I think reflective writing can help teach students how to think about their own thinking. By developing “a habit of self-reflective thinking,” students learn how to use revision to think through their writing, such as reviewing a draft, developing intentions on what their essay will communicate, and how it might relate to their audience. Reflective writing also involves setting goals, uncovering problems in writing, and deciding what style of language to use. Students can become active learners who are willing to independently seek out new ways of learning. This can help people outside of class in a job setting and also solve problems in everyday life. By learning all of these tools, anyone can become a great writer, thinker, and learner.
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What I found most surprising was the change in focus from the writer (myself) in Writing Project #1 to the people that I interviewed for Writing Project #2. In Writing Project #1, I only needed to focus on myself which was relatively straightforward. In Writing Project #2 however, it was much more tricky since I had to create a list of questions for the people that I interviewed and then figure out which ones to add and where to place them into my draft. The most challenging, confusing, and frustrating part was sorting through, organizing, choosing, and keeping interview responses compact enough to stay within the required number of words in my draft. The most important part of the writing process to me is organization and preplanning. From working on two writing projects, I found some strategies helpful in keeping track of everything I type, such as the use of bullet points to know where I may want to add ideas. Last time I mentioned that if I were invited to teach someone about writing “I would emphasize the need to practice writing a lot, trying new strategies for drafting, and making your story direct and personal.” I still think that is true, but I have also learned that reflection is an important part of writing and practicing reflection about my writing has helped me become a better writer.
If readers and writers think differently about proofreading and formatting the finished piece of writing, this could cause misunderstandings and miscommunications. Typical readers would expect good grammar and appropriate formatting with minimal proof reading errors. It’s a sign of disrespect to hand in work that is sloppy and inhibits what the writer is trying to communicate. As a result, the reader focuses more on mistakes rather than ideas and content. This also includes emails and social media posts. Unless you are making an example of bad grammar, proofing errors can take away from your message or turn it into the opposite of what you’re trying to say. Turning in work that clearly shows evidence of polishing up writing to make sure it’s grammatically correct expresses that you’re invested in what you are writing. Even with casual back and forth communication with email, it’s important to show good grammar to express your ideas clearly, which can give you an opportunity to impress the reader. Using good organization in writing is important as well. Having good organization of topics that you write about makes it much easier for readers to understand. This further reduces confusion and frustration for readers and they will more fully understand the message of the writer and feel more positive about what he has written.
I think we all learned about the importance of revision in writing. I discovered that revision can be a big help in writing. I originally thought of it as a simple tool for checking typos and re-editing a few sentences. I found similar responses from my peers. They too thought that revision was just a simple tool in writing. One of them mentioned that “revision isn’t quite what I thought it was.” From learning more about it in class, he described it as a way to “read over your paper multiple times to see your writing inside out.” I liked that idea. Other students mentioned revision as an important tool in writing, like what one peer who said, “revision always helped me to reorganize my ideas.” These responses, including others that I read, were helpful because they gave me a new perspective on what other students thought about revision and the importance of reflection and also gave me new ideas for writing. One of these new ideas was the use of bubbles to brainstorm ideas. I recently used this technique for thinking up ideas on my latest draft. I found it helpful to look back and read through the bubbles again to keep track of my notes. I went back and reorganized my writing project several times.
A little about the person...
I think of our family farm and its members as a community...
I conducted an interview of my Uncle Jeff who is the Farm Manager for the KCF on Sunday, February 5, 2017 at 11:15 am via Facetime. First I asked him if he was Gen One or Gen Two. He belongs to Gen One. We had a brief discussion about the fact that in historical terms if we start counting generations from my great great Grandmother Anna Knapp, he would actually be Gen 5 or 6, but as a more casual description he is Gen One if we start from the beginning of the LLC Agreement.
He lives 210 miles from the farm or about 3 and a half hours by car. He visits the farm on average about six times a year for fun and work, like repairing the old barn. He is the Farm Manager and has had that role since the LLC started. He usually goes once in the spring for fun and to ride the 4 wheelers and explore the woods. He always goes there at Thanksgiving. He makes 3 or 4 other trips in a year to check up on the place and to do maintenance and repairs. For example, last fall he worked on repairs to the old barn at the home place, putting up new wood on the door. He first memory of visiting the farm is when he was 5 years old. He remembers seeing the brand new red Massey Ferguson tractor -which we still have. This was probably around 1960. He remembers walking down the hill behind the old barn with his mom and dad to see his Uncle Dale who was mowing with the new red tractor. Another early memory is the big hog pen which was located in the “front yard” of the house at the home place. He remembers Uncle Dale giving kids rides on the huge boar named Denmark out in the hog pen. He also remembers carrying table scraps out to the pigs after every meal, like watermelon rinds and leftovers. He didn’t remember it smelling all that bad. His most recent memory of the farm was a visit for a day last week to check the new windows that are being installed at the KT to keep out the critters and to look at the progress on the siding that is being put on the sides of the AJ barn by a contractor to protect it from the elements. He visited by John and Luke Bohnert, local friends who watch out for us when contractors are working on the land. His fondest memories were of sitting around the large table in the kitchen at the home place with the Uncles, listening to all the conversations going on and playing pinochle as a kid. When reminded of the famous Fourth of July fireworks incident, he rolled his eyes. He mainly goes to the farm for fun and work. As Farm Manager, he often has projects to work on. For fun, he loves spending time with nature and spotting wildlife like deer, wild turkeys, skunk, coyotes, bobcats, and raccoons. He loves listening to birds and spotting hawks and owls. His favorite outdoor project is planting trees to reforest various areas of the farm and he really hopes they survive. He also enjoyed working on the old barn repairs last fall because it is over 100 years old and an important part of our heritage. He believes he fits into the community as a member and founder who helped create the agreement to put the land into an LLC for long term continuity so the land would stay in the family for generations to come. As first farm manager with no job description, he feels that his role is to supervise the projects that the family members decide on. He also is in charge of bill paying for the LLC and doing the taxes for everyone and he also acts as go between with the tenant farmer Kenny. The values of our community are camaraderie and the common bond we share as descendants of Anna and Christian Knapp. We all believe in protecting the land and believe we are stewards of the family land. We believe we must manage it to the best of our ability for future generations as the previous generations did. We want that bond to carry into the future. We all share a love of nature. What I value most about being a member of the KCF is that even though we have diverse points of view on many issues we try to put our personal views aside and do what’s in the best interest of the Farm as a community. At the end of the day, not every view is a winner. We’ve been able so far to move forward despite having differences of opinion. Keeping it all together is bigger than any one individual. Generally speaking, I think we all share the same values: to ensure that the ownership set up in the LLC continues for the long term for family to gather and share time together and to value each other as individuals and yet all as members of the same family. I have several future goals for our community. First, I hope that we will continue to move forward with incremental change, slow but positive changes, not huge changes. I think that will be most successful in the long run. I hope we also continue to improve the KT house and make it more comfortable for family to stay when visiting. I am looking forward to our next project which is to build a building at the home place with amenities like a bathroom and a shower. This will tide us over while we continue to debate whether we should build a house there. There is currently a split of opinion about that. I personally feel that one house is more than enough to manage, speaking as the farm manager. I don’t rule out the idea of building something that would be more suitable for our needs. Another goal would be to build up our cash reserves by a land or timber sale. We are still working on how to make that happen because we have some obstacles to overcome to make it happen. The biggest problem is that we don’t get face to face often enough. Email is a terrible form of communication and slows down the process of decision-making. It is hard to reach consensus over email. Face to face communication can be a problem when passion and emotion get in the way. Another big issue for managing the LLC is that decision making is currently mostly in Gen One and while that is changing, we need to figure out how to pass the torch on to Gen Two. Who will step up from Gen Two who are currently in their twenties and thirties and very busy with family and work. At some point there has to be a transition to the next generation. As to disagreements within Gen One, we have disagreements within agreements. We generally agreed to build a new building at the home place but continue to disagree on specifics as to where and what. As to disagreements within Gen Two, I don’t think I know. I believe they feel that the pace of change has been too slow, for example with respect to the timbering and sale of the Lost 80. I think Gen One agrees with that but since we are the ones who are supposed to make that happen we are more aware of all the potential problems that arose once we all finally agreed to do it. I think that we reach consensus on the goals through face to face communication. We have to identify our differences and figure out how to compromise. We have to make sure we agree on the common goals and make sure that we leave the next generation with a better process for moving things forward at the farm. My hopes for Gen Three, our little ones, are that they have the same fun at the farm that we have had all these years, that the farm doesn’t change much, that they learn to love mother nature from being at the farm, that they take comfort from our camaraderie and spending time with extended family. I am sitting in a green camping chair in the side yard outside the KT house. It is 11 am in the morning and the sky is clear and blue with a few wispy clouds. Family members are continuing to arrive in pickup trucks, SUV’s, minivans, jeeps, and sedans. Some have driven in from the local motel, while others are arriving after several hours on the road. The vehicles are parked next to each other on the grass around a rutted gravel driveway that circles a sealed off well. I see a few Gen Ones sitting outside in the yard rising to greet the new arrivals. One Gen One is playing with his grandson (Gen Three) nearby, outside an old, wooden barn that’s covered in sheet metal. They are running back and forth between the old barn and a boarded up brick silo.
Our family outdoor grilling expert is cooking burgers on an old Weber grill just inside the barn with the sliding door wide open. He likes to cook there in the shade. He is having a conversation with two other people about his daughter’s mission work in Tanzania and the trip he and his wife recently took to visit her there. The Weber grill meanwhile is spewing white smoke that exits through the open barn door and through cracks in the walls and roof of the barn like they are chimney vents. The air is breezy with occasional strong gusts. Above my head the branches of the large tree in the front yard are waving in the wind. Occasionally I catch a whiff of the smoky flavored juices emanating from the grill. As each vehicle parks and family gets out, there are shouts and hugs. A few kids come out of the house carrying juice boxes. Other young ones are running around and chasing each other. I am sitting on the side of a classic old white country house that’s two stories tall. It has counterweight sash windows on the original part of the house and modern versions on the remodeled kitchen. It has a rickety front porch that’s not used and a brand new deck that wraps around the back of the house along the new kitchen overlooking a steep slope and a fabulous view of the forest and countryside. Right next to me, between the house and the circular gravel driveway is a red wooden smokehouse with a sheet metal roof. It is used as a tool shed and has the remains of a smelter attached to it that we now use as a makeshift grill and a bonfire. Every once in awhile two of my cousins travel back and forth on our ATV’s collecting wood for a bonfire later tonight, leaving behind a whiff of gasoline. It is really quiet here when there is a brief lull in all the conversations. I hear an occasional blast from a passing freight train a few miles from us, and a passing driver on the paved country road every once in awhile. Mostly I hear the shouting of the kids, the shouts of laughter from the grown-ups and the conversations of family members on the deck behind the kitchen. A couple of the Gen Ones slowly come down the steps from the deck and join me in the deck chairs on the lawn. One of them is carrying a plate of breakfast food and the bacon smells delicious. When I move inside, I see two old wooden tables with chairs where some people are sitting and talking while my sister and her husband, my mother, and two other people are starting to prepare lunch. My uncle is busy cleaning up the mess from the breakfast he cooks there every morning when we visit the farm: pancakes, bacon, scrambled eggs, orange juice and lots of coffee. My aunt is at the sink washing dishes and her daughter is drying dishes. My aunt is looking out the window to the people on the deck and the woods beyond. A couple of toddlers run into the room giggling. From where I am sitting, I can see into the room next to the kitchen. I see two small tables containing snacks that family members baked and brought to the farm: a couple pies, a sheet cake, a plate of cookies, some candy bars, chips and M&M’s, and the brownies that I had carried in from our car. There is also an old couch and an old wood burning stove that provides heat. My great aunt is sitting there knitting and talking to her grandchildren who are laying on the floor. People have placed jackets and bags on the back of the couch and on the floor in a jumble. When I go into the neighboring room, which is larger, I see an old couch, an old armchair with worn out springs in the seat, and an old reclining armchair. There is a glass fronted cupboard with dishes next to the front door that we never use. There is also a wooden table that folds out with three chairs where we play board games and put together puzzles. One of my cousins is surfing her iPhone and working a puzzle. After lunch, a small group of us climb in the back of two pickup trucks. Most Gen Ones need a hand to climb up into the pickup, while the rest prefer to sit in the cabs of the trucks. It is always fun to ride in back, since the country road is very hilly and feels like a roller coaster. Plus, you have the fresh country wind in your face which feels really great. Most of us sit down in the back while more daring individuals sit up on the sides and even choose to stand up while holding on to the top of the cab which makes some of us feel nervous and causes the driver to stop until they sit down. Soon the asphalt road ends and we are driving on gravel. The dust swirls up behind us. We drive into AJ’s field, where I launch model rockets for the kids to chase and retrieve. Then we resume our ride in the back of the pickup truck to explore more of AJ’s field and the old barn my great uncle helped to build many years ago. We drive downhill and get out and explore the creek where the water is very low. We pick up rocks and turn them over looking for fossils. The younger people start exploring the woods while the older people stand around talking politics. The pictures that I chose were of Ahkohxet aged 8, and his or her bedroom from the Amazon of Brazil. The room is simple but well built. What I see is two walls that meet at an angle. The back wall is shorter than the side wall. The walls are made of red-orange clay that is molded around light colored bricks which have been placed in between vertical and horizontal poles made from branches of trees. Thin tree trunks are placed horizontally on top the full length of each wall for added support of the roof. The roof itself is made of wooden poles with horizontal and vertical supports with twigs or grasses weaved together over them to form the roof. The roof reaches over the room at an upward angle. There is a triangular shaped opening at the top of one wall where it meets the roof that lets in daylight. The floor is made of clay or compacted dirt with a bed made of two horizontal long planks of wood with wooden slats in between them. There is a blue striped blanket over the wood. There is a green plaid blanket and another blanket that appears to be pink, green, and with other colors in a pattern of some kind. There is a long piece of lumber on the floor that goes along the wall where the head of the bed is. Three posts stick out from the top of a wall over the bed that are used for hanging two backpacks. One is blue jean blue and the other is sand, dark grey, and light green. The corner of the room over the bed has a clothesline for hanging the laundry that appears to be a mix of clothes and blankets for the bed in various colors and patterns. Some pieces of clothing are strewn on the floor around the bed. The corner where the two walls meet is very dark.
I frequently go to a casual sit down restaurant near my home which is part of a national chain. What I noticed when I entered to “read the space” was that it is a very multicultural and multi generational space, both customers and staff. The customers included blacks, whites, and Asians. Some of the waiters are Hispanic, others Asian, others black. Most of them are in their 20’s. One waiter is middle aged with grey hair. One manager who works there is a little older than the others (probably in his early 30’s). He has a British or Australian accent, is black and wears long dreadlocks. The Hispanic waiters speak Spanish to each other at times.The three customers in the booth next to me were speaking Japanese or Chinese. The staff that works in the kitchen (which is open to customers to see) appear to be young but experienced. The uniforms the staff wore consisted of black collared shirts, black or dark pants, black shoes, black belt, black apron, and some wore a black hat with the restaurant logo.
Some of the customers were in nice, but casual clothes and others wore business casual. The age range included a lot of young couples, middle aged couples, senior couples, junior high friends, high school friends, and parents with their kids. At the back wall there were several tables pulled together for what looked like a birthday party for a junior high girl. The customers at the bar were a mix of couples, but all had wine glasses in front of them. I noticed a mother with her son, two young women who appear to be friends, and a young couple who seemed to be on a date. The decor of the restaurant was casual and welcoming. I noticed a decorative wooden pillar in the middle of the seating area with shelves of liquor bottles running up the pillar. There was also a cabinet located behind the entrance desk that houses liquor bottles and small fake potted pine trees. The main entrance and exit is a revolving door and to the right of the entrance desk is a side door to enter and leave. There is a bar that wraps halfway around the semicircle shaped kitchen with a marble or granite counter-top and metal bar stools with wooden seats and backs. Just like the bar stools, the chairs for the tables in the middle of the restaurant are metal with wooden seats and backs. The kitchen has a stainless steel gas fired oven to bake pizzas with yellow tiles decorating the outside of it. The booths nearby the bar have lime green vinyl seats and fabric backs while the ones that are farther away along the front wall have vinyl for both the seats and backs.The tops of the wooden tables and booths have a distressed look to them. The wall on the left of the restaurant is made of stone while the one on the right is drywall painted lime green. The wall facing the front is also drywall but is painted white. For the ceiling, it is painted all black. The ceiling above the bar and kitchen has semicircular shaped beams painted white with wooden beams connecting them. There are low hanging lights above the bar. Each one has a single bulb with a glass tube shaped fixture. For the booths, the low hanging lights are the same but instead have glass orb shaped fixtures. The restaurant has big spacious windows going along the front wall and a decorative large mirror next to the bathroom on the right wall. There are three T.V.s around the bar which frequently are tuned to sports and a desk located at the back left corner where people can pick up their take-out their food. I was there in the early evening when the vibe of the restaurant is busy and energetic. There were people waiting at the front by the revolving door to be seated. The wait staff moves around quickly but they are friendly and welcoming. They seem to enjoy each other because I see them at the cash registers talking and joking with each other. They all have name tags with their first name. They return frequently to make sure you have everything you need. The light in the restaurant is dim in the evening but that does not lessen the energetic vibe. The sound level is fairly loud from all the people talking, but the music is a bland classic pop that is not overwhelming. The sound on the tv’s is turned off. Some people are obviously there to celebrate family events, like birthdays. I notice people standing up from their tables or booths to greet people who are joining them with hugs. I think most people would feel comfortable here. This is clearly a family restaurant. From what I can tell, most people appear to be from the suburban middle class.The restaurant is in a suburban shopping mall, so some of the customers are carrying bags from various stores in the mall. I get a sense that people dine here because they like the food and the wine and because it is a great place for socializing with people you already know, for family celebrations, birthday parties, and for casual dining. Some people probably come here because the menu doesn’t change often, so it is predictable. People who are foodies would not be found here. It is not a place that twenty-somethings would come to for loud trendy music, or a trendy selection of craft beers and cocktails, or to meet new people. People come here to order food at a table, or have drinks and food at the bar, or to pick up take-out food. Probably, people would not be allowed in if they were barefoot or tried to bring in a dog (other than a service animal). Probably, people who were obviously inebriated or disruptive would not be welcomed. Since this is a family restaurant in a suburban area, I think this would rarely happen. I belong to a community that owns a family farm we call Knapp Centennial Farm (KCF). A large part of the land has been in our family since 1878 when my great great grandfather acquired it after his father died. His ancestors had migrated from Germany to southern Illinois in the mid-1870’s. The original farm house burned down in 1901 and my great grandfather, who was 12 at the time, lived with his mother and three brothers in the barn over the winter as a new house was built. That barn is still standing and that farm is known as “the home place.” My great grandfather had six kids, 5 boys and one girl. In his later years he lived at the home place and farmed it with two of his sons and two of his brothers. In the 1970’s three of my great grandfather’s children bought a nearby farm (affectionately known as “The Shambles” and later the “KT”) His widow lived for there for many years and my extended family often stayed there. After the last individual from these two generations died, my mother and her siblings and cousins decided to try to save all of this property and keep it in our family. In 2002 they put all of their individual ownership interests into a limited liability company (the LLC) with the hope of keeping the land in the family for their descendants.
None of the original members of the LLC (known as Gen One since they are the first generation of partners in the LLC) live on the farm. I am a member of the second generation (Gen Two, the children of the Gen One LLC partners). Like the other Gen Two members, I don’t live at the farm either. The KCF is used as a gathering place for extended family who live all over the country. Everyone including myself wishes we could live there, spend more time there, and help keep it maintained. Unfortunately that isn't the reality right now due to Gen two members like me being busy with college and careers. Right now, many of us can only get there a couple times a year, to hunt for mushrooms in the spring, or for hiking in the woods in the fall or at Thanksgiving where we cook a turkey on the Weber grill and have lots of fun catching up on each others lives, playing games and sitting around a bonfire at night. The atmosphere at Thanksgiving gatherings is fun, inclusive, and a time to repeat old traditions or create new ones. Everyone who comes brings a special contribution of food or wine (one Gen Two works at a vineyard in Oregon and brings really special wine), or starts a new tradition like cooking one meal in the ground! We usually have a job that needs to be done and everyone pitches in. I take rockets and shoot them off in one of the fields for the Gen Threes to run and recover. We always take a ride in the pickup trucks to visit parts of the farm. We often gather twisted grapevines in the woods and bring them back for people to make their own walking sticks. My sister used the grapevine poles we had gathered the year before in her wedding. The bridal couple stood in front of an arch draped with flowers fashioned from the grapevines we had collected. My cousin and his wife gathered rocks from the creek on our land and used them as decorations and good luck gifts for guests in their wedding. Our clan really values inclusiveness. An important tradition in our gatherings is for family who attend to bring guests who might otherwise be alone on the holiday. They are welcomed back each year and considered part of our extended family. Another tradition is to visit the old family graveyard on our land. It dates back to the 1800’s but has some recent burials too. We will be going there in the spring to clean up the graveyard, build a wall of rocks around it from an old out building that has fallen down, honor the family members whose remains are now there and to bury the ashes my uncle who died in November. We have fixed up the KT with a new bathroom, kitchen and deck overlooking the woods and valley below, so people can stay there when they visit. My Uncle Jeff who lives two hours away is the current Farm Manager and he spends more time there (along with his immediate family) than the rest of us. Some Gen One members are talking about possibly retiring there in the hopes that Gen Two and Gen Three will visit more often. We have a cousin who lives on a farm in the area and farms our land. Other local friends of my great uncle (who died in the late 1990’s and was the last family member who farmed and lived at the home place) help us by watching over the land and buildings for us. The Gen One family members (with help from the Gen Twos) have taken ownership of certain projects on the land, such as planting trees to improve wildlife habitat in fields along the Mary’s River, killing invasive trees in the woods, and repairing the old barns. The Farm Manager does the accounting work and taxes, another Gen One serves as secretary and does the annual meeting minutes, and several Gen Ones are lawyers and handle legal work for the KCF. Despite living 6 hours away, I always love going there because I get to spend time with extended family, enjoy the peace and quietness of being in the country, hiking in the woods, sitting around the bonfire roasting marshmallows, and listening to the Gen Ones telling stories of their youth at the farm. It’s great to have a shared history with people and create new memories every time we gather. We have found many artifacts of prior generations in the old barn and farm house at the home place. One of my roles at the KCF is to be a custodian and a restorer of family antiques, like an old Edison phonograph and wax cylinders which were discovered in the rafters of the attic in the home place in terrible condition. I cleaned it up, found the missing parts through the internet and rebuilt it. We are pretty sure it belonged to my great grandfather’s brother Amadee who was a very interesting character according to the family legends. Most places at the KCF are open to high schoolers and adults to visit and explore. We do have restrictions on access to some buildings and places for the younger children. Since the KCF is a farm, there are containers of fertilizers and other chemicals, large farm equipment, and tools in a storage shed that we don’t want children to be around without adult supervision. The KCF has several acres of forests that we working to improve and preserve. During certain seasons, snakes and ticks are abundant in the forest and everyone is discouraged from hiking. There is a cave on the land that we visit from time to time - only the slimmest of us can get down into it! When it's hunting season, we also avoid the areas of the land that we have leased to hunters. We don’t go into the fields if our farmer has cattle there or when our tenant farmer is running farm machinery. We all got to help plant small trees in the bottoms along the river. The Farm Manager has keys to access all buildings at the farm. Some Gen One family members have keys to one or more buildings since they visit the farm more frequently than others. Since I can’t get there as often as I would like, I don’t have a key and must rely on someone else to open the house at the KT. All of the family members are equally welcome to visit the farm at any time of the year and to use the equipment we have stored in the smoke house or the Morton building for work and fun (three wheelers, fire pit, wood working equipment, fishing rods, etc.) with the understanding that anything you take out has to be cleaned and put away before you leave. The same rule applies in the kitchen at the KT: you have to take your garbage and dispose of it responsibly and leave the refrigerator cleaned out. What I found most unexpected about the process of writing my autoethnography was that I noticed myself trying new strategies when I was working on my rough draft. In my very first rough draft, I started with a couple of paragraphs to get myself going. Then I started to brainstorm ideas using bullet points. On the next draft I converted the bullet points to sentences and then added additional details. I found this approach to be really helpful. I didn’t have a lot of past experience with writing, so I hadn’t really developed a strategy for doing rough drafts. I originally thought you were supposed to sit down and start writing paragraphs and get all your ideas down that way. Using the rough draft to get all my ideas down with the addition of bullet points was very helpful. Reading the discussion posts helped me see that there were lots of different ways to do a rough draft. In the past I would have gone paragraph by paragraph, trying to perfect each one before moving on. My previous ideas about writing were limited and restrictive and really slowed me down. So, switching mid-stream in my very first draft to brainstorming really helped me speed up.
The most challenging part of the process was trying to meet the deadlines. It is easy to avoid sitting down to start a big writing project like this because it seems overwhelming. What I discovered was that if I made myself do small sections at a time with a brief break, I was able to stay focused and be more productive. Another thing that helped was not trying to produce a perfect product the very first time I wrote anything. Also, I found that if I took a break from writing and did something else, new ideas for the writing project popped into my head. In the future I will remember to start small and keep going to avoid getting overwhelmed. When it comes to writing, I had little prior experience, so I learned a lot in all parts of the process while doing Project 1. I used to spend too much time with the brainstorming. I avoided starting to write the draft because it was so difficult to put the first words down on paper, and I wanted the first paragraph to be perfect. I speeded up when I allowed myself to do multiple revisions to my rough draft before turning it in. I think I learned the most about the writing process from working on the revisions for the final draft. The video with the revision strategies was really helpful. I took out excessive wording and paragraphs and kept the primary focus. I moved paragraphs around to make it flow better. I really liked the idea of finding the “heart” of my essay and tying the story of my experiences doing improv to the reason why those experiences changed my life. I would emphasize the need to practice writing a lot, trying new strategies for drafting, and making your story direct and personal. I think that the value of reflective writing forces you to think about why you want to tell a particular story and why that story means something to you. It also forces you to think about who your audience is and whether they will care about what you are communicating. As you think about what and how you are writing a particular piece, reflection makes you learn about the subject and also puts you in the role of the reader and makes you figure out if they are going to understand your message. I think everyone has a different style of drafting. Some people use it for brainstorming ideas and others think of it as a basic building block for the final product. In my experience, there are multiple rough drafts which gradually become my final draft that I submit. One student mentioned that he likes to draft paragraph by paragraph to not get overwhelmed. I like to get all of my ideas down and then start organizing them into my paragraphs. Other students mentioned the use of bubbles to brainstorm their ideas. I prefer using a mix of sentences and bullet points which I can later put into sentences. I agree with one students point that "drafting is a step before writing," and that as another student said "the rough draft has the same amount of importance as the final draft," because the rough draft is the base of your final work. It seems to me that the discussion forum shows that there are unlimited ways to approach drafting. I personally like drafting in sections and doing new parts at later times. I like to have time to process what I have written and get busy doing something else. I find that if I do that, new ideas pop into my head which makes the process of drafting easier. Knowing that people use different approaches to drafting is helpful because it encourages you to try something new or different if you happen to get stuck.
I have been taking Improv For Anxiety (IFAX) at Second City in Chicago since 2012. My identity has been defined by my participation in IFAX. The behaviors that mark me as a member are my willingness to stand up and do improv exercises with class mates (like singing the words instead of just saying them) and also the positive support we give each other when we perform in shows with audiences. One thing that identifies our IFAX group is "yes and..." It is something taught by instructors in both regular and IFAX classes. Instead of not agreeing with an idea that your class partner has ("Joe, we should put sand in our cake batter!"), you always have to agree and add more to it ("yes and let's also put shredded documents in it!") We always dress casual for our classes except for shows when we dress up and wear matching colors or custom printed t-shirts. Each group chooses a name for their group. My current group name is "Aggressive Salad." Every three months, we perform shows for friends and family on the Second City stages.
My choice of clothing, hairstyle, and other accessories probably are most likely influenced by my lifestyle growing up in the town that I lived in and the current social experience that I have at Second City.
My behaviors and practices that reflect my identity are likely affected by TV shows, weekly driving, attending Second City, and the town that I grew up in. My beliefs and values that reflect my cultural identity are most likely affected by being around family, friends, and the country that i’m in. My dietary and domestic practices likely came from traditional practices that my parents taught me, and what we were taught in elementary school. My cultural identity is reflected by the community of the town that I grew up in, the community of Second City, and the family and friends that I spend time with. I can’t think of a time when I was judged based on one or more cultural traits. However, my friends and I have been stared at in the past due to acting in a way that was considered inappropriate to them. The discussion forum tells me that everyone has different ways of generating ideas. The way that I have been generating ideas up to this point was to do internet research and then start writing. After reading the posts of other students, I realized that many of them use techniques that I could use, such as brain storming and making lists of ideas, using bubbles, and writing ideas down on sticky notes. One person mentioned that they acquire their ideas while performing activities and that happens to me as well. Sometimes when I am busy with something, ideas for writing just appear in my mind.
Writing has played a minimum role in my life. I was never really interested in writing because I always found it it challenging for me to learn. For fiction, I can write several pages on a story that I made up using very descriptive language, but when it came to non-fiction, such as an essay or other writing project, I start scratching my head and I can barely do one page. By the time I reached college, I was so far behind in writing that I could barely keep up with my writing assignments. I'm hoping that by taking this course, I will improve on my writing skills and then complete my college classes to get my Liberal Arts degree. My prior writing experiences were pretty poor, so that tells me that I need to improve all of my writing skills. I never did a lot of writing, so in order to improve, I need to do a lot more writing. I am hoping to get more comfortable with peer reviews and collaboration. I also am hoping to become more confident with my writing. I want to be a more helpful peer reviewer and I hope that we will all become better writers after this class.
I would describe rhetoric as using language and images to persuade people. It is an important tool to writing effectively. The rhetorical situation is a specific situation or context that was the reason for the persuasive message. I definitely am noticing that I am beginning to understand that writing is much more important than what I originally thought. When my family discovered an antique Edison phonograph in an active space, I brought it back home and repaired it. I then created a video on my Facebook page and used rhetoric to describe verbally how I fixed the phonograph and how to mechanically wind it up, how to load the wax cylinder records, and how to play them and adjust the playing speed. I will definitely use persuasive writing to be a better communicator. The fact that "Rhetorical Knowledge" is first on the list tells me that it must be a very important skill to have as a writer.
To me, a writer is someone who writes about their thoughts, opinions and ideas about something. A writer may also write stories about experiences from their own lives or the lives of others. A writer may write to document history or a fantasy story that is entirely made up. I think that writing collaboratively can help a writer become a better writer because collaboration helps a writer reflect.
I find collaborating on my writing to be intimidating. I have barely any experience with collaborative writing. Only recently have I started to have opportunities to collaborate with others on projects involving writing. Even those opportunities have been limited in their amount of collaboration. I’m not very confident in my writing or my ability to work with others and get intimidated easily. Collaborating with others during this course will help me be able to better collaborate in future classes as I continue to work towards my college degree. I hope to learn new strategies for writing and ways to look differently at my own writing. Collaboration is important in both academic and career settings. Students often work together on different assignments. Also, in a job setting, it is important that an employee be able to work with a coworker or customer in an effective and collaborative way. Collaboration in this class is an opportunity to practice and improve on those skills that are needed in other areas of life. It can give me insight on what you have written. Reflecting can reveal your strengths and what you need to improve upon. If I learn how to use reflection with my writing, I hope that I can become a stronger writer and more active learner.
Reflective writing differs from other writing because it allows you to look at your writing differently each time. In the past, I’ve previewed papers that I’ve written before submitting them but have never really reflected on my writing before. I will be more likely to think differently about reflecting on my writing after this class. I might reflect on my writing after this course ends to look back and see how my writing has changed over time. I think that reflective writing seems to relate most to the outcome under “Processes”: reflect on the development of composing practices and how those practices influence their work. The outcome sounds like a simple way to explain what reflective writing is. I think you learn how to write by writing a lot. I realize that I rarely write unless I am compelled to do so, such as a class or the need to write an email or text. If I want to be a good writer, I have to do a lot more writing. Another way to learn writing is to read a lot and think about what you are reading. I have recently started reading again and I am really enjoying it. I can see how the author of "Composition as a Write of Passage" believes that analyzing an opinion essay by another author to figure out if it works as a persuasive argument that you buy is a good way to help yourself think about how to write well. By analyzing the strategies used by other writers to appeal to their readers, you can figure out how to do that in your own writing. This would be learning by example and how to improve as a writer. The other way to learn how to write is to do a lot of writing and asking for feedback by your peers, friends and family.
To me, the "learning process" of writing is made up of all the actions you take from start to finish when you are trying to produce a piece of writing. The kind of academic writing we are learning in this course may not be the kind of writing some of us will do after college, but the skills we learn, including critical thinking and analysis of research or documents, will be helpful in our private lives and our professional lives. I also think that the internet and social media have changed the way people write in important ways, making writing more informal and actually changing the words we use and the way we use them (i.e., LOL). To me, the learning process of writing is going to differ depending on where you live and go to school, what your personal circumstances are, what experiences you have in life, and whether you have access to books and newspapers and the opportunity to read. My own experience with the "learning process" of writing is influenced by my language learning disability and the many hours of speech therapy and combined motor and speech therapy that I needed to acquire language. In my writing journal one year in early grade school, I went from drawing pictures in my journal with maybe one word to writing whole paragraphs with no pictures, as a result of language therapy. The posts of other students in this class also reflect the view that the learning process is individual, based on a person's own experience of how they learn best, which would equally apply to learning how to write. Another student noted that each individual's path to learning may be short or longer and influenced by "environment and social cues." Each learner charts a unique path in the process of learning to write. What I found surprising after reading through the course outcomes were all the skills and strategies that are used in writing. I understand the basic skills but I've never realized that there are actually a lot more of them to learn in order to be a good and well rounded writer. Before reading the course outcomes, I never thought of habits of mind as being important. Habits of mind such as openness, flexibility, and curiosity are good personality traits to have, but I had no idea that they were important to have when you are writing.
I found the "genre conventions" a little confusing and I am not sure what it means to negotiate "variations in genre conventions." The course outcomes make it clear that academic writing involves rhetorical skills, critical thinking, and meta-cognition skills. Most of my writing goes into emailing, texting, and occasionally short answer tests. This kind of writing is very different from academic writing and doesn't often use critical thinking, rhetorical skills, or meta-cognition. |
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