A Semester of Growth and Learning
Looking back at my coursework and learning throughout this semester it has been a year of significant growth. It helped me developed information literacy, citation, drafting, collaboration, reading, synthesis, audience consideration, and technology. Each assignment presented me with new challenges and helped mold me into the writer and communication major that I am today. Through this reflective essay, I will share why I believe the assignments we have completed throughout the semester align with the major points in the syllabus and how they have helped me reinforce my skill level and application of the skills while we have been given this opportunity.
Intro:
I started the semester motivated to not just learn but also to practice academic writing, the kind of writing that forms the foundation of our professional and technical communication. I was excited to learn the steps, the processes, and the shortcuts that help you form thoughts in such a way that they elicit an “aha!” from your audience. The assignments in this course served not only to refine my writing and to challenge my ineptitude and reluctance in the areas of research and collaboration but also to help me gain some valuable experience in the use of technology in various stages of writing.
Resume and Cover Letter:
Creating a resume and cover letter was one of my first major assignments. This was especially significant because I was able to really take advantage of audience and citation. Apologies, but that is within the realm of your normal job. Writing these documents brought up critical thinking of how to put my words together in a different way for a potential employer through an aesthetic way that is also clear and straight to the point what I have to offer. Furthermore, I learnt how to correctly format and cite information using APA style, which is an important skill for someone like me, who is in College and will carry it forward in their working life as well. Through this assignment, I learned more about how to communicate with a specific audience and the standards of professionalism I could have in my writing to present myself in the right light.
Lab Report:
Another big assignment was the lab report, which really helped to improve my skills in synthesis and information literacy. For this assignment, I took the results from an experiment of rolling 1,000 six-sided dice. With information literacy, I explored the principles of probability and compared each expected probability to the actually observed frequency distribution. The assignment required me to synthesize information from different sources, including statistical reports and journal articles, in order to draw conclusions and present my findings in a coherent and well-organized manner. Moreover, it helped me improve my writing skills, as I had to review and edit my report several times to ensure accuracy and clarity.
Group Proposal: Building a New Student Center:
Collaboration was a necessary component of our group proposal project, wherein my peers and I worked together to develop a proposal for a new student center. Most importantly, it involved group work and demanded incorporation into one paper from the myriad of ideas presented by different team members, not to mention consideration of audience needs and concerns. Together we created a student center valued and loved by all, that met every students needs as well as wants.
Technical Description:
For the technical Description, I presented a detailed technical description of internet security and the capital importance it has to the world today. Through this assignment, I got to take technology as a means to solve problems. I designed charts and tables with programs like PowerPoint and Excel to showcase and handle data, as well as discovering the current security trends to support my claim. I had to keep the audience in my mind the whole time—the people who may not even know the technicality of cyber security were the ones I connected to. So, I had to design an approach towards the task, which allowed me to make the difficult concepts understandable and accessible. This task was a wonderful experience for me because on the one hand, I was able to make the matter easier for the less knowledgeable audience and on another hand the deeper understanding of an essential topic of today’s digital world.
Other coursework:
The practice of in-class assignments and quizzes was equally beneficial as the rest of the coursework in improving my grammar and increasing my writing competence. It not only allowed me to build a stronger relationship with the discipline but also to groom certain valuable skills in tune with the readers. Continuously recognizing and using these textual aspects to make my scripts more captivating to the reader, had me realize the significance of mastering them in my writings. I learned how small edits in word choice, sentence structure, and punctuation can enhance the clarity and readability of my writings by practicing these skills on a regular basis. Furthermore, the quizzes acted as a diagnostic tool, which not only enabled me to apply what I have learned but assured that I have mastered these grammar rules on my written work. Consequently, I can feel that I am able to discuss my thoughts in a well-organized and convincing manner that serves their needs.
Conclusion:
In summary, this course has provided me with the instruments and training to improve myself as a writer and a professional communicator. In assignments such as the resume and cover letter, lab report, group proposal, and technical description, I have got information literacy skills, citation write-up, drafting, synthesis, audience awareness, and collaboration. Also, I became quite skilled at using technology tools such as Excel, PowerPoint, and Blackboard. Throughout the journey of my education, the knowledge that this class has given will be the core of my development and will be applied in my future projects and in every part of my life.
