Joseph Mastrota

300 Jay Street

Brooklyn, N.Y. 11201

 

December 15, 2020

 

Dear New Student English 1121, Holiday Blessings and Salutations!

 

My name is Joe Mastrota and I am a continuing education student at New York City College of Technology, “City Tech”. I am a returning student and am currently enrolled in the Paralegal/ Legal Studies Bachelors program. I am writing to you to give some advice or guidance as you enter into the English Composition 2, the asynchronous online course. What I have to say is my approach, it can be accepted or rejected. But please, take note of my description of the course at a minimum to aid in successful completion.

The course is agenda driven and constant. Assignments continue with little tolerance for deviation from deadlines. You must keep up with the work. The assignments will have you writing a lot. Be prepared for at least 6000 or more words by the end of the course. Some assignments build off each other, so give good thought to your subject matter. Pick subjects that are content rich and are interesting to you. This will save time digging for content. The time saved you can use to review your composition, structure, vocabulary, grammar and punctuation. This professor will read your work so be sure to be creative in your writing. Of the assignments the Micro-Activities are linked with the Major Assignments. They usually are practice writings walking you thru what that particular unit’s major learning objective is. Pay particular attention to the research writing unit as you will use this as you progress in your academic career and beyond. Be careful of your subject matter and try to stay away from controversial material. I involved myself with a political discourse and regretted my decision past the point of return. Realize there are differences of opinion and stay away from areas that can anger or insult other readers.

I found reading the speeches of great speakers interesting. Fredrick Douglas, Winston Churchill, Gen. Patton and Abraham Lincoln to name a few. Be sure to extract the techniques used and incorporate them into writings of your own speeches as these techniques are the building blocks of good public speaking.

I am a believer in the old school system of education, and this was my first experience with remote learning. The closest I have ever been to distance learning was a mail in locksmithing course. What I found is that online distance learning requires discipline. You will be guided and assisted in staying focused on the course’s learning objectives, but it requires a good amount of individual effort also. Take the time that you have a dig deeper into the material and hone your own skills. This I believe is the best way to get the most out of this course.

 

Good Luck, Be Creative, Express Yourself!

Joe M