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Andrew Zhang
Zack De Piero
Writing 2
15 March 2015
My Writing Journey
Writing has never been an easy thing for me. In high school, I took AP Language and
Composition and AP Literature, both of which required a great deal of writing. Almost every
writing assignment was a daunting task, as I had to analyze and talk about various rhetorical and
literary techniques. I found that it was difficult to express my thoughts on paper, giving the
readers a clear idea of what I was thinking. However, I felt like this class helped me bolster and
reinforce my writing abilities. I thought the biggest thing that made writing hard for me in high
school was the classic literature I had to read and analyze. It was almost a foreign language since
everything was so hard to understand. What I really enjoyed about this class, in a writing sense,
was the fact that the pieces and sources we had to analyze werent classic pieces, but modern
writings. WP1 was about a sports article, WP2 was written about a text about video games, and
WP3 was a simple translation of the effects of social media. I found these subjects so much
more relatable and useful as a writer and a student. All in all, Writing 2 has taught me the value
of analytical writing while keeping the paper succinct and smooth.
The prompt presented in WP1 was to analyze genres and what makes a genre a genre. In
this writing project, I chose to analyze a sports article, Dez Bryants controversial catch in the
NFC Championship game. Being a big basketball fan, I consistently read or watch three sports
news broadcasters, ESPN, Bleacher Report, and CBSSports. ESPN, being one of the biggest
sports broadcasting stations, has so many analysts and reporters all over the internet and the TV.

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On top of that, a large group of these analysts are also former NBA or collegiate athletes.
However, before I began any analysis of any of the current broadcasters and writers, I thought it
would be a good idea to first mention Stuart Scott, as he had recently passed away. From all the
news reports, I found that Scott was one of the main pioneers for modern sports analysts as he
added a touch of personality and flair by using phrases like Cooler than the other side of the
pillow. By introducing Scott, I was able to not only introduce the idea of modern sports
broadcasting, but I was able to introduce one of the main conventions of sports broadcasting:
personality and flair.
After introducing Scott, I introduced Mark Jackson, a former NBA player who played for
the Indiana Pacers and was the recent coach of the Golden State Warriors, and Stephen A. Smith,
an often criticized reporter from Philadelphia who always gives brutally honest opinions. Having
watched so many sporting events, I was instantly able to list the various conventions and
techniques they used during broadcasts and articles. For example, Mark Jackson always says
Mama, there goes that man, after an impressive basketball play. Stephen A. Smith writes his
articles in a conversational tone and he argues with Skip Bayless, on First Take, as if they were
best friends (Im pretty sure they are). Afterwards, I began a more detailed analysis of sports
articles, talking about the importance of the title and quoting my sources as examples of
particular rhetorical techniques. Overall, I thought that this writing project was a fun way to get
initiated into the Writing 2 course and it was an excellent way to begin developing the thought
process that the course is designed to teach.
WP2 was similar to WP1 but a little more challenging. WP2s prompt dealt with moves
and classifying different moves within scholarly publications. Before writing this writing
project, I found that this particular assignment was similar to that of the previous. Moves were

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correlated with genres in how they help define that particular genre. Initially I started off my
paper by introducing where moves applied and how they were related to writing. I then
proceeded to defining moves in the literary sense and the connotative sense. This allowed me
to transition from a dictionary defined definition to a definition associated with everyday people,
which helped me connect to the readers. Afterwards, I defined moves as a set of repeated
actions or conventions that almost define a person or thing. This allowed me to relate moves to
conventions, which led me back to the genre of the scholarly pieces.
For this assignment, I took Whitakers scholarly publication and Griffiths non-academic
article, both of which discussed the effects of video games on adolescents, and described the
moves used in order to define each genre as that particular genre. I started by describing the
content of each source and comparing how they differed in tones and styles. This allowed me to
introduce the idea of moves in the very first sentence of each source. After analyzing the
content, I moved onto analyzing the structure of both sources and how structure helps define
each genre. For example, in Whitakers work, her piece is organized somewhat like a scientific
report with chapter headings and subsection headings. Griffiths work isnt as organized as
Whitakers work, which clearly separates his work from Whitakers work. I wrapped everything
up by referring back to genre and audience expectation. Most genres are written towards
particular audiences which allows the writer to tailor his/her argument to that audiences
expectations. Overall, I found that this writing project helped build my ability to quickly adapt
my writing from a non-academic text, such as a sports article, to an academic publication, such
as Whitakers publication.
WP3 was probably the most creative, yet fun assignments out of the three writing
projects. My scholarly source, published by the American Academy of Pediatrics, was about the

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effects of social media on adolescents. In choosing my non-academic translation, I found that, in

todays social media based society, why not do something social media based since thats what
the topic of my work? Then for my academic translation, I remembered going through the
Readers Digest article and how simple, yet effective of a job it did in covering the details of the
topic within the article. I ended up translating my scholarly article into a ranty blog, intended for
younger audiences, and a Readers Digest article, intended for older audiences.
The first thing I covered in the assignment was looking at the conventions of each
translation. Blogs typically have a very conversational, almost Facebook conversation-like, tone.
On top of that, blogs are very personal and involve a lot of personal experiences from the writer.
This allows the writer to connect with the readers on a very personal level. The scholarly article
listed a lot of detrimental effects social media has on users, so I decided to take a stance and rant
about how social media is annoying and ubiquitous. This allowed me to use a lunchtime outing
as an example to not only help bolster my argument, but also allow the readers to relate to my
situation. I also incorporated acronyms and colloquial words like OMG and FRIGGIN in
order to make my blog seem more informal. Finally, I changed the font in order to make my
piece seem more diary-like, helping to reinforce the idea of the blog. The Readers Digest was
relatively simple in all I had to do was make a list of all the effects of social media. I simply
added a short introduction to my article and began listing both the pros and cons. I italicized
the main topic of each entry in order to emphasize it as the main idea of the entry. Overall, I
found this assignment really outside the box and it really forced me to write my translation while
keeping in mind what the audience expects in that particular genre.
I felt like my time in the Writing 2 class was really well spent. Not only did I learn new
things, such as genres and moves, but I also reinforced what I learned and fortified the

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confidence in my ability to write. I thought the WPs did an incredible job covering the various
topics we discussed in class, but I also thought that the class itself was incredibly fun. I thought
Zack did a fabulous job not only teaching the material, but also keeping us students interested in
what we were learning. The various writing activities, especially the peer reviews, helped to give
us a sneak peek of the upcoming writing projects and then a means for improving those
assignments. The planning of the course was impeccable and extremely efficient. However, what
really got me into the class was the enthusiasm and dedication Zack brought to class every single
day. It really inspired me to work diligently on all of my assignments so I could not only score
well on those assignments, but also bring the same level of effort he was bringing to class every
day.