My writing has faced challenges throughout my years in school. Immigrating to a new country and learning a new language, I found it difficult to dominate not only my speaking but also my writing. It took away my ability to express myself causing me difficulties to communicate and share my ideas. However, after dominating the English language I found myself falling in love with free writing since it was all based on expressing ourselves on whichever topic of our choice. During the semester, we wrote a literacy narrative essay, exploratory essay, bibliography, and critical analysis paper. Writing these essays was a challenge but I realized as I kept doing essay after essay, I also improved on my weakness when it came to writing. I was able to perform on some course learning outcomes.
Literacy Narrative Experience
I found it interesting as I had never written a literacy narrative and especially since we got to pick our topic. However, it was not easy as I felt like I was not very organized with my story at the beginning for example what to add on and what not to add in order to not lose track of what I’m writing. Also, the feedback that we received on our first drafts helped me to see what others see when they read my words. Then being able to read others’ literacy narratives was interesting and we had a rubric to follow which made it easier to identify what they were missing but also gave me an idea of what I was missing in my paper. Overall, I felt satisfied with the learning outcomes and it was a self-reflection of how I like to write but also what needed to be worked on not only as a writer but as a reader.
Exploratory Essay Learning Outcomes
The first-course learning outcome was, “Explore and analyze, in writing and reading, a variety of genres and rhetorical situations”. In the process of writing my exploratory essay, I found myself developing this skill majorly as we had to read various articles that would support our topic of interest. I had to summarize and define the message behind long articles and find specific details that would provide me with narrowed information for my essay. However, I did find myself struggling as I had difficulties finding my sources. I was confused with my topic as I knew I had to narrow down my information and stay within the topic but I kept going out of topic due to a large amount of information. Eventually, finding good sources and reading very closely helped me to put together the purpose of my essay and not be disorganized with my ideas, even when I come to encounter a large amount of information.
The second-course learning outcome was “Develop strategies for reading, drafting, collaborating, revising, and editing”. Within the process of writing my exploratory essay, I noticed I had to repeatedly read over my words and make changes in order to present a solid argument to the reader instead of confusing them. Also, while reading various articles I would prefer to take out the strong points made by writing many notes aside from coming to a conclusion about the article and how it can back up my essay. I found myself getting better at concluding articles and focusing on the main points for my topic instead of driving me away from my topic.
Lastly, the third-course learning outcome was,” Locate research sources (including academic journal articles, magazines, and newspaper articles) in the library’s databases or archives and on the Internet and evaluate them for credibility, accuracy, timeliness, and bias”.As I mentioned earlier within my first two-course learning outcomes, having good sources helped me majorly in completing my exploratory essay. Finding sources that complement my argument but are also credible, including data from experiments. I majorly used journal articles as they presented me with a good amount of information that was helpful for my argument. It also helped me to expand my topic as I was learning a lot more about my topic in the process. I would write papers before, but the sources I would rely on wouldn’t provide much but an opinion and now I attempt to look for data for my argument to rely on.
Critical Analysis Learning Outcomes
The first learning outcome was, “ Locate research sources (including academic journal articles, magazines, and newspaper articles) in the library’s databases or archives and on the Internet and evaluate them for credibility, accuracy, timeliness, and bias”. I felt more confident in searching for sources that stand my argument. Within this paper, I placed my aim to add actual data from conducted research. As I read each article, there was a lot of information but I was able to have a solid summary of each quote I would add to my paper.
The second learning outcome was, “Develop strategies for reading, drafting, collaborating, revising, and editing”. Throughout my critical analysis articles, I found myself not going over and over again confused about what the author’s points were trying to convey. I was able to find a counterargument within a few articles and I had developed a possible idea to add to my argument but in the end, I did not include it. I did not want to lose balance within my argument and I wasn’t sure how to approach it.
Lastly, the third-course learning outcome was, “Explore and analyze, in writing and reading, a variety of genres and rhetorical situations.”. I found myself being more straightforward with my points in the arguments in which I felt more confident writing my paper. Also, reading article after article filled me in with a lot of aspects for my argument and enough to talk about. I realized having strong sources and a good analysis of the information I will use in my paper makes me feel more confident about my argument and helps me to express myself more.
Conclusion
Essentially, I also found myself checking off another learning outcome being to recognize and practice key rhetorical terms and strategies when engaged in writing situations. This learning outcome was demonstrated in all my essays. This required me to fully understand the meaning of a text in general, considering many factors such as the audience, genre, media/design, and purpose. I also had the opportunity to practice the systematic application of citation conventions in the process of writing an annotated bibliography. We had to use MLA format citations, and this helped me evaluate my sources.
Ex: Annoted Bibliography
“Miniati M, Marzetti F, Palagini L, Marazziti D, Orrù G, Conversano C and Gemignani A (2021) Eating Disorders Spectrum During the COVID Pandemic: A Systematic Review. Front. Psychol. 12:663376. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.663376
This article outlines data projecting that COVID-19 may exacerbate or trigger eating disorders due to the challenging circumstances of the pandemic. This was a study performed to analyze the effects caused in patients, mostly through online surveys. According to the analysis, it was revealed five main findings which would include; changes in routine, food access limitations, restrictions in healthcare facilities, social isolation, and the anxiety of “no way out”. These findings are important for my paper as these are results from a concluded research. It will be used throughout my body paragraphs as I rely on my source’s data. However, I did notice this article mentioned bias since it was done through online surveys and only those with the advantage of technology would be representing the population but it was unavoidable. This allows me to perceive a new perspective being that as it happens the pandemic limited studies leading to a lack of data for researchers.”
Overall, all these papers helped me develop into a better writer and also analyze the skills I need to improve on.
