THROWBACK

“Today’s tears water tomorrow’s gardens.”- Matshona Dhliwayo

To summarize everything, this course is all about hard work and perseverance paid off. Initially I registered for this course just by recommendation from the co-op instructor without any awareness of the workload and what this course offers. Thus, I was really taken aback by the amount of weekly readings and writings mentioned in the course outline. I had a really hard time adjusting myself for this course in the first month as I haven’t had much opportunity in the past to polish my writing skill, however as time goes by, I became more comfortable to sit down for a couple of hours and pour my ideas using words.

While revising my reflection blogs, I came to realize some changes in my writing style compared to four months ago. To be honest, it is quite embarrassing to read things I wrote in the beginning of the term, but then I manage to learn how my writing has matured from before. Not only I managed to improve my writing technique, weekly assignments have accommodated me with a good writing habit, that allows me to shorten the time required to accomplish an assignment. I remember it took me almost half a day to complete the first assignment because I kept rewriting my paragraphs, but now I can comfortably write what I have in mind without going back to rephrase it again.

Although I managed to improve my writing skill, I still can’t get rid of a bad habit of mine, where I inconsistently keep interchanging the use plural and singular in a single paragraph. Although proof-reading sometimes helps spotting the mistakes, most of the time they go unnoticed and I keep proceeding with the same habit throughout the entire essay. I also have the tendency to use preposition at the end of my sentences, and keep mixing up the use of preposition based on instinct. I realize that they are habits that I can’t get rid in just a couple of months as I have grown accustomed to them for years, however I believe with more practice they can slowly vanish.

As a student, I believe I have the tenancy and diligence to learn and improve, which important for succeeding. My nature as a quick and organized learner helps me to grow accustomed to my surroundings more easily, and I believe it’s an important asset to have to develop new skills in a fast-paced working environment.

CREATING WEBFOLIO

Although this is my first time, creating Webfolio has been a very pleasing and challenging experience for me. I’m enjoying every moment I spent in editing, building up, and especially designing my Webfolio. Due to my sister’s influence as a graphics designer, I really like layout designing (despite lacking the ability). Unfortunately, since my major of study is nowhere design-related, I don’t have much opportunity to spend on it. Therefore, I was really pumped up on this project and put many things on my to-do checklist, which some I couldn’t accomplish in the end because the deadline for this WebFolio crashed with the deadline of another course’s term project and some urgent personal issue required me to push back all my schedule.

Compared to others, I find editing my proposal for formal report to be the hardest task. I realize that I had not express my intention properly on my proposal and my words are not convincing enough to persuade the audience, in this case Langara’s MATH 1150 instructor, to agree with my suggestion on assessing visual notes effectiveness on eliminating math anxiety. Although there were many ideas I had in mind, I couldn’t structure them in proper order and express them using the right words. I feel regretful that the final revision of my proposal is still somewhat unsatisfactory, but it is the best I can come up with.

Creating a short introduction to every post was also a bit difficult, because I must summarize everything into a concise and effective paragraph. Sometimes, the content of the post can be very general, but to enhance readers’ interest, I have to introduce it in an interesting and engaging way. Finding the right visuals for my Webfolio is also more challenging that it may seem because I want to make them personalized enough for my Webfolio to represent my individuality. What I had in mind initially was to put visual for every post, but given the time pressure I had to cut it down.

Despite the chaos behind its creation, this Webfolio project has been a very fulfilling and enjoyable experience. I find Webfolio as an effective self-customized media that packs all the achievements and efforts in an interactive way, which allows future employer to see candidates not only as a potential employee, but also their individualities dynamically.

BUILDING UP FORMAL REPORT

The unit mainly focuses on researching, organizing, and writing draft for the formal report, which is a long and challenging process. I find data collection to be the toughest part since not only I had to distribute the surveys, but also provide MATH 1150 students with visual notes as a review material for their weekly quizzes. For the best quality, I used SAI (graphics editor software) to create the notes. Each note took on average 4-5 hours to make, which was reasonable since there were many steps to go through: summarizing the materials for the quiz, creating the draft of the note, rewriting the note on the computer, proof-reading the notes, submitting the notes to the MATH 1150 instructor, who would later distribute them to the class. To familiarize myself with making visual notes, I researched on some methods and tips for visual note-taking. This process was also quite time consuming since there were many new terms and notetaking techniques that were foreign to me.

Because my initial plan was to distribute the survey after the last quiz, which was after the draft due date, I didn’t have much to write except the table of content, introduction, and a summary of the notetaking technique that I used to write the visual notes. For the recommendations/conclusion part, I only listed down recommendations I personally would give after observing the content of the note, and common suggestions from research articles about visual learning.

“In learning you will teach, and in teaching you will learn” – Phil Collins

As always, the process of writing peer review made me realize many important things that I had forgotten to double check before submitting my work. For example, while reading my teammate’s work, I realized that I had omitted YOU-attitude in my draft, especially for recommendations part. I was also not aware of APA-style header and sub header guideline and did not put any definition on notetaking techniques that might be foreign to the audience, as it was to me before.

Overall, this unit has taught me a lot of things in writing a formal report, both during drafting and peer reviewing process.

Attachment: ENGL 301 – Lani Diana formal report draft

BUILDING UP PROPOSAL AND  NETWORK

This unit started with writing a formal report proposal, a new experience for me. Finding a topic that is both plausible and informative was quite time-consuming, but writing the proposal was even more challenging as it required some in-depth research on math anxiety, visual notes, learning behaviour and more. From this research, my tutoring experience, and consultation with the MATH 1150 instructor, I listed down all possible limitations, and used them to narrow down the topic.
My proposal started off a bit shaky: I didn’t specify my intended reader and the content of my proposal was too general. Fortunately, the instructor’s feedback and peer review helped highlighting my proposal’s weaknesses. While giving feedback for my teammate’s proposal, I also taught myself on how to fix similar mistakes I had committed. In addition, my teammate gave me excellent suggestions to improve my proposal’s introduction, and grammatical guidelines on eliminating ambiguity in my sentences.
The second half of this unit focused on networking. Prior to this course, I had created a LinkedIn profile but left it unattended. Writing a memo on best practices of LinkedIn let me learn about how to operate LinkedIn, and its importance as networking device in modern world. I had the opportunity to apply this new founding right away on the next assignment. While doing peer review on my teammate’s LinkedIn, I realized how inexperienced I am, and it motivated me to do better in the future.
At the end of the day, the assignments and peer reviews in this unit have helped me to learn to write proposal and formal report outline, as well as the importance of networking and how to build up my LinkedIn profile.

Link to peer review for formal report proposal: Robert Trigo formal report proposal peer review

Revised formal report proposal: ENGL 301 – Lani Diana formal report proposal revised

STARTING UP

Personally, I find lesson 1:3’s assignment very useful because it provides me with new knowledge of types of definitions, and gives me the opportunity to learn the term I am usually familiar with in different perspectives, depending on the audiences. In addition, I had the chance to learn new vocabulary, as well as receiving feedback on improving my writing techniques using other people’s feedback.

As a proud mathematics student, I decided to go with the term Calculus, which was also the first math course I took in university. Aside from the theories I am already familiar with, through this assignment I had the opportunity to learn more things about Calculus, such as its historical background, and some minor details that are usually not taught in class. I also had the opportunity to have a little experiment in arranging the explanation’s structure, which is something impossible to do when tutoring.

The most fun part comes in the peer review process; constructive writing critiques allows me to help my teammates with their paper, and helps me reflecting on my own mistake. Using others’ work as reference, I can find my weaknesses more easily and learn several solutions on fixing them. My teammates’ feedback helped pointing out some mistakes that I couldn’t catch, even in the peer review process. They even went as far as providing excellent suggestions on how to sharpen my writing style and make it more reader-friendly. In addition to my writing technique, they pointed out a major issue I did not address properly: the audience. In my initial paper, I had forgotten that each country has their own curriculum and addressed my audience using my country’s education curriculum as the standard without addressing it properly, which may have caused confusion.

Overall, unit one has given me a great start and I am excited to learn more in the next three months.

Below is enclosed the revised version of my description of the term: Calculus and peer review for my fellow teammates.

Michael Robinson peer review
Brooke Bowles peer review
ENGL 301-Lani Diana-Assignment 1-3 definitions revised

To        : Brooke Bowles (brooke.bb@hotmail.com)
From    : Lani Diana (lani.diana09@gmail.com)
cc         : Erika Paterson (erika.paterson@ubc.ca)
Subject : Invitation to form a professional writing team
Date     : May 26^th 2017

Dear Brooke,

I’m writing to invite you to join our professional writing team for ENGL 301 class. After reading your application letter, I believe that you would make a great contribution to the team.

As students coming from different background, I believe that your knowledge in Economics, a field different from mine would allow us to explore a more diverse and broad perspective of technical writing. It’s good to know that your dedication and diligence towards the completion of this course would make a great asset to the team.

I have attached my application letter to this message for you to review. If you feel that I am someone you can work with, feel free to contact me through my e-mail at lani.diana09@gmail.com. I hope to hear from you soon.

Best regards,

Lani Diana

Attachment: 301 Lani Diana application letter

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To        : Michael Aaron Robinson (m.aaron.robinson@gmail.com)
From    : Lani Diana (lani.diana09@gmail.com)
cc         : Erika Paterson (erika.paterson@ubc.ca)
Subject : Invitation to form a professional writing team
Date     : May 26^th 2017

Dear Michael,

I’m writing to invite you to join our professional writing team for ENGL 301 class. After reading your application letter, I believe that you would make a great contribution to the team.

Your experiences in managing a yacht club of several hundred members and being a principal liaison in office works show that you have an admirable management and leadership skill. Not to mention, your previous experience in writing different types of office reports and memorandum would be very beneficial to the team.

I have attached my application letter to this message for you to review. If you feel that I am someone you can work with, feel free to contact me through my e-mail at lani.diana09@gmail.com. I hope to hear from you soon.

Best regards,

Lani Diana

Attachment : 301 Lani Diana application letter

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To        : Robert Trigo
From    : Lani Diana (lani.diana09@gmail.com)
cc         : Erika Paterson (erika.paterson@ubc.ca)
Subject : Invitation to form a professional writing team
Date     : May 26^th 2017
Dear Robert,

I’m writing to invite you to join our professional writing team for ENGL 301 class. After reading your application letter, I believe that you would make a great contribution to the team.

I find your various experiences with different type of written communication to be very impressive and having someone with more experience would certainly be very helpful as you can give us valuable feedbacks on our projects. Given that both of us have good time-management and organizational skill, I believe we can work efficiently and effectively as a team.

I have attached my application letter to this message for you to review. If you feel that I am someone you can work with, feel free to contact me through my e-mail at lani.diana09@gmail.com. I hope to hear from you soon.

Best regards,

Lani Diana

Attachment: 301 Lani Diana application letter

MEMO

To         : Dr. Erika Paterson, ENGL 301 Instructor
From    : Lani Diana, ENGL 301 Student
Date      : May 24^th 2017
Subject : Application Letter has been posted

I have posted my application letter on my UBC blog website. The context of my application letter is as follows:

• Professional experience as a tutor that shows my skill.
• University and work experience that allowed me to have some exposure to technical writing.
• Strength : responsible, detail-oriented,and organized.
• Weakness : difficulty in expressing opinion and perfectionism.
• My belief of the outcome in learning.

Please review my application letter and let me know if there is anything else I need to provide.

Enclosure: 301 Lani Diana application letter

602 Como Lake Ave
Coquitlam, BC V3J 0G2

May 24, 2017

ENGL 301 Technical Writing
Summer students
University of British Columbia
Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z4

Dear ENGL 301 classmates:

Please consider my application as a professional writing team member for 301 technical writing class as advertised on the course website. Currently, I am a 3^rd year student who will be graduating in 2019 with a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics. Professor Erika Patterson, the class instructor, encouraged me to apply for this position with three other members from ENGL 301 class.

During my studies, I had the opportunity to work as a tutor in the Mathematics and Statistics Activity Center in a college. Other than helping students with their study, my duty also included helping the instructors conducting weekly tests by marking the tests and recording the student’s grade in a limited time. I also had the chance to accumulate some experience of using technical communications such as emails and memos, either directed towards other tutors or the instructor, in regards to the students’ progress. Aside from my working experience, in both college and university I took a couple of statistics courses where as a team, we had to conduct a research and make proposal and final report.

My experience shows my strength as a detail-oriented and organized student. I take responsibility very seriously and I always make sure to finish my job properly within the deadline. My weakness is, due to my shy nature, I may not voice out my opinion as often as others initially. Sometimes I can also be too perfectionist that sometimes slow down my own work. However, I believe I can overcome my weakness through hard work and practice.

I believe that practice helps people to improve in their learning as it allows people to see things from different perspective. As a mathematics student, to understand the materials taught in class, I often do practice, either the ones assigned by the teachers or just some random questions I found in textbook. Through practice, I always manage to find new things to learn, even if it come from something that I have done before.

Thank you for the time you have taken into reading my application. As a focused and capable student, I am sure I can make a good contribution to your team. You can reach me anytime through my email at lani.diana09@gmail.com or through the English 301 Sept 2014 Facebook page. I hope to hear from you.

Sincerely,

Lani Diana

301 Lani Diana application letter

English 301 is a study of principle of written communication in working environment where students learn how to write the technique for professional purpose, both theoretically and in practice. This course acts as a learning forum for students, where they can get feedback from professor and classmates in an online classroom environment, such as Facebook group page, students’ blog, and instructor’s blog.

The course starts up by polishing our technical writing by giving us some exposure to the theory of elements in technical writing, and giving us the opportunity to apply the skill on simple tasks such as writing letter of application, online memo, and e-mail messages. From there, students are expected to perfect the strategy and technique for business, professional, and technical contexts for writing the final assignments: Application package, formal report, and Web Folio in form of Linked In profile and student’s blog. Other than improving writing skill, this course also teaches students how to develop a good networking strategy, that is crucial for the job application process.Aside from developing individual skill, students are expected to engage with their classmates through group work, where they have to participate in online discussion, peer review, and production and analysis of documents for professional purpose. At the end of the course, students are expected to have some improvement in their job application, technical writing skills, and self-editing skills.

As an international student, even after staying in Canada for 3 years, I am still struggling with my both of my oral and written communication skill. What I was hoping to gain from this course is to have a significant improvement in my communication skill so I have the appropriate strategy for networking, for both before and after in the workforce, as well as having the capability to  personalise a job application that can appeal myself as a potential employee.