Through my journey in FIQWS 10108, I’ve grown not only as a writer but as a student and a person. This class was challenging because I no longer was riding a bike with training wheels like in high school, I was going straight into Olympic tricks with a unicycle. Through the reading of titles like “Bizup’s BEAM Method”, “The Norton Field Guide To Writing” and “ They say I say” I’ve learned writing is what you make of it, but there are always rules to be followed.
Writing concepts like the audience, asserting your opinion, and having clear evidence is explained in “They Say I Say”. It taught me when writing an essay to clearly state your opinion and what you are arguing for; if failed it would result in “ writers frustration”(Graff and Birkenstein). Which in better words is when a reader cannot fully understand the author’s opinion or side on the subject so they are left struggling to figure it out. After reading that chapter I found that as my main focus in making everything clear and concise, not one wants to read a weak paper. The other concepts of the audience also showed importance; remembering who you are writing for. A paper that if for middle schoolers will not hold the same tone and purpose as a paper for your professor; it is your job as a writer to make the paper appropriate for each audience. However, in some cases there may be the paper is for both people of a scholarly and normal stature and is your job as a writer to make that paper appropriate. In this case, I was writing purely for my professor the papers were of course of a higher standard.
As the class progressed I began to see the importance of reading scholarly work and peer-reviewing. Peer-reviewed, as opposed to you just looking over your paper, offers a new world of benefits, you find yourself catching mistakes in other people that you make. While I may admit it is uncomfortable to tear someone’s paper up with corrections and ways to improve their work, however, it creates a learning experience for you and your peers. As for the benefits of looking at scholarly work, there is no greater benefit of learning from the best. As my professor stated “read go writing to become a better writer”; it allows you to see how your writing should sound depending on the setting and the audience of the paper.
Furthermore, all the essay assignments and reading between both parts of the class allowed me to see how authors use rhetorical devices to speak to the reader. Writing is an art, it’s complicated and doesn’t have its definition and is always a working progress. I found that the pinnacle of my struggle in this class was the CRA essay. In the assignment alone we involved all teachings presented in the class. Learning how to cite work, display evidence and explain it, and also demonstrate our own opinion but also connect it to the purpose behind the other writing the paper. All things had to be balanced essentially in this paper; it was both a challenge and a success at the same time.
Overall this class was eye-opening in the world of academia and college writing; it has taught me to take my time and trust the process of drafting and reading others’ work. Before this class I would never dare rewrite my essay and ask for peer reviews, now I found my self constantly looking for a way for me to improve my writing through a rewrite. As I stated before this class was both a developing stage for me as a person, writer, and student.