Near the end of my junior year, I had to decide what classes I wanted to take the next year. I knew that my first choice was going to be sports literature. Speech scared me and I was never really into journalism. College composition caught my eye and I thought it might be the one. I did want to get better at writing and knew I was going to need it for college. It was a college level course so it would help prepare me and fill up my schedule.
I thought I was a pretty good writer before I took this class.I would always put my papers off to the last minute and preferred to do them when I wanted. I would usually get a good grade so I was happy with it. Thinking back to it, my papers were not really as great as I thought. College Composition made me so much better than I previously was. I wish I could have known how to write like this throughout high school. I am glad I have learned everything for college though.
I learned a lot throughout my half-year of College Composition. We studied multiple different modes of writing. We also looked at various techniques in order to enhance our writing to the next level. The four modes of writing we studied this year were narrative, descriptive, expository, and persuasive. We also went into in-depth categories in exemplification which include definition, cause and effect, process analysis, classification and compare and contrast. We also practiced each of these four modes. We would study each mode by reading articles in order to learn which techniques professional writers used in each mode. After, we wrote a similar piece and for some we had peer review sessions. We would learn different strategies to help boost our papers also.These strategies include humor, quotes, anecdotes and flashbacks. Then we learned how to write better introductions, conclusions, and pick strong titles. Strong introductions and titles are what hooks the reader and makes it enjoyable.
I believe I grew in many different areas as a writer during this course. One area I noticed is in the structure of my papers. I felt as though my papers were never very organized and the flow was always off. After getting feedback from my peers during every session, I figured out how to sequence my events so they are easy to read and flow easily.
Another major area of growth I noticed after taking this course was my use of details in papers. All of my papers were full of details. In my Definition paper, I had to take out details because I had extras that crammed it up. When revising my papers, I made sure to read them over to see if I needed to add any detail. Throughout these papers I enhanced my writing in more ways than just adding details. I also made use of the different strategies I learned. The main strategies I used were quotes and listing which are shown in my definition paper. I feel that my revised pieces show how much my writing has grown from the beginning of this course.
My portfolio showcases everything I learned throughout this course. I revised three of my pieces I wrote during the course. I reflected on my changes in the papers. The reflection follows each revised paper.
Overall I think my writing has improved in every aspect. My papers flow a lot smoother, they have strong structure and I can write longer papers with ease. I am confident I can write college level papers and i am proud I took the course.
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