Original Writing

The technical term that I chose for this assignment is Purchasing Power Parity. I chose the target audience to be non-technical because explaining the economic concept is similar to explaining to readers with little or no professional background in the related field. Also, I could practice how to polish my technical writing skills to make my work understandable and appealing to the readers.

The textbook was a useful source for me to study how to explain the technical term in a parenthetical, a sentence and an expanded format. Furthermore, I found that the expanded format was the most interesting part to me because it allowed me to further understand the concept of this term that I did not realize before. The expanded definition also allowed more space for me to illustrate the meaning of the technical term, which makes the audience easier to grasp the main point.

Review Process

The review process was very useful. While reviewing my partner, Sydney’s definition of her technical term, Hydrocephalus, I could self-examine whether I have done the same thing that I found useful in her assignment, as well as whether I have made the same mistakes I found in her explanation.

For example, I found that she is really skilled at using technical terms that are common in her professional field. While suggesting her to either change the target audience to a skilled and more technical group, I have also examined again whether I used highly technical words in my assignment as well.

All in all, I enjoyed reading her definition because not only had I become more familiar with the impact of Hydrocephalus on a young child’s cerebral development, but also I gained a lot of insights from reading Sydney’s work, both in a good way and to-be-improved way.

Editing Process

Sydney has given me a very detailed peer review report about my strength and weaknesses in this assignment. I have read through her report and my work again. I realized that there were some parts there were ambiguous in the reader’s perspective. For example, I did not state clearly what is “Big Mac Index” in my parenthetical definition; I performed the same mistake as Sydney that I used technical terms in my work and did not realize that my non-technical readers would not understand the meaning of the term. Before handing in my assignment, I read through my work again to make sure there are no undefined highly technical terms.

Sydney’s suggestions are more about the technique of my writing, such as grammatical mistakes and citations. While making the amendments according to her comments, I would read more journals and opinions on the news in my related field in order to learn the writing approach of explaining highly technical concepts, as well as to learn how to write with the right tone and grammar.

Revised definition document: My Revised Technical Definition – Purchasing Power Parity

My review to Sydney: My Peer Review Link for Sydney

Peer review from Sydney: Peer Review Link from Sydney