Furguson 1

Haley Furguson
Professor Olivia Rines
UWRT 1101-02
9 April 2015
Final Reflection
During my semester of taking the course University Writing 1101, I have noticed much
improvement in my writing and research skills. This course had much to offer for improving
skills for future college classes that are writing and research based. Before my experience in this
class, I would not expect to have a better outlook on research at all, but it has greatly expanded
my understanding of the process of research. With the process of research came the process of
writing, drafting and revising the different pieces in this course. This course stressed how

Comment [HM1]: This word is very broad.

important it was to not only have a strong final written piece, but to have much improvement
throughout the writing process. I believe that my writing pieces have vastly improved because of
the amount of feedback that was offered from peers and the professor.
This course required many different types of writing and research ranging from writing

Comment [HM2]: Is this your thesis? Maybe say

something about all of the items you will be talking
about?

personal experiences to learning about different communities. Every day in class there areis
writings called daybook entries. These generally include personal opinion, either about our
experience in class or answering a what if question. These daybook entries allowed me to
expand my personal opinion through writing with a less structured and formal format. When
writing the daybooks, it allows me to write without limits and warm up my writing skills.
Daybook entries are also a way to begin class with a discussion starter.
Class discussion is a big part of feedback for understanding concepts we covered in class.
Since participation is part of my final grade in the class, I made sure to try to put in my opinion

Comment [HM3]: Discuss the specific daybook

entries that youre putting in your portfolio.

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at least once a class period. I think class discussion has been the biggest struggle for me in this
course. I am not quick to respond to peers and I generally like to keep my thoughts to myself. I
think I have lost a significant amount of participation points this semester because of the fact that
I am quiet in the classroom setting, but I do enjoy listening to what my peers have to say and
learn material through their perceptions. Listening to my classmates opinions and ideas helped
me a lot especially when it came to brainstorming for a paper. We had many essays to read over

Comment [HM4]: Which paper?

the course of the semester and had to base our papers off of the concepts of we read about, so
many things were hard for me to immediately understand. During class discussion many of my
classmates had known more about the concepts we had read about and shared their opinions,
whichand greatly helped my understanding. When I shared my opinions and findings for my
research and readings, the feedback I had got from my peers helped improve my ideas greatly. I
think that as simple as the class discussions were, they were a big part of learning new concepts
and contributed a lot to the early stages of the writing process.
Since feedback and class discussions were a large apart of the writing process, discussion

Comment [HM5]: This flows really well. Good

job connecting paragraphs.

forums online wereas also helpful in utilizing feedback from peers. I think that the discussion
forum helped me develop more skills in responding to peers in a written setting. The forums
were also a way to keep up with my writing skills and write persistently throughout the semester.
Even though writing before every class became tedious, I became aware that it has slightly

Comment [HM6]: Try to keep things in the same

tense. Became is past tense and has is present.

improved my writing. Because of writing constantly, I have noticed the simple mistakes I make
in my writing in general, even conversational writing. Noticing mistakes that I usually wouldnt
is a skill that I have gained from this course.
With research being another skill that I have gained, both the genre analysis and micro
ethnography required for this course have been pieces of writing necessary of utilizing this skill.

Comment [HM7]: In order to make this

transition smooth, I would say Another skill I have
gained is

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I think that since the genre analysis was the first big piece written for this class and required
more library and hard paper resources, it was the weaker of the two main projects I have written
for this class. My ghost grade for this paper was a C, which in my eyes was not acceptable. I
have much improvement to do before I submit the piece to my portfolio. The process of
collecting, organizing and writing out data I had found was very tedious. Since I had wrote about
the genre of commercials, I did not know the many elements that were involved in a general
commercial. Because I had wrote about different types of commercials, I had to include multiple
corpuses; finding research to support these corpuses was the toughest part about constructing this

Comment [HM8]: I would say that you didnt

know the elements BEFORE you started your
research.

paper. Another big struggle throughout this semester was supporting all of my claims with found
facts. I think that through the process of peer workshops and having a ghost grade from the
professor allowed me to view my mistakes and understand what I needed to improve upon for
my future pieces. The genre analysis was probably my least favorite piece just because I did not

Comment [HM9]: Yay, this answers one of the

questions.

enjoy collecting the research and also because it was the a piece where I had made the most
mistakes. It also required more formality in writing, limiting the ability of including my style of
writing. Regardless of how I had felt about the genre analysis, it was the most productive piece
throughout the semester because of the fact that it pointed out the faults I make in writing,
mainly through my research techniques. I would say that this piece is my greatest success in this
course mainly because of the vast improvement I have made from the first draft to the final draft.
The piece of writing I enjoyed most throughout the semester was the micro- ethnography.

Comment [HM10]: Yay this answers another

question.

This paper allowed me to research a community with a firsthand experience. I chose a

community of football players, which is close to me at heart because I am close friends with
football players at UNC Charlotte. I really enjoyed seeing more of the inside look of the
discourse community that outsiders of a community would not have the privilege of

Comment [HM11]: getting an inside look on

the

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experiencing. With the research of this paper being more observational and hands on, I had
enjoyed the process of research much more. I think that I had learned more about what a
discourse community was throughout the process of producing this piece, rather than learning
more about writing and the writing process. Even though there was much to the writing process
for this piece, I learned more about the concepts this paper required me to be aware of. I think
that this course allowed me to learn past just different forms and elements of writing, but also
terms like discourse communityies. Terms like discourse communityies will help me with future
classes and gain more perspective of terms that I was not aware of before this class.
Along with writing the micro ethnography was presenting my findings. The presentation
was a good way for me to practice my presentation skills, which I do not get to practice often. I
think this was another great opportunity for feedback in the classroom. I enjoyed hearing what

Comment [HM12]: I would say I also had to

present my findings in front of the class.
Comment [HM13]: Maybe say something about
how practicing these skills will help you in the
future.

my classmates had to share and seeing their take on what a discourse community qualifies as.
This semester overall has been very productive, there are some things that were tedious

Comment [HM14]: Overall, this semester.

and tough, but also some things that were more enjoyable and helpful. I really enjoyed having
the many different forms of writing offered through this course and having the opportunity to
strengthen my writing through these different forms. I have made much improvement during this
course and I would like to show that through my portfolio. Since I have struggled with writing
and research, I am happy to display improvements with these main issues from beginning of the
semester to the end.

Comment [HM15]: Since we have to explicity

discuss portfolio contents, maybe in your
paragraphs about the other things you should talk
about the improvement in the different drafts or
compare and contrast the different essays to show
improvement.

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Overall, I think that this is a strong rough draft for you final reflection. Make sure you answer the
questions specifically with examples other than what you enjoyed/didnt enjoy because you
answered that one. Since you want to show improvement in your portfolio, you should talk about
improvement throughout this reflection. Especially how each thing has helped you grow as a
writer. Minor errors are just grammar, and I noticed that you use the word had in places that
arent needed. I tried to take them out for you, but if you just go back and read the sentence after
taking out had youll see that it flows better. Basically other than that, just give some specific
examples of daybook entries and the other small things that are included in the portfolio. Best of
luck!