Monthly Archives: December 2016

Objective self assessment is an important skill for people to master.  Identifying strengths allows one to understand what they can most easily excel at, while identifying weaknesses allows one to identify areas where they need to spend the most time and effort in order to improve.

For as long as I can remember, I have struggled with keeping my writing concise and I knew coming into the course that this was something I needed to focus on improving. Luckily, the students who I formed a writing team with were good at keeping their writing concise, and I learned a lot from reading their writing. Even as the course comes to an end, I still have the tendency to be overly wordy. However, I am much more conscious of correcting this while editing my own work, and I plan to keep working hard in the future at getting my point across in less words.

I consider organization to be the main strength of my writing. Before writing (whether it be a short blog post or long paper), I always make sure to establish a clear outline that will present the parts in a logical order that creates good flow. In terms of learning, I consider my main strength to be my work ethic and attention to detail. I am not one to set a certain amount of time to complete a given assignment. Instead, I keep working until I believe I understand all the concepts and have produced the best work possible.

The parts of the course that I got the most out of were learning to write peer reviews and learning to write with the “you-attitude”. A major career goal of mine is to enter a managerial position within a mining company once I gain the necessary knowledge and experience. Reviewing the work of others is an important component of being a manager, and doing this in a respectful tone that considers the writers point of view can contribute to positive employee morale.

Finally, I would like to thank Dr. Patterson for creating a dynamic and practical writing course that has contributed to my personal, academic, and professional growth.

It is amazing how fast time can go. I remember reading the course schedule at the beginning of September thinking that creating my Web Folio was such a distant task. Now, I have completed the entire course and am finishing up my Web Folio.

To create my Web Folio, I chose to modify my original English 301 blog. When I was first setting up my blog at the start of September, I was overwhelmed by the various editing tools and features the site provides. However, by working with it throughout the course, I have become comfortable with carrying out tasks such as inserting and re-ordering pages and adding hyperlinks and pictures. Thus, creating a layout for my Web Folio did not prove to be a difficult task.

Creating each page was an enjoyable experience because revisiting and editing my old assignments allowed me to see the progression in my writing throughout the course. I noticed that as the course progressed, I began writing  pieces with better style and less grammatical errors in a shorter amount of time than at the beginning of the course. This is a testament to how the course has increased my writing skill and writing confidence.

The page I am most proud of is my application page. Although I have written cover letters and resumes in the past, the course textbook and peer review process have given me ideas and strategies that allowed me to produce a cover letter and resume of much better quality than before. I have always been a career focused individual, and I am excited to see how my new skills in writing to potential employers will help me in landing future jobs.

Overall, I was happy to put the Web Folio together because it showcases the hard work and learning that was central to my experience in English 301.