I perceive myself as a poor writer, before this class. I had never been taught the proper way to write a paper. I struggled through English 101 and hoped to get more out of English 200. I never thought about the process that I took to write any paper before this class. I know that I have learned a great deal this semester, which I will be able to put towards my up coming writing intensive courses.
The readings throughout the semester helped me to understand the dos and don’ts of writing. I really enjoyed most of the reading that were assigned. The assignments where a great source of information which I was able to refer to when writing my final draft.
Reading my peer’s papers was helpful not only to my peer’s but also to me. I was very interested in the many different topics that where being discussed. I discovered that I am a better peer responder than I thought I would be. I was able to find mistakes in other peoples work, unlike my own work. I also found that the advice I was giving my peer would have also been beneficial to my own paper.
The peer responses that I received were very helpful to me in correcting my paper. I tried to take all the advice and apply it to my paper. I feel that my peers are also my audience. Any information that they say would be helpful in understanding my paper or that would make my paper better is worth using.
Choosing to write about my father’s death was difficult for me, but was helped my a great deal with accepting his death. I had to over come a lot of emotions to allow me to write a paper that not only help me understand the situation, but also allowed my audience to understand. I tried to use a balanced amount of research information and my own personal information. I was able to break the information up with example of my personal life.
I wrote many drafts this semester to finally get to this final draft. Each draft brought a new idea or thought to my paper. I really liked the fact that the class as a whole wrote a different draft each time instead of always working on the same draft. This allowed us then to take all of our ideas and put them together. I know that I found some thoughts in some of the drafts that I probably would have never written about if I were always correcting the same draft.
Through all of the research that I did whether on the Internet, in the library, or through my personal interview was helpful in understanding what I truly wanted my focus to be. As I worked through my drafts, my focus is clearer not only to me but also to my readers. I also feel that the research opened my eyes to information that I had never heard about or seen before. That research helped me understand my father’s death and in the long run help me reintegrate it to my audience.
I found that this class truly helped me in my writing skills. I know that I will be able to use these skills not only while I am in college, but throughout the rest of my life. I would know say that am a descent writer, but not a terrific one. I will always need that extra little bit of help, but I now know that there are places like the Writing Center to help me. I feel that I will approach future writing assignments with an open mind, which I hope will take some of the stress of the assignment.
For me taking this class on the computer was very beneficial. I am not the kind of student that likes to speak up in class, but talking through the chat room allowed me to express myself. I like the fact that we got to create a website, instead of a daily journal. The information about how to research online was extremely helpful. Over all I was very happy with the class and my progress throughout the semester.