Sidnee BakerUWRT 1101-001

Final Reflection

If I were being completely honest about this course, I would say that it has been one of

the best classes I’ve been a part of this year. This was my very first class of my college career,

and by far one of the most resourceful. One thing I’ve always loved is an instructor with a

passion to show other people what they’re passionate about. I feel like that is really the best word

choice to use when talking about this course: passion. It is what drove the class. It’s what made it

what it was. Because it was such an early class and on a Monday morning half of the time, it

would be expected that some class periods were a little rough. However, I could always be able

to feel like I got something out of the class. That’s what really matters in the long run. The peer

knowledge about things that I actually wanted to know about is what made this class one of my

favorites. I loved how everything was up to us. Our topics, our assignments, even a majority of

the deadlines were left up to us. I appreciated that more than ever because I feel like it gave

everyone a fair chance to bring their own unique ideas and approaches to the various

assignments. I loved giving and receiving feedback. If ever there was a question about

something, I knew for a fact it would get answered in a timely and precise matter. I feel like

because of the way this course was set up, it allowed me to get as much out of it as I wanted. I’m

thankful that I was able to learn that and really see the benefits from it in this class. I really

wanted to learn. Self-motivation played an important role in my grades in this course.

For our first assignment, the vignettes piece, when we were first learning the guidelines

and requirements I was nothing short of confused. I didn’t understand why we had so much

leeway to do what we wanted with it, and honestly, I didn’t really know how to handle such a

broad assignment. After seeing a few examples and really trying to reflect on myself, I was able

to create something very meaningful to me. I didn’t make any changes to it after I got my ghost

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grade. I felt pretty confident about the way it turned out. Because of the positive feedback I got

and the good grade, I feel like that’s when I started to get what this class was going to be about.

In high school we were taught a correct way to write and an incorrect way to write. The fact that

I was able to break through those standards after the first assignment only strengthened my

interest for the class.

The textual analysis was the next assignment. We had to choose our topics before we

could begin. I struggled for a while trying to find one a topic that I felt I could talk about for the

rest of this course. We had briefly been talking about feminism in this class and also in one of

my other classes so I thought if nothing else, I’d have enough material and resources to write

about this topic. So, with that, I began looking for my resources. I easily found the five required

texts for this assignment. This was probably my least favorite assignment because I struggled to

find enough to say about each text. I had never done a text analysis before and I found out early

on that they can be quite challenging. I found that videos were easier for me to write about. I

assume it’s because there’s a more visual aspect of videos than regular text. In a video, I was

able to see the facial expression of the narrator. The way they talked, the way they interpreted

things, and the illustrations made it much easier for me to analyze who their targeted audiences

were and what they were actually wanting people to get out of what they were saying. When I

was reading an article or a chapter in a book, those things were pretty much left up to me to

interpret, which was quite a challenge for me. After getting my ghost grade and my feedback, I

was able to go back and change somethings. I added to the analysis’ that were too short and fixed

the ones that needed to be fixed. This was the assignment that I focused on fixing the most

because I did the worst on this one. I was glad I was given the chance to change the things that

needed to be changed. This helped me understand the things that I was doing wrong, as well as

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the things I was doing right that I wasn’t sure about. I was able to learn and grow from this

assignment, which to me is the most important thing. I know that whenever I’m reading

something, I’ll give more thought to who he or she is directing their writing to and why they use

the language and modes that are used. I’ll also put these thoughts into my own writing, which

will improve my writing skills tremendously.

The essay was the one that scared me the most when I was first hearing about the

guidelines and requirements. I engraved it into my brain that I was not going to procrastinate on

this because I did not have that luxury at all. Six to eight pages of academic intelligence is not

something that can just be typed up one day before it’s due. I knew that from the beginning. I

really wanted my essay to be good. I wanted to show of the fact that I was learning a lot about

this topic. I wanted it to make sense and be relevant. I wanted it to flow well together and stay o

topic. I knew that if I wanted all of that, I couldn’t mess around. I had to put the work in. I

decided to focus my essay on all of the falsehoods and misconceptions that are associated with

feminism. I already had a lot of new knowledge about the issues with feminism thanks to the text

analysis assignment, however, I wanted more sources that were precise about the common myths

about feminists. I was able to find the ones I really wanted to talk about fairly easily. I started by

making an outline. I put a fair amount of thought into the outline because I knew it would’ve

been the best way to ensure that I stayed on topic while I was writing my paper. Oddly, I found

this assignment not only to be one of my favorites, but also one of the easiest. It was so ironic to

me that my mindset completely changed in hindsight after completing this assignment. I also

chose to go to the writing center for the essay. I am glad that I chose to go for this one because

they were so extremely helpful. Honestly, I think my essay turned out to be as successful as it

was because of my trip to the writing center. I was able to get any questions I had about citations

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answered, as well as proofread a large portion of my paper in a constructive way by reading it

allowed. The feedback that I got was also very helpful. I decided not to make too many changes

because I felt like it was pretty well written the way it was. I only made those minor grammatical

improvements that were pointed out to me in my feedback. Other than that, I left it pretty much

as is.

The genre remediation was a lot like the vignettes piece in the sense of free reign. I

wasn’t really sure where to take this assignment at first. After talking about it in class, I decided

that a protest sign was a great idea. I googled different protest sign ideas and found a great one

for me to interpret into my own. I chose a sign that was relevant to the main points that I had

made in my essay. I think that I did well in capturing the right idea. I’m no artist, but I liked the

fact that it wasn’t some clear cut, formal thing because I don’t think that style is seen much when

it comes to women protesting for their rights. At first, I used simple “blue boy and pink girl”

stick figures for both the top and the bottom. However, after getting feedback about it, I felt like

I was close to capturing the message I wanted, but there was more I could do with it. After

making those few minor changes, I thought it was perfect. It was the perfect statement for

equality for everyone and I loved the fact that I was allowed to make those necessary changes.

Overall, this class taught me so much. It was personal to me. I love that I am talking

away so much, but at the same time, I don’t feel like I had to study for hours upon hours to be

able to do that. I feel like this class was set up in a way where the student it taking away as much

knowledge as he or she wanted to. The work was there for you to do, but it was up to you to

make it what it was. Every assignment, for the first to the last, was based off of one’s own

personal creativity and style. I’m walking away from this class knowing that I am a writer in my

own sense. No one can take that away from me.