The third unit of the ENGL 301 course flies much quicker than I through. The major task within this unit was focusing on finishing the draft report and the peer review of it. The entire process of both have brought me a comprehensive reflection on my researching and report writing skills.
The report developed by three main research. Each of them was represented to different types and sources of information. Among those, the field trip, as the primary research source, which was no doubt a challenging task. It is the first time for me to conduct a filed observation and data recording on my own. To setup a plan and prepare the equipment for the field trip is the first and primary step for the researching process. After that, being keen and attentive is the key to gain the most useful messages in the field. At the same time, it is inevitable to encounter and response to the various conditions which may brought from the environment and the climate. The ArcGIS mapping and the population data were acting as secondary sources. The whole researching process for these two aspects are smoot overall. The pivotal idea for these researching processes is to proper select the effective data for the upcoming analysis.
The analyzing step is the main body of this report. The goal of this is to extract the effective information from those prepared raw data sources. And followed by the rearranging and concluding procedure to express the meaningful result. It is really a challenge on technical writing when trying to discuss a result in a concise way within a logic flow. And this will surely become the window for the reader to understand what the report is trying to tell.
Organizing all the puzzles together to combine them as a formal report is a finalizing work. It is of great importance to remind myself when was doing the organization to employ YOU attitude through the entire article. Previous practice on this topic has become an extremely useful experience at this link. By following the instruction from the textbook and reading those hints provided from the Instructor’s Blog, the report draft is completed step by step.
The peer review was playing as its important and powerful role to give me unexpected feedback as usual. By reviewing Zainab’s draft report, I have learned more than how to process a research, analysis and give solutions to improve the voting rate. His concise writing style and the usage in grammar have impressed me each time when I read his article. This would become a valuable reference to improve my technical writing skills. At the same time, Zainab’s review on my draft report gives me an incredibly detailed and useful suggestions which I may not notice by myself in a short-term. It is a shortcut to help me reach my weak points on my writing skills and identify them much quickly.
The course is coming to the end. I think it is the time to focus on the remaining tasks and get to apply those techniques that have been learned from this summer.