Ethan Fung
June 12, 2022
Writing the first draft of the definition assignment
As an aspiring scientist, the definition assignment where I defined the word “amino acid” was very helpful and enlightening. In scientific literature, terms, phrases, and lingo are not defined because the writer assumes the reader has a firm grasp of the subject. Thus, this assignment helped me learn techniques like negation or etymology which are not taught in scientific writing. Something that was challenging in this assignment was trying to describe the structure of an amino acid without using any technical terms. Unfortunately, I could not think of any other way to describe the structure of an amino acid and a few necessary technical terms were used. To compensate for this all technical terms were included in a glossary at the end. This assignment also allowed me to practice communicating complex ideas to non-technical readers. This may prove useful when talking to family or friends about my work. Furthermore, non-technical writing should be more widely practiced in science as being able to communicate science to the masses is very important in avoiding misconceptions. An example of scientific misconception was the vaccine hesitancy during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. Scientists should learn about the three levels of descriptions and how to communicate complex terms effectively to non-technical readers just as I have in this assignment.
Peer review
As for peer review, I found it enjoyable to read Matilda’s work and offer her some suggestions in terms of grammar, sentence structure, and word choice. Through her work, I was able to gain another perspective on how to tackle the assignment which I employed when working on my own revisions. In addition, when peer-reviewing high-level writing like Matilda’s, I was forced to dig deep for mistakes and errors. This helped to improve my ability in finding small, subtle errors in my own writing. The most difficult part of the peer review was learning how to apply constructive criticism when reviewing other people’s work. There is a balance between not discouraging the person you are reviewing and also providing blunt, direct suggestions. This created some difficult situations for me as the reviewer.
Self-editing
When self-editing, I took the suggestions Juanita provided me and applied them to my description. I learned a lot from Juanita’s comments. For example, when listing a century like the 1800s there is no apostrophe. Another example includes learning that “an” should be used before vowels and “a” should be used before constants. These lessons will help me become a better writer in the future. I also took some of the writing elements that Matilda used in her description assignment and applied them to my revised definition. An example of this was to put a hyphen between non-technical readers. Both being a peer-reviewer and getting peer-reviewed helped me in my final description assignment edit.
Conclusion
Overall, the definition assignment, peer review, and self-editing have taught me three things.
- How to explain complex details to non-technical readers.
- How to critically search for errors in peer review and provide constructive feedback.
- How to apply suggestions and criticisms from peers to revise my work.
This has been a great start to ENGL 301!
Revised definition:
Juanita’s peer review: