- Enhance strategies for reading, drafting, revising, editing, and self-assessment
- At the start of the semester, I feel that essential elements such as drafting, revising, and editing were lost on me. This was explicitly shown in my first assignment, A Rhetorical Analysis of: Social Media Addiction in Adolescents and Parent-Adolescent Relationships. Although written concisely with formal vocabulary and a few adequate points the overall requirements of the assignment were missed. Unfortunately, I had submitted a rough draft on slack consisting of a very basic hypothetical outline for my paper only to meet the deadline. There was a distinct lack of review and consistency. In addition to my failure to understand the prompt fully, I failed to write objectively and included a multitude of subjective analyses. Now, however, I understand the importance of the early stages of the writing process. The editing process is required. I realize, had I properly drafted for the first assignment I would have received well needed criticisms and potentially would have avoided missing the objective of the assignment. I believe I’ve shown growth in my utilization of the early stages of the writing process. You can see the growth in my second assignment, Social Media and its Impact on Children and Adolescents: Does Social Media Impact the Mental Health of Children and Adolescents Negatively. Although I was not able to receive my peer review comments, I drafted the piece twice. Through that drafting process I edited out subjective writing that was present throughout my first assignment. However, a shortcoming I noticed in my second assignment was my failure to use each article in every paragraph. Had I made it a point to connect every source to each of my points, my argument would be a lot stronger and more consistent throughout the assignment.
- Develop and engage in the collaborative and social aspects of writing processes
- The collaborative and social aspects of the writing process had never been introduced to me before this class. My previous English classes did not utilize peer reviews with any assignments. That being said, the benefits of the utilization of peer reviewing was lost to me in the beginning of the semester. I failed to participate in the peer review for the first assignment and I received criticisms however I didn’t submit any on my peers work. Furthermore, I failed to take into consideration the critique provided by my peers. Failure to do so inevitably reflected on my grade for the assignment. For my second assignment, I was excluded from peer reviews and yet again failed to utilize the peer reviews. Being that I missed out on the first two rounds of peer reviewing I decided to really take into consideration to critique provided by my peers for the third assignment. Afterwards, there was a major difference in my ability to execute the assignment. Specifically, the critiques provided by Cory assisted immensely for the PAC. After reviewing my draft he noted that the campaign would be much stronger if the intended audience is clearer throughout my campaign. I took his critique very seriously and I decided to subtly declare my audience through the language I chose to use throughout the campaign. I used an informal vocabulary to make it easier to read and understand for a younger audience since I was targeting the adolescent users of social media. Subtleties such as the language used in the campaign is what I feel earned my grade for the campaign. Overall I have found a new respect for the collaborative aspects of the writing process.
- Engage in genre analysis and multimodal composing to explore effective writing across disciplinary contexts and beyond to include public audiences
- Throughout the duration of this course, I was able to explore various methods of writing and analytical skills which enriched my writing over time. The first papers submitted for this course reflected a general lack of collaboration around peers and audience members. For my Public Awareness Campaign, I adapted a more relatable and structured approach. I have definitely improved my comprehension of sources and how to utilize the information provided to compose a coherent and engaging paper. For example, I feel that I have significantly improved in my discernment of visual aid, use of rhetoric and other crucial elements in my sources and writing. Initially, my rhetorical analysis paper failed to communicate efficient criticism and observations of the sources. I took this heavily into consideration when crafting my Public Awareness Campaign because I learned the effort I put into a paper is lost if the intended audience is unable to follow. When I crafted this campaign regarding social media, it gave me the opportunity to write with a plethora of rhetoric while incorporating people’s real accounts. This gave me the authenticity I needed to reach audiences who may relate. As a result of incorporating so many methods like statistic research, personal accounts, and an interactive element, I realized that the readability and structure of my paper were crucial. It enabled me to write for an audience as opposed to writing something only I could understand. After careful review, I can see that previous papers lacked such engagement. Additionally, this course exposed me to many techniques of writing and review that I was not overly familiar with. I feel that my Public Awareness Campaign demonstrated growth in areas that I was not as comfortable with such as multimodal composure. This experience has definitely improved my style as a writer.
