My Writing Experience in English 102 free essay sample

In the following essay , I will reflect on how my writing has improved and the affect of English 102 on my writing. Then I will touch on how I have attempted to overcome my weaknesses with my writing and my research project. The biggest thing I have learned from English 102 is how to become a better writer. Writing is a difficult process for me. Originally starting the writing process in English 102 , I thought writing would difficult for me and would not meet the course goals. I took this class for two reason ; It was a degree requirement and I wanted improve my writing skills. Even though the course difficult, I learned a lot about the writing process. I took English 101 at MATC. So, I never had a portfolio formatted class before taking English 102. Improving my critical analysis skill was a must. As I reflect upon my strengths and weaknesses as they relate to my writing, I think of the old saying about how my â€Å" my greatest weaknesses became my greatest strength† applies here. We will write a custom essay sample on My Writing Experience in English 102 or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page One of problems I have with writing is expressing my ideas and thoughts in concise and coherent manner. As the semester progressed toward its end, I have learned new writing skills and gradually learned how to engage with audience. This skill was very useful in meeting my course goals in English 102. When I was going to school some few years back , I had to lookup up sources manually on card catalog . Now that time has past , the creation of the internet has revolutionized the research process. This technology allows a beginning researcher like myself to search for articles with just using key words. The internet significantly help improve my research and writing skills. Even with the with computer , my research skills were average. My research skills to gather creditable information improved , after a tutorial session in the libriary. I would consider myself a decent writer with strengths and areas to work on. My writing strengths include being able to create coherent and concise ideas. However, I feel that I can work on several aspect of my writing still. While I am improving , I feel that my thesis statement could have been better. I should have develop my thesis through many stages , not just using the first version that pop to mind. I believe that if I had developed my thesis more completely ,my writing would be of better quality and more focused. Peer review of my controlling purpose and thesis statements helped me generate a thesis and purpose statement that worked with my research project. Another area that I feel I could work on to improve myself as writer is expand upon my ideas more. While I have good ideas , I feel I often stop too soon to present a completely well thought out analysis. Writing assignments helped me with some of the constraints on my writing. Writing a critical analysis essay such as the one in English 102 is much different than writing a simple paper. The strict and academic nature of English 102 has demanded me to change my writing stlye. I consider my greatest strength as a writer to be my insightfulness and creative slant which I approach my writing. I now know how critical inquiry works and I enthusiastically grasp the details of my sources with eagerness and relate to them. In other words , I engage with my sources. I enjoyed gathering sources for research project and tried to explain them to my audience. Curiosity lead me to do a detailed evaluation of my sources. Reading my sources more than once, allowed me to understand what the authors were trying to say. My choices of sources reflect my interest in a variety of writing styles. I used critical analysis to pick apart my sources for useful details. Now let me reflect back on my research project. My goal with my project was about the power of words , which may render positive or negative results. In doing my research on words and labels, I learned how powerful the written or spoken word can be. Words tell much more than stories. Stories tell about life and the human condition. But, words define and transform human life through labels and symbols. Words let us express our feelings and emotions. To meet the course goals , I took my research project through several stages in the writing process. I believe that the writing process differ from person to person. We were given the assignment to write several annotations of sources . There were four scholarly articles and four non-scholarly articles. The purpose of this assignment was to generate information for the first draft of research project. What helped me choose the articles I did was the article by Shadle and Davis. In the article , Shadle and Davis proposed alternatives to traditional research. The main purpose of the article was to urge the student like myself to become critical inquiry writer. This is one of course goals I am aiming for. These alternatives offer me an opportunity to engage in research with a personal choice. With this new found freedom of choice, I could choose my own research topic. So I chose the topic on the power of rhetoric. I chose this topic because I knew words had power but, I wanted to know why. Doing research writing is like a detective solving a mystery. You must go beyond the surface to find the evidence. I critically analyzed my research project sources. There are two of my sources that met my original expections. In this article , she describes how the label T. A. constructed her idenity. The label created a dual I dentity . I called it a dual identity complex because she has to play two roles. These two roles created a conflict between the teacher- student paradigm; the teacher who is possessor of knowledge and the student seeker of knowledge. The way she presented the information caught my intention immediately, that why I chose this article.