Reflection Paper

It is essential to understand that classes taken in grade school do not give students a full understanding of each subject. With the topic of writing, there will always be a new lesson to learn, an aspect to improve, or a differing way to explain. Author Craig Vetter states in Bonehead Writing, “This is your enemy: a perfectly empty sheet of paper. Nothing will ever happen here except what you make happen.” Each story, essay, or response comes from a writer’s experiences. With each attempt at a new piece comes an underlying story of emotions the writer is facing. Each person’s writing is unique and the ideas people have are related to their past experiences and what they believe to be familiar with when deciding which writing style to use. As a high school student, I have learned many things about writing that helped me become the improved writer I am today, but the most essential advice I have received is practice makes perfect. Although there is no actual perfect way of writing, I have discovered that each essay I write, my writing improves. It is easier to spot mistakes, find areas to improve, and ponder elevated word choice to use.

Science Instructional Analysis and Methods class has afforded me countless learning experiences which I have taken into my intern classroom. I have several take away for this fall’s science methods course. The first being, in Methods class I learned to work in distinct groups of with peers of various levels. My peers who are experiencing classroom teaching for the first time and the graduate interns. Surprisingly, I learned from working with both of these groups. From the graduate level students, I was able to actually make a connection with the content we read about in our text and experiences I had everyday in internship. I appreciate the opportunity, as I felt safe and free to ask questions about the experiences they had in teaching science. I commend you on the way you had broken up the class groups, and afforded us to work with different groups. During this process, I feel I have started to find my voice as a professional. This opportunity allowed me to be more confident to voice my ideas to the teachers I worked with in internship, as I contribute to my PLC group.

My initiation into writing was typical of the 1960s, when I began receiving a public education at Elementary School. Writing consisted primarily of penmanship, books reports and research papers, all with highly structured formats as designated by the teacher or by the textbooks the teacher used. Our schools days were equally as structured with class time divided by subject, the major ones being English, math, science and history and the minor ones being gym class, art and music. The

Reflecting at my own writing process and using my experiences as a way to shape my future practice as an English teacher, has brought light to the concepts of style, providing opportunities for multiple forms of writing, creating low-stakes writing opportunities, addressing authentic audiences, and establishing non-judgmental/safe space classrooms. Based on the theory that Milner et al. outline in the "Process Model," (2012, p.339) I would almost explicitly follow this pedagogy as a way to help students explore writing. For example, I would focus on the steps relating to revision (step 2), teaching multiple forms of writing (step 3), creating opportunities for teacher conferences (Step 4), and providing students with authentic, and divers audiences

In my childhood I was not taught the fundamentals of proper writing. Nor was it influenced in my household to dedicate time for writing. My father owned his own business, therefore, I always saw him writing inventory and receipts. As for my mother, I can recall her writing down messages from phone calls. At school I found little to no growth in my writing. When I did face a task that required legible writing I would seek help from my friend Sandra. This class is by far the first English course I have taken were I could truly say lectures are broken down enough for me to develop satisfactory growth. I am still a developing writer, but I have made a lot of progress because of influences of my own desire to learn, Professor Anna C. Morrison, and

A learner’s ability to communicate effectively through writing to his/her target audiences is a major prerequisite for academic success. It is also a major pillar of success in one’s career across all areas of practice. Even though, writing clearly is critical to one’s academic and career success, I have not always loved writing. In fact, for a long time I despised writing. At one point, I had a feeling that my writings skills were bound to remain stagnated throughout my life. However, time has proven that I was wrong. My attitude and outlook towards virtually all genres of writing has changed positively. The various helpful methods I have been exposed to by my English teachers through different grades have helped me

The article, Call a Meeting with Your Writing Teacher Self by Ruth Culham, surprised me. I was not aware that writing wasn’t really a big topic until the 1980s. The idea that writing is not just a linear set of steps was stressed throughout my writing education. I agreed with Culham’s statement that writing is a “highly individual, creative process”. The process should be looked at as stages, not steps. The fact that writing has not been stressed on in the past means that many students my age and older probably never really learned the best ways to write. I think back to some of the classmates I had and they could only regurgitate what they learned. It’s up to us, as teachers, to focus student writing on “learning how

All the readings I’ve read so far have opened my eyes to something I didn’t know. For example, the rules some writers go by and the misconceptions of writing. We all have our own unique ways of writing. Our writing styles help our writing come together. Some of us follow rules and some just go with the flow.

If there is anything that this class has taught me, it is that writing is more complex than I ever imagined. I have concluded that writing is like a cake- the good ones are creative with many layers. Coming from a small public school, I was raised on the five paragraph essay style. If you were to get a pile of my senior classes final research papers, it would be hard to tell them apart. We all wrote the same, and our style hardly changed from second grade on. Metaphorically speaking, we all created the same plain vanilla cake.

The current pedagogical methods of teaching writing are not necessarily effective. A “formulaic” approach to writing limits the originality of the students, thus fomenting a peculiar form of censorship: self- censorship. The experience of the students in learning about writing must “create opportunities for students to engage in meaningful writing” rather than focusing on specific structure (Huntley-Johnson 4). Writing should be made a personal experience, completely contrasting with the teaching of math or science.

Writing had always seemed so calculated. Since fourth grade I was taught that when you write a paper for school it should be a five paragraph essay with an opening paragraph, three supporting paragraphs, and then a closing paragraph. If you wrote in this exact format then you were sure to get a good grade. Up until college writing had always lacked creativity for me and seemed more like formula that was to be followed. Writing had always seemed dull to me and more like a chore rather than a chance to express or research ideas that I truly cared about. It was not until I was in my college writing classes that I began to realize that writing involves a lot more than just following a formula and that writing can be in all different forms with various purposes. College Writing I and II has expanded my knowledge on the different forms writing can come in, what are some of the process steps that can be taken, and that overall writing does not have to be a chore.

I have a very particular writing process. It was introduced to me during my sophomore year of high school and proved successful over the last four years of my undergraduate education. I began to consider myself a writer following a year long course required by my high school. The purpose of the class was to perfect our writing abilities and appreciate literary classics (inspiring us to write) such as; Slaughterhouse-Five, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, and Catcher and the Rye, just to name a few. Our classes began each morning with a themed brainstorm, we would use them to develop our essays, following the steps which follow. I have continued to follow the rules I was taught, as it has been prosperous through out my educational endeavors.The course of this essay will examine my writing process, while comparing notions of good writing skills.

The years a child spends in elementary are crucial because their teachers will essentially lay down the foundation for learning, as well as stimulate an interest in growing knowledge. The various subjects students are taught include math, science, English language arts, and history. However, within those subjects, there are skills that students need to learn and master so they can be efficient learners. Each subject contains its challenges, but with great teachers, students will be able to develop the adequate skills to make them successful in subjects they find challenging. I will be focusing on why students struggle with writing and the methods they are taught in order to

For my service learning project I worked in Mrs. Evelyn Costa's first grade class at Meadowlane Elementary. Meadowlane is located at 4280 W 8th Avenue in Hialeah, Florida and was constructed in 1957. There are one thousand one hundred and seventy seven students enrolled at Meadowlane Elementary school. Meadowlane has fifty three classrooms and fourteen portables and there are one hundred and seventy nine students per grade level. The school was built on nine acres of land. The student population of meadowlane Elementary is comprised of 97% Hispanic, 2% White, and 1% Asian.

Over the course of the semester, there has been numerous amount of areas where I believe I have improved in comparison to high school. What has helped me in my writing is the writing class and the in-class writing workshop. The writing class that is located in the Kremen education building has helped me with my writing greatly because in the writing center the person in charge teach us lenses and we apply those lenses to the writing, draft, or reading that someone brings in. The in-class writing workshop has helped me because other students get to read my writing. This is helpful because I get feedback from many students and they let me know what needs to be fixed. A new tool I have been using is They Say I Say. The book is very helpful because of the information and examples it provides such as the templates. I have been applying the templates into my essays and I have seen a significant difference.