For the final writing assessment of this college course I had the opportunity to write about a topic that both greatly interests me, but will also serve me in my future. Through the art of argument I was able to establish how I felt about bioethics, and hopefully convince readers that it’s not something to only fear, but be excited about. During the writing of this argument I was able to utilize many of the writing skills and tactics that I learned about writing and forming an argument. I truly feel that writing this paper has given me insight on the value of a supported argument and allowed me to sharpen my researching and persuasion skills. When it came to choosing a topic I initially had trouble finding something both gripping and heavily studied. Since I am currently planning on studying biomedical engineering in college, I thought it’d be useful to look into bioethics. At the suggestion of my AP Biology teacher I decided to focus on the revolutionary technology in genetic engineering: CRISPR. I knew that this would be a great topic since it was both very interesting to me, as well as the fact that I didn’t know very much about it. Since I had practically no preconceived notions on the subject, I was able to conduct my research without favoring one side of the argument or another. This made making a claim fairly simple since I felt it was based off fact and meticulous studying. During the research portion of the paper, I decided to implement some of the strategies
Prior to taking First Year Writing, my main approach to writing stood on the principles of a constant formalness, persuasiveness, and providing context. Often too much context. I believe this was primarily due to most of my prior academic writing prior was solely consisted of argumentative writing, which I see as a pro and con. The good thing is that I knew how to make debatable thesis, but not with much use of all of the rhetorical appeal of pathos. Now I believe I approach writing in a much more open way, in the sense that I believe that I am much more versed in writing for academia both formally and informally.
As a “Advanced Placement” student during high school much of my time was spent writing essays on various topics and challenging prompts. Many of my essays centered around structuring supportive arguments to push or pull the audience in my direction of belief. Writing a persuasive essay often included looking for multiple supportive cases, choosing two or three that best “pushed” my view, and including these real world cases and examples throughout my essay to help “build” my case.
The transition from conducting research in high school to conducting research at the college level can be a difficult challenge for many people. High school research is very basic and has a defined end state in most cases; whereas college level writing presents an argument or a claim that interests others and makes them want to know more about your specific claim. In this argument in order to sway a person to what your actual point of view is the author must provide evidence and reasons for their specific claim. It is not simply stating ones opinion and that being the end state of the argument but providing
Throughout the course of this semester, I have learned so much about writing. I used to think writing was my best skill in terms of school, but after taking this course, I realized I have a lot to learn still. In high school English was always my highest grade because of my writing, my writing in my SAT scores was always the highest, and last semester in ENGL 1301, I got a high A in the course. But this course has challenged me as a writer to think outside of the box and be more academically smarter in terms of writing. The journals have helped me write about things that we like more than the other assignments because it gives us more freedom and flexibility about what we can write about. These journals are being used as a tool as practice
After completing my final persuasive research paper, reflecting upon it revealed different aspects of my argument and provided me with personal insight. First, a strength of my persuasion is my abundance of supporting materials from a variety of reputable sources including statistics, quotes, examples and rhetorical questions. On the other hand, a weakness of my argument is the interference of my prior beliefs. This occurs through my assumptions and my dismissive nature towards counterarguments. For example, I experienced difficulty writing about counterarguments, and often assumed that treatment programs will fix our country immediately, which is unrealistic. Even though I did a plethora of research and tried to consider counterarguments, my stance on the incarceration of nonviolent drug offenders remains the same. Nonetheless, an articulate evaluation of my argument opened my eyes to the strengths and weaknesses of my argument, as well as the role my prior knowledge played in the development of my paper.
For my persuasive essay, I wrote about lowering the legal drinking age. I wrote about this topic because it is very controversial and is a popular subject. The essay was quite challenging because I was fighting it and a lot of the reliable information, such as statistics, were going against my opinion. In my paper I think I did a good job of finding a fair compromise between the two sides by using what I researched to point out the pros and cons and coming to a solution. Although I took the side of lowering the legal drinking age, I have explained why people believe it shouldn’t be changed.
When I look back at my writing before having any college experience, I can see that I had a lot to work on. I can say that I was never really a big fan of writing anything much less essays. Even when I was younger, I just did not have a great big interest in writing. This was because I felt that I could not elaborate as well as others. I was not use to having to write anything really, but I now feel that I have a better grasp on the steps that I need to take to get my writing on the level that it needs to be.
From the first assignment to the last, I realized that my writing process has changed a lot. I usually write my papers in my room, whether on a desk or on my bed. I did not organize my thoughts as eloquently as I should have. My ideas were more sporadic, and I did not give myself as much time to write it out. In addition, I was more worried about the page limit rather than the content of my work. Similar to the other assignments, I did not start my process with an outline. I went straight towards writing my paper without giving any structure, which did not help with the organization of my papers in this class.
Overall, I see myself doing well in this program, however there are some areas that I need to improve upon. I anticipate some challenges in organizing, structuring long documents and critical thinking. The idea of having time to sit for a period of time to focus on my writing is difficult. Most of the time I have a wealth of ideas but I need to organize them in a cohesive outline. If I rush through an assignment, I make too many mistakes and that is frustrating. My approach to tackling frustration is to start early. Finishing early allows me the time to go back and check my work. This also works to my benefit because I will stay up late and put in many hours to make sure my work is correct. My philosophy, when it comes to education,
This is the second writing course I’ve taken in college, and it has ultimately helped with my writing abilities. Something significant that I have learned throughout this course, which I didn’t previously know, is the complete writing process. I was unaware of the distancing period. This certainly helped give me a renewed outlook of what I was trying to accomplish in my essays. Similarly, this course has brought to my attention revising resources I was unaware of. I found the smarthinking website to be very useful in completing my essays, and I know it will be beneficial for future
Olympian, Kim Collins said, “Strive for continuous improvement, instead of perfection.” This quote can also apply to students in school in many different ways. Students always want the best project or writing grade that they can possibly get. While that is a worthy goal it is not realistic because students are not perfect and they are still learning, and developing important skills. In my personal essays throughout the year I did strive for perfection, but I learned that I could not do it. I had to make slight improvements to better my writing for the next essay.
In my opinion this project has happened to be one of the most beneficial projects. I personally wanted to do the field of Veterinary medicine because I have always been interested in that field and my fiancée is starting Vet school at Louisiana State Veterinary School, so knowing the statistics about the industry will benefit us. So after talking to my partner we both had an interest, so the decision was easy. Doing research about the job opportunities, salaries, and the stigma of the industry helps one realize the pros and cons. Ashley and I met twice to work as a team for the executive summary. I had finished my half of the project a week ahead of time and Ashley was not as proactive so I got a little nervous
To effectively persuade my point I used a range of persuasive writing techniques such as personal pronouns, expert evidence, inclusive/exclusive language, and hyperbole,etc. As this was based on a speech, I have attempted to appeal and direct most of my writing towards the reader/target audience which was students and attempt to convey a compelling yet factual piece of writing. Overall my goal was to provide some unusual as well as interesting facts about
In order to be a successful writer, one must be able to thoroughly understand and incorporate a wide variety of sources into their writing. Outcome 2 requires the ability to analyze complex texts and sources, and then synthesize them into a coherent and complete essay. The sources should support the ideas being expressed, and it should be evident that the writing benefits from their inclusion. In addition, a variety of pieces of evidence should be used to represent a more broad scale of sources. Another important part of outcome 2 is something I intentionally did not do in the Short Assignment 3 (which is the paper I chose to show my understanding of the outcome). It is necessary to document sources used in an appropriate format. I would just
Jaschon and I are good friends and work well together so it didn’t feel like I was trying to convince someone to work IN ADDITION to doing debate. Something which I feel is very important, that I didn’t have to drag him behind me as we worked. I probably could have made it through debate if I had to become a totalitarian style dictator and made someone else do work, but it would not have been quite so...smooth. So ending up with Jaschon was helpful. Then came time to pick. Now, we could have picked practically any of the ones that had already been picked once, as I believe we were group number 5 or 6. Originally, I wanted to talk about ObamaCare. But that didn’t happen. So, how did we pick. Well, we looked at the list, looked at Tiger and Seth and said to ourselves “Selves, do we think we can argue against Tiger and Seth on what has become a meme in our culture.” We decided it couldn’t be that difficult. We were kind of wrong. It was more difficult than we thought it would be, but not as difficult as it could have been had we decided not to play the game the way we did. Now we move on to research. I knew as soon as I had to do research for why we shouldn’t build the wall, I was going to have to do research on why it would be bad for the environment. I’d like to clear something up. I do not hate the enviroment. I simply have not been given a case that is presented in a logical, non panic driven, fashion that was also persuasive enough to convince me I should care and do something. But, back to the wall. I was very glad that I didn’t end up going the environment route because of an economics paper from 2009 I found very early in the research. Basicly, everything for the negative argument fell in line with that paper which made it so that I could argue either side and not feel like I’ve become something I despise: an environmental alarmist. Those people really get on my nerves, cause