Category: Portfolio & Reflection (Page 5 of 15)

Brandon Muniz

Eng101

Final Portfolio and reflection

Unit 1 Revise

      My earliest impression of schooling and education is quite unpleasant. I always had to struggle throughout my school because I was less attentive and more distracted. I attended a summer school in my 3rd grade. Sometimes I felt I wasn’t getting anything what was being taught daily. Sometimes I felt alone and overwhelmed with my low grades. I wasn’t good in studies and never really was able to focus. I never want to miss my summer again. I already disliked the school and to do it in the summer had me more stressed. Soon I left that school partially because I disliked the teaching methods and partially because I wasn’t too keen.

I felt disappointed and started to look low at myself. I acted like I’m strong, can handle the changing situations even though I know I was terrible. So, I kept myself tangled with irresponsible nature and let my mind wander to meaningless things and habits. It wasn’t that I wouldn’t get the concepts taught, I was not so willing or say determined.

And then it happened. I made progress slowly and steadily. At 7:57am I entered my school building on one sunny cold day in my 8th grade. I said good morning to the secretary whom I met on my way to the school auditorium. I waited there to be called upstairs for classes. The day looked usual and I too was my usual sneaking in my phone, without getting noticed, as the classes didn’t start until 8:05am. The principal and dean were strict about using phones and especially strict on me as I was one of those kids who was always targeted for not obeying the rules. Then I made my way towards my class. I thought to myself that getting average passing marks is all I need to be promoted to the higher class. At that time, I was giving multiple tests for high school and also the most dreaded by me “SATS”. I used to be up day and night as studying was hard for me. These chains of thoughts were running in my mind while I was physically in the class. I was leaving for lunch with my friends after my first three classes of the day. The principal had put the honor roll students list on the bulletin board outside the main office. And then, I stopped. That was real. My name flashed on the honor roll list. I remember walking past to it in 6th and 7th grade as I never really cared about the honor roll. As long I was passing that was fine to me.

But that 8th grade year I hit the honor roll. It totally made me view my education differently and gave me more of a motive to strive and do better. I went home and gave the big news to my parents. My family and friends were proud of me and that really made me feel special on that day. I have heard stories of dropping out for whatever circumstances from older relative friends. That did impact my psychology and made me put less efforts on my education. But I know my situation wasn’t that bad. I thank my parents for getting me up every day. My father always quoted Abraham Lincoln – “the best way to predict your future is to create”. This still resonates in my mind. I understand that I don’t have to be good in everything. I just needed to be more mature and responsible.

I realized that it’s all a matter of choices and education just show us the right roadmap to lead a successful life. It is not something to be scared of, it simply a test of our abilities. I need not always get good grades but should also not desert myself from learning as it is a never-ending process. It is not just grades, honor rolls or endless assignments. It is way up and beyond. Education has definitely made me who I’m today, ‘my better version’. It gave me discipline and boosted my skills and awareness about our surroundings. It opens the world to me in my little head.

Unit 2 Revise

Brandon.docx

Final reflection

     Throughout this semester I think I had improved my reading and writing. I may not have been very constant with my work but I believe I have learned a few good lessons and this semester overall had been quite fruitful to me. As a reader I have learnt that reading is the first basic stage that makes us familiar with a plethora of information. The more we read the better we get at different ideas. Reading enhances our vocabulary, communication skills and knowledge. And as we gain knowledge by reading, we understand how things work, we start to question How? and Why? As a good reader now I process my ideas and information deeply. I think and rethink and have become a critical thinker. Reading has significantly broadened my views and knowledge in addition to improving vocabulary.

      Initially I thought that writing was not my cup of tea because I am into sports and fun filled activities more. But as I had to work on different assignment my early perception of myself about writing has slightly changed. Now I feel I have improved and get to know myself and others better through simple writing and understanding the meaning attached to certain ideas and understanding why. Writing is like testing what you have learned so far or how much do we know about something. Writing reflects our thought process and also the efforts we put. When I write I try to keep the content in sync and easily understandable. I make sure that I include the important points in good detail and the content makes sense and looks complete. As a writer I have made quite a progress but I still needs to work upon my grammar and vocabulary to be better at it and also doing some good research.

I have learned the importance of time management and how to prioritize things. It helps to deal with unnecessary stress and anxiety. I have learned the importance of revision to improve our quality and reduce our mistakes to be a better version of ourselves. As a scholar I have learnt to continue to strive for better and higher.

        The knowledge and experience that I had gained this semester will definitely help me in one way or the other. This semester has taught me how to look into things in a deep and meaningful manner and analyse. It not only gave me new knowledge but also taught me other skills like time management, coping with stress and importance of good research for making our writing informative and impressive. I have learned the importance of revision, artist statement and how it reduces our mistakes and improves our overall writing process. And how focus and consistency help us to achieve our goal. At the beginning of the semester we were just getting the feel of writing, we began writing off by annotating a lot and thinking deeply into scenearios to become better writers and critical thinkers. Then coming to the end of the semester to revising work, brainstorming previous work and wrapping up with the final reflection for the semester. I have tried to keep up the momentum and I believe I have become better and myself at writing and expressing.

      As I’m going back breezing over my writing over this semester I had found one of my drafts useful to now add this to my reflection, As I quoted from the text “Most people think that the principal problem is that writers are too proud of what they have written. Actually, a greater problem for most professional writers is one shared by the majority of students. They are overly critical, think everything is dreadful, tear up page after page, never complete a draft, see the task as hopeless.” The meaning of this wound be  the writer must learn and value one’s writing and form of portraying. But  writers must never give up and think that the task is always possible. A side note, is I always take breaks when I’m writing. Once you’re tired of writing, take a break and come back when your mind and eyes have been refreshed.

       Another fun fact and topic I enjoyed was “Schools are killing Curiosity” as stated in the text “When you visit schools in many parts of the world it can be difficult to remember they are full of active, intellectual children because no one is talking about their inner mental lives. How well they behave, and how they perform seem much more important to many people in the educational communities. Often educational bureaucracies have shunted curiosity to the side.”This quote explains our mental lives as students are suppressed and this correlates with our curiosity, I feel like curiosity is one of the most important foundations of one’s life. How can a person stop being curious about something, there’s always so much more we can learn about. Let’s look at a group of students who go above in beyond with their thoughts and not how well they look put together.

    A great assumption I had mentioned in my incomplete unit 3 assignment was “I don’t want to project a short movie or any motivational speech as such. Instead, I think of having an informal discussion once a year in institutions where people openly express the challenges faced and share their experiences. We can get a chance to listen the first-hand stories and learn from them. This will help, not just them but all, to be more confident,compassionate and considerate of other people. This way our society can work together well and be more understanding about people’s sufferings. And no matter which field we choose to pursue in life later, mental health is something which we cannot afford to ignore and need to focus constantly throughout our lives.” I feel like we don’t need any doctor to fight our inner battles, it is just that we don’t have to give up on ourselves and continue to live up. A lot of people may see life or get hit with life very different and very tough, some people get depressed and fall into the hole and on the other  some people mange’s to hide what they go through and push forward and don’t show it.

Q1.   This semester’s English class has taught me so much about myself as a reader, writer, and scholar. I noticed extreme growth in my writing and reading skills compared to what it was coming into this class.

• Reader: My reading skill has enhanced from merely reading to find the standard author’s purpose, literary devices, genre, and overall meaning of said writing to reading to understand the author’s writing style such as word choice, sentence structure, and the flow of ideas and information. Deeply looking at a piece of writing to understand the author thought process and identify some of the characteristics of their writing that you could use in your own to make it better.
• Writer: Prior to this class when writing for school I would do the bare minimum barely meeting the requirements for an assignment. And most times my writing would have missing patches of ideas or some ideas that need more clarification so the flow of ideas in my writing would be all over the place. However, while writing for this class I notice that my writing style has changed. Now I tend to complete ideas and when I feel as though I have not explained one enough I overexplain to make sure my audience is not confused.
• Scholar:  As a scholar, I learned that I have the ability to complete assignments on time, but I have the tendency to procrastinate which as a direct result my work is usually turned in late. So, I have to work on my time management skills to stop procrastinating.

Q2.  I will definitely be using the knowledge and experience that I gained throughout this course in other writing situations in my college life. This semester I have learned how to properly analyze a text to find the deep meaning and the writing style the author of said text used to make the purpose of their writing effective. I have also learned how to not only write in different genres but also how to change my writing into a completely new genre which would be very beneficial in my next English class.

Q3. When comparing the work, I did early in the semester to now, I would say my writing has improved. I noticed that overall, my writing made sense and all the ideas were coherent and well explained which I something I felt like I did not do enough of before. I also learned how to make my writing fit into different genres by using different languages, tones, and word choices.

Q4. My least favorite assignment was Unit 3 “Writing in a New Genre”. I found it very hard to choose a different genre that was not only best for my research but also for me. My favorite assignment was Unit 2 “RAB”, I really enjoyed researching and writing about something that piqued my interest.

Q5. Some notable lessons that stuck with me after completing certain assignments are how to write a proper research paper (how to properly quote and cite sources), how to find sufficient sources that do not only support your predetermined ideas about your topic, and how one genre could form many different ones. Lastly, how to gather sufficient information that will make your writing beneficial to others.

Q6.  I have noticed many changes in my writing as the genres and assignments changed throughout this term. Firstly, my writing style, I have learned how to navigate and shape my writing to fit different genres. Secondly, my vocabulary has improved drastically. I have been reading many articles and books in and out of school which has helped strengthen my vocabulary. Thirdly, my proofreading skills are now trained to see minor mistakes in my writing that prior to this class would not have noticed.

Q7. Before starting an assignment, I would always look at similar writing online in terms of the genre to study the standard format to use as a model of my writing. Then I would gather all the information for the assignment and put them in sequential order for my writing to flow so that said information would be coherent and cohesive. Then I would start writing.

Q8. My assumptions about my writing skill prior to this class were that I am not a good writer. I never really enjoyed writing so I would put in the minimal effort which made the writing process boring and tiring. On top of that, the assignment I had were that interesting which made me dreed writing even more. Now, writing is more fun since most of the assignments in this class have been about our interests and experiences. I find that when I am writing about something that I have experienced or am interested in, the writing process is easier and more worthwhile.

Q9. I would not say I have an experience with revising assignments since I haven’t revised any of my assignments. Whenever I would receive a grade for an assignment, I would also be satisfied with it, so I did not feel the need to revise the assignment. Also, I do not do revision whenever I submit an assignment that would be the end of my writing process. I just submit a writing assignment and never look at it again. I just check what grade I got and that is it.

Q10. This semester was I found particularly challenging was making sure my writing made sequential sense which meant making sure the flow of my writing was not all over the place. To make sure my writing made sense and the information in it was flowing properly I would gather all the information I needed then list them out on a piece of paper then put them in sequential order. Then and only then I would start writing.