Reflection Essay

It is still so surreal to reflect back on my first semester as an incoming college student in the ENC1101 course, analyzing at my progression as a reader and writer in literacy. Since the first day of class I set in stone my goals for this class: receive a 4.0 GPA, develop my connecting theories skills in writing, and become more aware of objectives for each Unit throughout the course. All of these goals became achievements that not only make others proud but most importantly give me self pride. In order to earn the grades and achieve these goals, I went after every opportunity that I was given as an incoming college student, such as office hours and extra credit. By taking this course I have gained confidence with the utilization of literacy, and made an addition to my group of impactful literacy sponsors. Once students are finished with high school they assume that there is nothing else to learn beyond the stereotypical five paragraph essay, but they are so wrong. I was able to obtain so much knowledge about numerous course concepts from Writing about Writing, articles, and my professor. These concepts will carry on with me throughout a bright future of writing courses, job interviews, and any other skills that require literacy. The four outcomes listed below will help illuminate how I improved as a writer, by being a driven college student and going out of the way to earn my achievements in this course. In the first outcome I improved comprehending scholar texts,

The lesson I’m going to tell you about was a very important one. It shaped me into who I am today, and the outlook I have on things. This might not be a situation that other people would think would be important, or necessary, or something you should remember for years to come. But this moment has stuck with me since I was 8. This instance was when I Skipped school back in 3rd grade.

Over the course of the English 1B class, my eyes opened to new techniques and to consider new ways to improve my writing. Throughout this course, my class was assigned four essays all of which asking different questions. Some of the essay were more difficult than another because it required more work and research; however, writing these essays helped me to grow as a better writer. During these essay writing process, I was able to grab a sense of what is and what is not essential when writing an essay and to remember to avoid diverging from the essay topic itself.

The most advantageous learning I had through the process of research and in the time of this class, was when I was presented with the opportunity to teach literacy and foster diversity by becoming a mentor in a local program called Reading Buddies. As a mentor, I assisted elementary students who have fallen behind in mastering literacy, to help improve their skills in English writing and reading comprehension. Many of these students are those of immigrant families, who are currently facing hardships adjusting to schooling because English has been learned as their second language. I have always been passionate about education, so naturally, I took interest in providing help where the structural violence of our non-accommodating American

In freshman year, I have grown intellectually as person. I’ve gained qualities that have helped shape me into a portrait of a graduate. I have learned that to be successful I must have the ability to work with others due to many group oriented projects. Through those projects, I have also come to the conclusion that I must have effective communication with my peers to be successful. However, with that said, it is important to have a strong motivation as an individual. Overall, I have become a better student by being a proficient collaborator, communicator, and goal directed and resilient individual.

I have learned a great deal of materials in Dr. Wise AAPS. class, we readied the county and wrote reflections about topics pertaining to literature, technology, and literacies. This allowed me to become a better critical thinker because her course requires us to analyze and reflect on yourself as individuals more than just giving a brief summary on our paper .After taking this course for about 6 months, I have realized that it had made a significant change in my life that i need as a african american man. When I am attending in classes such as political science or nutrition, not only am I understanding the readings better than before but I am also analyzing the information, forming my own thoughts (at times I even present my ideas to the members in class), and incorporating ideas from the past to increase the literacy towards the topic that I would’ve given up in the past. I value the qualities the AAPS course gifts to the students because it has improved me as a student, learner, and as an active member in the society we live in today.

For the past three and a half years I have participated in the school band. In that time I’ve taken part in concert band, marching band, and jazz band. Setting up my schedule in sixth grade kicked off the adventure.

For the last ten years, I have taught third grade. Though mathematics is just one of the many areas of discipline I am responsible for to teach my students, it is definitely the hardest curriculum for my students to both understand and master. With both formative and summative assessments, including the annual state standardized assessments, it seems as if every year my students are struggling more and more with understanding and applying mathematical concepts. This is also evident with an increasing number of mathematic Academic Improvement Plans (AIPs) that my students bring with them from second grade.

In this class we have a credo, and in that credo there are some key words that were capitalized: Read, Think, Write, College Level, rigorously, Holistically, Learning, Safe, and Fun. Everyone has their own way of defining words, some maybe the same and some may be different but that’s ok. In this essay I am going to thoroughly and efficiently explain to you in my own words what each of these words mean to me in the context of this course.

As I sit here and write this literacy narrative, I reflect on a time in eighth grade when I read a book regrading civil injustice. Back then I wouldn’t have thought to use such fancy words. Instead, something along the lines of “a black boy my age got killed for whistling at a woman! And the murderers didn’t even get in trouble.” So much confusion was attached with my not so politically correct summary of the book. In fact, we read this book in the upmost politically correct way as possible. Derogatory terms such as negro, nigger, and colored was to be renamed and replaced by the word African American. Simple. Nothing too hard to do in eighth grade just switch a word or two around. But how ironic we didn’t go over any set “rules” for the white character’s. No negative connotation related to the word “white” at all. In fact, when we had class discussions for this book it was normal to say “Hiram the white boy went to visit his grandfather in Mississippi.” But if I was to talk about Emmett Till, African American would always be attached to his name. I can admit just like any other person in that class it was weird but we never put too much thought behind it. Just abided by the rules and read.

There are many lessons I learned in a little over a year. June 24, 2016, I remember standing on the stage at CSU when the old district president gave her words of wisdom to me and I received the district flag. Our first event as an officer team we elected the secretary, treasurer, and parliamentarian. When Sarah, the old district president, stood up to nominate me for Parliamentarian I looked at her like she was crazy. I never thought that I would get the spot until they announced my name as the new parliamentarian. As a new team, we went to New Mexico as a new team and I met some people that are fun but I never thought they would become my best friends. I remember thinking that they were some of the best when we were sitting around telling embarrassing stories and Kyle, The State president, told his most embarrassing and everyone else just laughed. When we said goodbye it was hugs, tears and until next times.

Practicums are a time to put into practice what we as pre-service teachers have learnt in theory. This experience can be challenging and rewarding all at the same time as it makes a pre-service teacher face both their strengths and challenges as an individual and an educator. Lesson planning can be time-consuming during the hours when one is not teaching but makes the teaching time run more smoothly. There are standards that graduate teachers need to adhere to and relationships with mentors, children, families and colleagues to establish all in such a short time.

There is no clean way to gut a dog shark. I carefully held the sharp scalpel in my right hand with my left hand on the belly of a shark. My professor mentioned that my specimen might be pregnant and she wanted me to find out for the class. The excitement and anticipation were palpable in the room as all eyes were on me and my lady shark. Shortly after the first incision was made, I held up a fetal shark like Simba in The Lion King. Everyone’s eyes sparked with awe as they saw the baby shark. There were five other unborn dog sharks and I gave each group one to explore. This lab was very special to me because I became the unofficial teaching assistant. My classmates would ask me to help identify structures and give them tours of organisms. In this lab, I felt purposeful. It almost felt like I was the professor. I cherished every moment in comparative anatomy because I deeply enjoyed getting my hands dirty, working with real organisms, and teaching my classmates.

As life becomes hectic and challenging, being able to manage my time is increasingly difficult. Additionally, being involved in online education adds a layer that requires time, that can be hard to find. Personally, through the use of a planner, eliminating distractions and studying at a coffee shop, has helped me find a way to balance my life.

For as long as I could remember I never understood how to comprehend shakespeare, or old English poetry such as epics. My first time being introduced to this type of writing was 9th grade where she had us read Romeo and Juliet . At first, I was excited because I had always heard great things about the book and movie. However, I had no idea it was written in a different context. I was introduced to different words and phrases I never heard of . It had reminded me a lot of the bible, how you actually had to put things into perspective yourself because the message would never be as clear. It’s almost like critical thinking, but even knowing that trick I still would have no idea what I was reading or what the message was. We often would