I found this assignment very interesting and actually quite a bit more challenging than I originally anticipated. I think the assignment was most difficult for me because I have never had to write for a variety of audiences like this assignment required me to. I actually found it challenging describing a term that is unfamiliar to others, as I was unsure what is a good balance of describing my term yet not being too complicated with it, but also not patronizing the reader by oversimplifying my explanation. I chose to write about a term that is used in the renewable energy business, which my classmates were probably unfamiliar with as I was until I began my professional career in renewables. I thought that, even though most of my group would be unaware of the term, it does relate to a concept everyone is familiar with, that being sustainability. My main goal with this assignment was to educate my group members on something I find very important, especially with the current status of the world’s climate. Climate change is a very real issue, and with cogeneration being such a great resource to help reduce greenhouse gases, I thought that it was very important to share this term and this concept with my team.
To explain my term, I chose to use history, visuals and examples/FAQs as expanded definition techniques as I felt that they were the best option for explaining my definition clearly and efficiently. My peer review partner was Thomas, and I found it super interesting having a peer review partner as I have not done this process in any of my other university classes. It was super helpful having someone go over my writing, as he caught things that I would have never found. I am very passionate about cogeneration and renewable energy and therefore went quite in depth in my assignment with the economics and the details, and Thomas helped show me that I may have indeed gone a bit too in depth. I described the economics side of cogeneration too much, and dove too far into the details behind the monetary aspect, so this was my main change that I made in my edited assignment thanks to Thomas. I reworked the economics paragraph in my assignment and took out the portions where I overexplained. Thomas also mentioned in his peer review that the order of my paragraphs was a bit confusing in terms of explanation and I completely agreed with him and made a change to the order of some of my sentences which in turn greatly improved the flow and understanding of my term. I really think that having my work peer reviewed was super helpful and beneficial to my assignment.
I thoroughly enjoyed peer reviewing Thomas’s work. Editing is my favourite part of the writing process as I am a bit of a perfectionist so I was pleased that I got the opportunity to help Thomas improve his already impressive assignment. I did find it difficult to gage how picky to be, and I was unsure at times if I was overwhelming my partner with my tips or if I was actually helping. I think peer editing is challenging in this sense because there is a fine line between helping your partner in a kind fashion, and coming across as “better than”. I hope that Thomas found my comments on his work helpful as I actually found the process of peer reviewing very beneficial to my own writing. It is easy to become stagnant in your own personal writing style, so getting the chance to read others’ work was helpful as I was introduced to different writing styles and formats.
Overall, I am pleased we had this opportunity to peer review others’ work, and have our work peer reviewed as well. This was a very helpful exercise for me as I don’t usually have others read my work, and in the future I will definitely incorporate this more into my writing even if it is not required. Having another person’s perspective and opinion is so beneficial to writing and I found the process very interesting. I am happy to have had the opportunity to reflect on my own work with the constructive criticism from Thomas, and improve this assignment.
Attached is my revised assignment: 1.3 Edited Three Definitions Vergouwen
The link to Thomas’s peer review of my assignment: https://blogs.ubc.ca/engl301-99a-2019wa/2019/09/26/lesson-1-3-peer-review-of-cogeneration-by-amy-vergouwen/
