Reflection Paper

While attending writing class, I learned about the 4 steps in writing, bases for revising, organizing, and connecting specific information, and I also learned about the different types of essays such as descriptive, narrative, process, cause and effect and argumentative essay. I have been a student at Milwaukee Area Technical College for 1 semester, and over the course of my enrollment I have grown and learned more that I knew prior to attending this writing course. Participating in this writing class has taught me so much more than stuff about literature and language, it has taught me another way of expressing myself. I have learned here how to write and express myself, how to think for myself, and how to find the answers to the things that I don 't know. Most importantly I have learned how important technique, outlines and organization are. My goal in this paper is to inform writers about how my writing skills have improved.

In the English 110 class, we performed many tasks that are required to do in the class. The class also required us to read a book which was titled, The Perks of Being A Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky. Reading the book was to help us write an essay about the book. We wrote many essays in the class also each essay was a different type of essay. In total in the class we wrote 4 essays on different subjects and with different methods of writing of the essay. Three of the four essay I selected because it showed the seven different outcomes that are for writing. The seven outcomes are process, revision, critical reading, rhetorical analysis and argumentation. Then the others are researching, quoting, paraphrasing, and documenting sources plus

Over the course of this semester, I have learned many things to improve my writing. Having taken the course before, this semester has been an excellent opportunity to expand on my existing knowledge. Although I had written many essays before, there is still much to be learned and improved. Two factors of writing that I had learned or improved on this semester were transitions/topic sentences and how to properly structure a conclusion paragraph.

The assignments in this class have allowed me to improve a great deal from where I began. Firstly, the assignments have taught me to properly cite my sources using MLA format, something I wasn’t familiar with before. In addition to this, analyzing the texts given allowed me to realize that rhetorical choices are everywhere and aren’t useless as I thought before. I can now locate rhetorical choices in newspaper ads

When I entered your classroom on the first day of school this year, I was confident that what I had learned in previous years was sufficient enough to call myself an experienced and competent writer. However, I discovered throughout the semester that this confidence hindered my ability to improve in the beginning. The first few days of analyzing essays and literary works was something I had never experienced before, opening up my eyes to a side of literature and the English language that I previously did not pay any attention to. After we finished writing our very first in-class essay, I was extremely surprised to see that the score I earned was a 6. But when I look back on that very first essay, I am even more surprised to see what I could improve using the knowledge and strategies I learned in AP Junior English.

Throughout the semester, I have gained skills necessary for understanding and utilizing logic while writing. I am now aware that for any writing to be scholarly, it must possess an introductory section, a body and a conclusion section. Further, I am now able to understand as well as utilize most of the basic techniques useful in pre-writing, revision and editing. Through writing the “downloading from torrents” paper, I acquired skills in word processing, sentence elements, and punctuation. Further, I developed some special skills in writing a website analysis which is a critical aspect in contemporary learning as argued by Flateby (p 182). As the semester folds, I believe that I have gained the prerequisite skills in writing and critical thinking. However, I need to improve much on some of the common problems in writing that seems to disturb me especially grammar.

effect. Lastly, it will discuss how the essay could have been strengthened by explaining more on

The third essay that was written was a critical argument. This assignment required me to choose two articles from the school library and write an essay stating my opinion on a particular subject. The topic I chose was medical marijuana. This topic was interesting to me, so it made the assignment fun. On this essay I had fewer mistakes than in previous essays. I continued to struggle with APA citation and the use of commas. When I looked at the feedback from this essay, it gave me confidence. I felt that I was learning and my writing skills were improving.

Three days a week, sixteen students drag themselves out of bed before the crack of dawn, wishing they had an extra ten minutes of sleep. Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, without fail, they begrudgingly get ready for the day as they pack their bags and eat breakfast. As one of these sixteen students, I myself often wondered if what I am about to do will be worth the lost hour of sleep and studying. But ultimately, I, along with the other fifteen, continue to drag myself slowly towards school week after week. One by one, we walk through the glass doors that welcome us to the place we have learned to call our home: St. Daniel’s Hall. The large hall, usually filled with groups of students joking and laughing, is still dark and quiet, waiting to be filled with the life of the day. It is so silent, we almost balk at disturbing the atmosphere. As we half-heartedly greet each other, we discuss our day to come and lament over our lack of sleep.

Growing up for me went a little something like this. All three of my sisters and I shared a king size bed in the attic of a rental house off 17th & Dorcas. In the mornings we would wake up to mom’s chorizo and tortillas on the stove. In the background you could hear Telemundo, a Spanish channel, on the television. Being that I was one of four siblings Birthday parties came often, and were celebrated with lots of carne asada, jugo for the kids, piñata’s, guacamole and lots of beer and music for the adults. These parties were huge and went all night long. I guess you can say this was the Hispanic traditional way to throw a kid’s birthday party. Growing up biracial, and multi-cultural Mexican- American, our primary language in our home when we were younger was Spanish.

Each Wednesday in class, you will learn about different world religions and how they compare to Christianity. Your class discussions will be lively and Mr. Mackie’s lectures will be informative. Your time in class each week will solely be devoted to learning about different world religions. There will be no English or grammar instruction in class. Our time together will solely be digital and online. Assignments will be sent to you each Wednesday evening via email. For the most part, most assignments are due the following Tuesday by 6:00AM. Students will be notified of due date and time when each assignment is given. Students will send via email their completed assignments to me. While we will not have in-class instruction, this internet approach allows me to individualize assignments and assessments according to the student’s age, grade, and writing level. I will read, analysts and assess each composition and send back to the student (and parent) my detailed notes, comments and suggestions for corrections. The students will not be allowed to revise graded assignments, however, the comments and corrections given in the previous compositions are expected to be applied to each paper handed in there after.

For the past four weeks, I have had the opportunity to participate in the Reading Rainbow SUN program at Fabian. The SUN program has been very interesting and educating experience, however, I have only been with the children four times. An hour and a half for four weeks makes it difficult to learn about a child’s home life, growth, and even their full personality. I am still trying to learn their names let alone their life stories, but have been able to gain some insight. I have been able to observe many students through this experience, however, for this paper, I will focus on two: JJ, KB.

During this second semester I have been trying to accomplish my goals from first semester. These goals include being able to write smoother introductory and conclusion paragraphs, maintaining an A in ELA 10, and improving my writing in any way possible. I took many steps to complete these goals. First of all, I maintained an A in ELA by turning in everything on time and turning in quality work. Second, I improved my writing by continuing to write often and using newly learned concepts in my writing. However, my last goal is still a work in progress. I have been working on my introductions and conclusions by trying new methods out in my essays. For example, in my Of Mice And Men essay I tried starting my introduction with a quote, which I hadn’t done before. In my opinion, I think I met my goals very well and followed the steps I needed to to become successful in achieving my goals. To conclude, I successfully completed most of my goals and got the results I wanted.

This counselor met with Anthony, his grandma/guardian, and transition coordinator, Joe Delegato to review the results of his community based assessment and draft his plan for employment, on 10/10/17.

I’m turning the pages of my life to find the parts that have made me who I am today. I don’t believe who I am is static, though.