Park 1

Grace Park
Anya Connelly
English 2
30 November 2016
Metacognitive Cover Letter
To enhance our reading skills, we annotated and critically understood complex texts such
as Freires Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Anzalduas How to Tame a Wild Tongue, Logic and
Contemporary Rhetoric, and the Invisible Gorilla. By discussing the implicit and explicit
meanings of these authors works, we showed sufficiently deep understandings of the critical
ideas. Also, collaboratively, we partook in group presentations where we presented our own
examples of fallacies and logical reasoning.
The readings of these texts led to the formation of our own ideas and opinions regarding
the reasoning and validity behind the authors subjections, as well as the concepts discussed,
which was essentially the premise of our first formal writing project, a Rhetorical Analysis. By
closely analyzing an article, we were able to distinguish whether the author used cogent or
fallacious reasoning to support their points, and we used supporting evidence from Logic and
Contemporary Rhetoric, such as fallacies and types of validity, to fully substantiate our ideas.
The second formal writing assignment was based on our ability to notice the effectiveness of an
advertisement and read into the implicit message they are trying to convey. After studying the
various fallacies found in media, we used that knowledge to understand the motives behind
actual advertisements and whether they effectively encouraged their desire for consumers. All the
freewrites and class discussions built up and prepared us for the formal writing projects. For the
formal writing projects, we were expected to follow a writing process, meaning we had to
brainstorm, draft, edit, revise, and edit many more times after. We used our writing and reading
comprehension skills to critically analyze our own and peers writing in the workshops where we
peer edited. Writing a peer letter, we gave advice to our peers about suggestions for revisions and
encouraging words about the positive aspects of their essay. Afterwards, by writing a revision
plan based on the editing, we were able to metacognitively think about the thought process going
into our writing and change anything that was necessary.
Information competency was shown by using research for support in the last formal
writing project, the research essay. In the previous essays, we substantiated our ideas with
evidence from the Logic and Contemporary Rhetoric textbook. Also, the sandwich quote lecture
helped strengthen our skills in incorporating in-text citations into essays directly.
Participation benefits both oneself and the entire class because the sharing of ideas leads
to more ideas from people who may have different perspectives of a statement. Having an open
classrooms where students are able to freely discuss their opinions leads to mindful growth and
increase in thought. Therefore, I feel that frequent participation will lead to better grades,
especially if a teacher grades based on participation. I feel I only participate in class if I think of
something which I think may benefit others in their thinking process or bring a new perspective
of a subject to the conversation. If I do not have anything special to say, I do not participate in
discussions. I believe I should try to participate more in class despite the quality of my work
because contributing anything seems to be better than having nothing to say. In the future, I plan
to participate more in class by asking more questions and adding to discussions in creative
thinking classes such as this one.
This final portfolio reflects my best work because I have enjoyed writing about the
subjects assigned by utilizing all the ideas learned in class to substantiate my own arguments.

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Because I appreciate having a prompt from which I structure my essay around, I have
particularly enjoyed writing these essays. By receiving feedback and incorporating revisions into
the final drafts, I believe these essays represent some of my best work in this class.

Sincerely,
Grace Park