Magliba 1 Erenea Magliba Dr Lynda Haas WR 37 December 3, 2013 Reflection Essay During high school, I took typical English

and writing classes in high school including AP literature and composition. I thought Writing 37 would be similar to classes that I had already taken but that was nothing less of a false assumption. Throughout these past ten weeks, I have been able to work both independently and collaboratively on essays, projects, and presentations. We specifically worked on blogs, Connect modules, a genre essay, a rhetorical analysis of World War Z, and an end-of-the-quarter seminar. I found that while working through these assignments I further developed my habits of mind, which are: curiosity, openness, engagement, creativity, persistence, responsibility, flexibility, and metacognition. I can confidently say that this course has shaped me into not just a better writer, but also a better communicator. We were introduced to the easier assignments during the first week, which were the blogs and Connect modules. I had never written a blog before so this was foreign to me. Almost every week, we were assigned to write a blog that reflected what we had learned about in class. After we composed the blogs, fellow classmates would reply to what we had to say. The Connect modules were also unfamiliar. The modules were assignments online that tested our knowledge on grammar and punctuation. It was interactive too, which was a refreshing change to the endless

Magliba 2 worksheets I was accustomed to completing in other writing classes. Both these exercises helped me further develop my sense of metacognition. Metacognition is the ability to understand and reflect on one's thinking and cognitive processes. My blog was a space where I could spill my thoughts onto. Every other week, I would find myself referring back to my blogs as a way to reflect on prior topics that we had already gone over. So I basically used them as guidance and was successful in reconstructing all of my papers. The major assignments we had in this class were mainly essays. First, we wrote an essay regarding the zombie genre. Then, we moved on to writing a rhetorical analysis on World War Z. Lastly, we were given the task of writing a reflection essay based on everything we had done throughout the course. We normally composed a couple of drafts and then a final paper for each essay. For the zombie genre essay, we were assigned a zombie film. My group had to analyze the film I Am Legend and how it fit into the zombie genre. Before writing the essay, each group made a PowerPoint and presented their film to the class. This is what helped me during the actual writing process. While I was writing my drafts on zombie genre, I looked back at my groups PowerPoint and included the conventions that we used in the presentation. Even though the PowerPoint aided me, my draft papers were far from flawless. I did not include enough of the rhetorical situation, film terms, or credible sources. The feedback that I received in the peer reviews and from Professor Haas definitely helped me realize that I needed to fix these issues. So for my final zombie genre essay, I would say that I actually turned these components into my strongest points. I feel that I used plenty of sources that give rise to my expertise on the topic.

Magliba 3 I also feel did a great job of including a sufficient amount of details on the rhetorical situation. If I had more time to write I would say I would work on giving more film terms and explaining them. The next essay I composed was the rhetorical analysis on the novel World War Z. This essay was actually comparable to the first essay in the sense that I had to explain how the novel fit into the zombie fiction genre. My drafts for this essay were in major need of improvement. The main criticism I received had to do with giving too much summary and not enough analysis on characters that I included in my paper. So for my final essay, I focused mainly on reducing the amount of summary and giving more analysis. For instance, instead of giving so much story behind Dr. Kwang Jingshu, I analyzed him instead. I talked more about his tone, personality, and what kind of character he was. This is what I feel is my strongest point now in my final essay. For both the genre essay and World War Z essay, I believe I turned my weakest points into my strongest points. What helped me do this were the peer reviews and feedback I received from my professor. Not only were they beneficial to me in the sense that my essay improved significantly, but my sense of openness and engagement were further developed as well. Openness is willingness to consider new ways of thinking and engagement is a sense of investment and involvement in learning. My openness was further developed because I was able to look at topics through the view of my peers and not just my own. My sense of engagement was further developed because I feel like after I received feedback from my professor I really dedicated more time into fixing the problems I had in my essays.

Magliba 4 The last and most important assignment we had was the RIP Seminar. The RIP seminar was a presentation that we gave to another Writing 37 class, which showcased the hard work we had completed throughout the course. Each group was assigned a different task for the completion of this seminar. Our professor ultimately created five groups. There was a handout group, a presentation group, an MC group, a flyer group, and a food group. My group was given the duties of the presentation group. Our task was to collect and put together visuals for the presentation. In our group, we decided to split the work as well. I was responsible for creating the first part of the seminar. The division of tasks certainly helped my sense of responsibility and Im sure this was the case for my fellow classmates. In the Habits of Mind, responsibility is the ability to take ownership of ones actions and understand the consequences of those actions for oneself and others. Everyone in our class was in charge of a specific part of the presentation. If one part did not get completed, our whole presentation would fall apart. I believe this helped in making our portion of the seminar so successful. We were able to put a great presentation together and showcase everything we had taken from this course. Some people might not think that the lessons we learned in Writing 37 will be beneficial outside of this specific course, but they would be wrong. I personally feel that all of the skills obtained in this class will help me throughout my college life. Being able to develop an essay has it's obvious benefits. Without a doubt, I will be asked to write numerous essays. I feel as if I well have an easier time organizing my thoughts onto paper. Also, I could always ask myself questions similar to those on peer reviews. For instance I could ask myself if I am conveying a clear thesis or main

Magliba 5 idea. Ultimately this will help me in developing a clear, scholarly essay. As for examining rhetoric, as I mentioned before, I feel like I can now do this with any film or text. So, if I am ever asked to examine a novel or film, I will automatically have the advantage of already knowing how to detect the rhetorical situation. Lastly, I am sure that examining genre will be useful to me throughout college. Whenever I am asked to write a paper, I will automatically think about genre and then conventions. If I am asked to write a report in another subject besides English or writing, I will always think about which conventions I must follow for that specific paper. Overall, I think all three of these skills are beneficial to any person who is familiar with them. I know I will put them to use throughout my college life and future endeavors.