important to have my work evaluated by others and myself as well. The use of rhetorical knowledge, critical thinking, reading and writing all are the important aspects in this course.

I thought it was a detailed summary of what a person was looking at. I came to realize that an analysis was used in many other subjects that I would encounter throughout my education. I also realized that analyzing is not just of documents, but data and media as well. I now understand that analysis as a breakdown of the elements of something and interpreting them to mean something. When analyzing, I first study what I am working with and try to answer questions like, what is the author trying to convey?

I feel as though I improved as a writer after taking English 1101 class. The research paper, as you know, had become extremely challenging for me. Essays have killed me since every teacher I had in the past told me different things. No one sat down and explained how to write an essay like

I learned about how to write a detailed reflection after critically analysing the book. The hardest part was finding the right quote to back up my theory/thoughts. There are many quotes that I can use, but I had to find one that really described my

“My attitude is if you push me towards something you think is a weakness, then I will turn that perceived weakness into a strength” Michael Jordan.  Knowing your weakness and strength is an important thing in life.   It can help you succeed by knowing the things you need to improve.   In writing, my strengths are in the content of my papers and the conventions.

The context is why news reporters or newspapers have headlines, who said what, where they got their information, and they also give readers a background picture of what they are reporting. Writing style is what words, what sentence structure, and what paragraphs you choose to use to convey your meaning. The hardest part of writing style to me would be my sentence structure and what paragraphs to use. Words use to be hard for me, but now that is not that hard anymore. A genre is many different kinds of texts like essays, laboratory reports, case studies, book reviews, and so on these are usually referred to as genres.

We watched a video walkthrough of a student’s ”Cause or Effect” sample paper. This walkthrough really helped because it taught some great techniques to help us create a strong thesis statement and strong supporting points. I found that the “Cause or Effect” essay was the most challenging essay of the course. With a minimum of 1500 words and 6 sources, including 3 from scholarly journals, I found myself struggling to complete this assignment. I worked on this essay for a total of three days.

Although it was the most work I had done throughout my years of high school, the complexity of the class only challenged me to work harder and to read in between the lines. My intentions for next year are to work twice as hard and improve my reading, critical thinking, oral, and analytical skills in English 1102.

I have learned a lot about how to improve my writing and make it more engaging over this past semester. When writing the first paper I learned a lot about how I write and how to improve my writing. At the beginning of this paper I learned how to plan a paper, by writing down ideas and notes down on a separate sheet of paper. This really helps to narrow down the ideas that I was passionate about. While writing this paper I learned how to self-correct mistakes that I would make a lot throughout my paper.

After this simple but because of my topic so it becomes complicated assignment, I believe I learned how to effectively locate, interpret, and evaluate evidence in order to support my idea. In addition, writing assignments are not the only way I learn from the class. The professor also teach the students different types of logical fallacies, inductive and deductive patterns to be use while composing our essay.

What I learned that certain events may occur and it will change your thought over something. The steps I had to take was to write a outline overview of what my essay was going to be like and think about the argument and claims I had to pick to support it and find quotes in the book that support my claims. We had to do timed essay about are theme of the essay were going to on. The way we wrote the essay was in TIED format because it would be easier to introduce the claim and back it up with evidence and finally discuss what it means. The leadership skill I used was to complete project effectively because I had to concentrate what I was writing about.

The essays I have chosen to revise are the Causal Argument and the Proposal Essay. I have chosen the Causal Argument and the Proposal Essay to show the improvements I made from one essay to the other. I will also use the comments and suggestions given to me by my professor on the original essays to help guide the two essays that I have chosen to revise. The reason I have chosen the Causal Argument and the Proposal Essay was to show the weaknesses and the strengths at the point of turning in these essays.

To write this artifact I first had to read and annotate

She claims that the title and the introduction needs to tell the reader clearly what they are going to read. This opens the reader to the essay and the information in order to process the essay completely (Lunsford). She conveys that in the conclusion the writer needs to reevaluate the reader of the claim/ thesis. After that evaluate your sources in the paper, Lunsford suggests to organize all the sources In addition to drafting, the writer must proofread the essay to see if it needs improvement (Lunsford). She gives tips on proofreading the final draft before finalizing and

The 214 English hybrid course has got me into thinking more about constructing a strong thesis and creating solid topic sentences. Being able to identify my thesis has also helped my writing have better organization that helps the overall flow of my essay. With blogging incorporated into our academic criteria it was certainly something different. Blogging geared me into reading more articles and analysis the authors use of rhetorical devices. After this course I have gone more on magazine websites to read current topics.