Week 2:
What kind of self-reflection experiences did you have in your freshman English class? What have you learned (related to self-reflection or writing in general) that has stayed with you and supported your writing?
In my Freshman Composition class last semester, I didn’t really have many self-reflection assignments or experiences. One minor self-reflection experience was during my first major writing assignment where I met up with my professor for a mandatory conference to review my essay and she gave tips on mainly formatting and how the essay needed to be structured. Essentially, I needed to reflect on my entire essay and reformat it in the way that she required. I really learned how to structure a rhetorical analysis essay in a systematic way which really made it easy to outline and put the information into the essay.
The only other time I had to self-reflect was the final assignment for the class. It was to choose one of the course learning outcomes that were set at the beginning of the semester respond to it and answer how and what you have learned throughout Freshman Composition. I chose to answer the course objective “Compose texts that integrate a stance with appropriate sources, using strategies such as summary, analysis, synthesis, and augmentation.”. To respond to this I really needed to look back and analyze my previous writing for the semester as well as remember the process of writing them. When I looked back I realized that compared to my first piece of writing to my last the quality improved and the difficulty in writing the papers decreased as I got more familiar and comfortable with the strategies mentioned earlier. These strategies that I had learned in writing especially learning how to properly outline using the format has stayed with me and supported my writing.
Week 3
Prompt: Analyze the rhetorical situation of your Freshman Portfolio. For those few students who do not have one only: analyze the rhetorical situation of your Freshman English research paper/project.
The purpose of my Freshman Portfolio last semester was to present all 4 of my major assignments throughout Freshman Composition, also known as phases. The audience was just my professor to see if all the parts required were on the website. The way the information was presented was effective with 4 separate pages and an essay on each page. However, the website isn’t polished as a sample page was left and excess information was not removed. It is very organized and easy to navigate, and the theme makes it appealing. There weren’t many requirements for the Freshman Portfolio, however, it can be improved by cleaning up the unnecessary information and removing the sample page. Each page should also have a mini description of what the assignment is before the essay is posted instead of just posting the essay without context. Phases 2-4 don’t have any indents however phase 1 has indents which should be changed to follow suit with phases 2-4. Overall, it successfully completes the purpose of presenting information, however it can be improved visually.
Week 5
Prompt: Analyze the rhetorical situation of your Product Review essay.
The rhetorical situation for the Product Review Essay of the Muji Polypropylene Pencil Case is that the author is a college student with firsthand knowledge of the product offering a perspective that blends personal insights with general evaluation criteria. The purpose of the product review essay is to review the Muji Polypropylene Pencil Case based on 3 main criteria and how well it accomplishes its purpose as a pencil case. The information is well organized and for the most part, keeps a consistent tone of third-person description. The essay is structured in 3 main sections for the 3 criteria durability, capacity, and accessibility. The information is also extremely detailed, providing every measurement of the pencil case as well as material. In conclusion, the Product Review Essay successfully reviews the Muji Polypropylene Pencil Case in an organized fashion.
Week 6-7:
Prompt: What have we done so far that has been helpful to your writing process? How might you apply this helpful information or tool? What would you like to spend more time on? If the clarification/additional focus does not occur during class time, how will you acquire the knowledge?
Something that we have done so far that has been helpful to my writing process would be brainstorming in class. This greatly helps with the creation of my ideas as I can hear the input of others and their ideas which inspire my ideas. Another very useful thing is the clarification in class where we get a session to ask any questions regarding assignments. Many important questions get answered and the writing process becomes much easier. Peer Review has been a great help in editing and revising the draft as my peers give great feedback and different perspectives on my writing. Something that I would like to spend more time on in class would be self-revision techniques and how to edit papers. If the clarification/additional focus does not occur during class time I will research to acquire the additional knowledge through articles or videos.
Week 8:
Prompt: How are you doing with time management? Are you balancing the multiple needs of this course? Your other courses? Are you making time for reading, writing, studying,and collaborating? Explain how if yes or share your success plan if no.
At the start of the semester, I had poor time management and was extremely disorganized, and once I was getting overwhelmed, I started to organize all the work I needed to do using an app called notion. Notion allowed me to schedule all my assignments, projects, exams, and helped a lot with time management, and I started to balance the multiple needs of this course without getting overwhelmed and other courses as well. This course forces you to meticulously plan out assignments because there is a large workload that overlaps with each other. There are different assignments occurring at the same time, so scheduling is extremely important. I am making time for reading, writing, studying, and collaborating by completing assignments ahead of their due date which frees up a lot of time and also prevents procrastination. This reduces stress and helps with my mental health and gives me time for other activities.
Week 9:
Prompt: After you have received feedback on your essay: Analyze the rhetorical situation ofyour Lab Report Analysis essay. Include textual detail to support your claims.
The lab report analysis essay was a very tedious essay to write as the process beforehand required a lot of research and analysis of the sources. The purpose of my Lab Report Analysis essay was to rhetorically analyze the 3 lab reports based off the standard format of a lab report. It needed to evaluate and highlight how each lab report approaches the presentation of its findings around the theme of fast food. An assessment of clarity, organization, and accessibility, analyzing in detail each section of the lab report and how the information is presented instead of the content that is presented. The format in which I structured my essay was to analyze section by section, from top to bottom of a lab report and compare the three lab reports. This allowed me to carefully analyze each section carefully. The message conveyed in the document stresses the importance of clear, organized, and accessible reporting in lab reports to effectively communicate findings. Each lab report’s strategy is dissected to reveal strengths and weaknesses in meeting the needs of their specific audiences and purposes. Although all the information presented was informative, at times it is also excessive. The original draft was around 18 pages and after revising it I was able to cut it down to 13 pages and even then, there is extra information that can be removed. By closely examining and refining my essay, I demonstrated how clear, well-organized, and easy-to-understand reports are crucial for effectively sharing scientific findings.
Week 10:
Prompt: What experience have you had working in groups before this class? How has the group work we’ve done in this class been for you? What are you doing/will you doto optimize your experience completing the collaborative project for this class?
I have often worked in groups before this class mainly in junior and high school for school projects. When creating groups either the teacher created assigned groups or we were allowed to create our own. The process varied for each project as I worked with many different people, sometimes I get lucky and have a group of people I know would complete their work and have a smooth process however sometimes when the teacher assigns groups I get group members who aren’t as reliable and don’t do their work which making the process much more difficult. There have been times where group members don’t do work at all and need to be removed from the group by the teacher. So far the group work done in this class has been fairly smooth, as the people in my group are reliable even though this is the first group assignment being the technical proposal. To optimize my experience for completing the collaborative project for this class will definitely be to organize workload and complete assignments on time. I think being organized will be the greatest strength for this because everything is digital and I can’t meet with my groupmates in real life making it a bit more difficult to communicate. A set schedule will be very helpful.
Week 11:
Prompt: Analyze the rhetorical situation of your Technical Description. Include textual detail to support your claims.
My technical description was on the product, the GMMK Pro Mechanical keyboard. The purpose of the Technical Description is to break down the keyboard into its parts and subparts and explicitly describe each component and how they work as well as how they connect with each other. The language used in this description is very professional and formal and is organized in a specific way. The keyboard was described from top to bottom starting from the parts at the top like the rotary knobs and the keycaps all the way down to the steel base of the keyboard. Each section was described in great detail, with dimensions, shapes, color, texture, and materials, as well as having an image for each part to provide a visualization when reading it to better understand the part. This technical description is intended to provide an overview descriptive enough to where a person who isn’t knowledgeable on the subject can understand how each part of the keyboard works with each other.
Week 13:
Prompt: Select one learning objective or one component of a learning objective. When, where, and how have you learned it? How have you developed in this arena?
One learning objective that I have effectively learned in this class is practice using various library resources, online databases, and the internet to locate sources appropriate to my writing projects. I learned this objective during the lab report analysis essay where I needed to find 3 different lab reports sharing a similar theme or topic that was long enough to analyze. I was restricted to using the CCNY databases which I was unfamiliar with using as I was more comfortable with just using the Internet, however Professor Rodwell explaining how to properly use databases during class greatly helped me in learning how to use databases. Although it took a while once I got comfortable with using databases and restricting my searches using keywords I was able to find 3 lab reports related to fast food. I am now able to use databases efficiently to find sources and lab reports if I ever need to in the future.
Week 14:
Prompt: What have you learned that has proved most useful to your composition process?
Something that I have learned during this semester that has proved most useful to my composition process is the outlining phase of starting an essay. Before this semester I had rarely done outlines and went straight into the writing of an essay which in the end had worked however the process to getting to the final product was very chaotic, messy, and unorganized. Once I had started doing outlines in this class it helped the entire writing process become much easier. It allowed me to brainstorm and figure out a plan of action instead of just starting to write. I was able to organize my paper into sections and write details separately and when it was time to create a draft the process was really smooth as I knew the layout and what I needed to write for each section.
