Growing up in a regular English class setting, I was taught to regurgitate information based on a reading or an experience and put it out in the form of a paper no longer than 1.5 pages with and introduction, body paragraphs, and conclusion.
I say the word “taught” very loosely because there was no choice in the matter, so it was more drilled into me throughout my academic experience. With this background, the environment that is my English 1102 class is completely different from what I am used to, and I find myself having to adapt frequently to the changes and what is actually required of me. I went from having to constantly write a paper without actually having to process or sit down with the information to having to be aware of every detail as it relates to my work as a whole.
The class is primarily set up of reading summaries, annotated bibliographies, and built environment descriptions per unit we cover so it is already distinct from traditional English classes. The setup is the same where I am given informati0n to do whatever is required of me to do, but it’s different because I have the option to do more. Key word being option. The work that is required of me in this course in not the only work I can do. Furthermore the work that is required of me in this course only grants me a passing grade of a C. This has caused me to rethink what it means to gone you’d what is simply required of me and I believe I have not disappointed myself.
The straightforward assignments are easy enough, with my audience being my peers and the showcase of my work being a blog rather than a notebook full of paper which allows me a different approach of how to convey my work. I spend the majority of my time on my Tumblr blog anyway so writing assignments on a blog post wasn’t as foreign to me as I thought it would. I actually prefer it over writing on a piece of paper. I also feel more comfortable writing to my peers than I did in high school and growing up being of the environment I’m allowed to write in.
Looking back on how much I’ve accomplished so far versus all that I had the opportunity to accomplish, I would say I haven’t let myself down, but I haven’t put myself in a position to be as comfortable as I wanted at this point in the semester. Outside of doing the regular reading summaries I enjoy writing an extra blog post about how I felt about the reading. I also take advantage of the quizzes as I have completed most of them. However, what’s difficult for me is what do I turn in and is what I turn in even important. It has taken me sometime to realize that everything matters simply because it truly does. No detail is too small and unimportant in the larger scheme of things and I need to continue with that knowledge. I also have to be more accepting of the fact that Im not in this alone. I have peers that are going through it right along with me and instead of working alone to accomplish our goals, we can work together. Peer-review, study groups, these are things I can take advantage of to better myself as a writer. Not to say that my writing is weak, but it has the possibility to go farther.
English 1102 has taught me that there is so much more that I as a student can accomplish when the choice is mine to make. I have done well enough with the choices that I have made throughout the semester but I know there is more I can do to get the A I so desperately want.