“What I Have Achieved”

 

I took FIQWS 10003 & 10103 as my freshmen English composition class over the course of the fall semester. There are four phases in this course and each phase had a major essay that is designed to help you write in college level. During each phase, we were assigned with assignments, group works and class discussions to strengthen our reading and writing skills. The purpose of these assignments and groupworks is prepare us for each phase’s final essay. These assignments and essays help me achieved serval course learning outcomes. These course learning outcomes indicate the growth of my reading and writing skills. The assignments, groupworks and class activities are evidences of my growth.

The focus of phase one is to analyze how social differences affect one’s literacy development. We were assigned to read and analyze serval literacy narratives written by famous scholar. When I am analyzing these narratives and writing my literacy narrative, I have “recognize and practice key rhetorical terms and strategies when engaged in writing situation” (Learning Outcome 5). As I am analyzing these narratives, I discover that most of the authors use pathos and sensory details to appeal to the readers’ emotion and make their messages and claims stronger. As shown in figures 1.1,

Amy Tan in her narrative, “Mother Tongue,” uses sensory details and pathos to describe her mother’s case of discrimination. By knowing the importance of sensory details and pathos in narrative, I use these rhetorical strategies in my narrative to make my message and situation more appealing to the reader. Evidences of this is revealed in Figure 1.2.

I have achieved learning outcome number five when I was annotating the course reading for rhetorical strategies; and use these rhetorical strategies when I am writing my literacy narrative. There is oral presentation for the literacy narrative we wrote, where we describe our narrative and our literacy development to instructors and classmates. As I am planning for my presentation, I “understand and use print and digital technologies to address a range of audiences” (Learning Outcome 7). I used PowerPoint for my presentation, which included animations, pictures, charts, and sound effects in my PowerPoint. Pictures of my PowerPoint can be found in Figure 1.3 and 1.4.

I achieved learning outcome number seven by knowing my classmate are digital generation and PowerPoint to present my messages. The images and sound effects allow my audiences to visualize my literacy situation and make it more appealing. It is more effective than describing it in words. I also “explore and analyze in their own and other’s writing a variety of genres and rhetorical situations” (Learning Outcome 2). We need to complete a rhetorical situation worksheet when we are analyzing a text from the reading packet. For each reading, we need to find the author’s credentials and publication of the reading. This information will help us determine the audiences, rhetorical strategies and genre of the reading. For example, Amy Tan is an American writer and her mother was first generation immigrant. “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan was published in the Threepenny Review. By looking at the information and the context of “Mother Tongue”, I can say Amy Tam’s intended audience was her mother and the genre of “Mother Tongue” was memoir. Overall, rhetorical situation worksheet helps me identify the genres and rhetorical situations of the text.

Through out phase two, our class learned how to write an academic summary, evaluating sources and synthesizing information. I have “develop and engage in the collaborative and social aspects of writing processes” (Learning Outcome 6) during the Fish-bow activity and writing my exploratory essay. For the Fish-bow activity, we were asked to discuss a topic that was given by instructor Miller. Each of us was assigned with an author that we have analyzed their work before. Our job is to pretend to be these authors and use their perceptive to start a conversation. All of us have prepared for these conversations. In addition, these conversations were successful. Some of us agree, expand, and exemplify with each other’s claim, while others disagree and challenge each other. I have achieved learning outcome number six by expressing my opinion and engage in the collaborative conservation. This activity prepares me to write my exploratory essay. I have ” develop strategies for reading, drafting, revising, and editing” (Learning Outcome 3). Although I annotated all my sources for my exploratory essay, I still struggle when I’m writing my first draft of exploratory essay. I made an appointment with Instructor Nagales. She gave me advises and I was able to improve my writing. Figure 1.5

is my drafted exploratory essay and Figure 1.6 is revised.Listening to my instructors and peer’s advices, I realize my exploratory essay and analysis essay lack of my opinions and my claims. When I am revising my exploratory essay, I added my claims and evidence to support it. For example, I added my interpretation of native English speakers’ purpose of mocking Chinese accents and use Lippi-Green’s statement to support my point. In addition, I synthesized sources. I also “practice systemic application of citation convention” (Learning Outcome 4) for this essay. My instructors showed me how to crate a work cited page and intext citation. I have been practicing my citing skill by answering the first question of the rhetorical situation worksheet. To make my work cited page more precise, I used MLA generator, Easybib. I input the author, publication, and title of my sources into the generator. Then after my work cited page is generated, I copied and pasted to my exploratory essay. My work cited page for my exploratory essay can be found in Figure 1.7. I alphabetize my sources by the last name of the author and I indented after the first line of each sources.

The focus of phase three is to analyze examples and practices that are driven by language ideologies. When I was analyzing my example for my critical analysis essay, I have “recognize the role of language attitudes and standards in empowering, oppressing, and hierarchizing languages and their users” (Learning Outcome 1)I have recognized the myth and social consequences of my example. Figure 1.8 shows my analysis of my example. The myth is that poor grammar is not acceptable, and it will limit your possibilities in life. The social consequences of this myth are discrimination and lowering of people’s self-esteem. I have achieved this learning outcome when I am writing my analysis essay. In order to support my analysis with evidence, “I locate research sources (including academic journal articles, magazine and newspaper articles) in the library’s databases or achieves on the internet and evaluate them creditability, accuracy, and bias” (Learning Outcome 8). I used OneSearch to look for sources for my essay. The filter my results feature of OneSearch helped narrow down to peer-reviewed articles and the type of genre I wanted. I read the abstract of the article before I read the full text. This helps me save time and locate my sources faster. After I gather a few sources, I will search the authors of these sources to evaluate the creditability of the sources. After all, OneSearch make sources gathering easier.

After all, I have written a variety of essay genres such as, narrative, exploratory essay, analysis essay, and academic summary. I attended several tutoring sessions at the writing center. These sessions helped me improve me writing. Moreover, I made appointments with instructors to discuss my progress and ways to improve my writing.  The course learning outcomes showcased my growth in this course. The writings and assignments we did had strength our reading and writing skills. In addition, it prepares us for other college course.