A. I believe a song that represents this class would be “Let’s Get Started” by Dylan Gardner. It has a good beat and moves well, which was the feel I had for this class throughout the entire semester. In the song, he says, “come on, let’s get started, just don’t leave me broke hearted” – I think this is a good example of how we came into this class at the beginning of the semester. Everyone was there, ready to start college for the first time, and basically just praying that this class was not torture. Dr. Rand was eager and excited, as well as instructional from the very beginning. Over time, this class turned out to be so great in ways that I do not think anyone expected. About three-fourths of the way through the song there is a small lull in the music, which I think we all felt around the time our Inquiry Projects were due. However, it quickly picks back up and keeps going. The song repeats, “let’s get started” many times throughout its duration, and I think that is pretty indicative of how the semester in UWRT 1103 went. Every time we finished one subject or project, it was time to start another one. Each time we had to hope and pray Dr. Rand wasn’t about to lead us into a wall as she smiled and laughed up at the front of the room. However, every time, we made it through and found ourselves better because of it.
B. If I were teaching this class, I would emphasize much of what Dr. Rand did. The ideas that you must write for yourself, have confidence in what you say, and deeply about the world we are trying to understand was crucial to our success both in this class and others. I would work to emphasize the importance of thinking of the world in different ways. For examples, metacognition, defamiliarization, and intertextuality are all examples of ways of changing your perspective. I think these concepts are key to entering the world of college and being able to succeed at a higher level than most.
C. A source that I really enjoyed reading was Shitty First Drafts by Anne Lamont. Lamont has a writing style that allows her to teach and inform but in a way that is interesting and relatable. Her lesson about writing everything down, even if it is terrible, really allowed me to improve my writing throughout this semester. I have always been the kind of person to want to write everything perfectly the first time, but in the process I forget good ideas or connections I come upon. So by just throwing everything down the first time around, I was able to include more thought and ideas in my papers that were getting lost before. Lamont was interesting and thoughtful in how she described something as simple as accepting your own terrible first draft, and it made me want to continue reading the rest of her book in the future.
D. My writing successes came when I took my subject from a different point of view. For example, in my Inquiry Project, I looked at child poverty through the eyes of the child, her parent, and her teacher. When I tried to sit down and write a 5-paragraph essay about a topic that was supposed to be interesting and captivating to my audience, it just did not work. Through the class, we began reading What the Best College Students Do, and working with defamiliarization and intertextuality. All of these began providing me tools with which to transform my writing. I visualize my writing like a cube. At first, my writing was a head-on look at a flat piece of paper. By adding a new perspective, I was able to add a third dimension to both the story and the meaning behind it. I wish I had spent more time working with my papers and projects. I found that the more drafts I wrote and the more time I spent with a paper, the stronger it was. However, my procrastination won over most of the time during this semester.
When writing my inquiry project, I needed a way to describe the facts of the situation those children are in, in a way that was more than simply reciting information. The fact that this paper was research-based terrified me. I have always been a horrible research-writer, and I expected this to be my weakest paper. So, coming into this I knew that if I wanted to be successful, I could not write this paper like a report. I also knew that I needed an interesting way to include my research or I would start reciting facts. The result of this thought process? Using a new perspective. I decided to use Emma’s perspective because of the simplicity of a child’s point of view. She would also be the main victim of many of the troubles as the oldest child of four. A child’s pain is also much easier to empathize with for many people. Next, I chose Emma’s mother’s point of view because she is the one seeing her child suffer, she is the one responsible for her children’s lives, and she is suffering alongside her daughter. Finally, I used Emma’s teacher as a point of view to help show the more official side of child poverty and its effect. Mrs. Lemon’s point of view could be one with less of the emotional turmoil than the two living in the middle of this extreme poverty. She could also help portray the facts from the community, school system, and other officials that interact with Emma’s life. All three of these points of view were used to create the full picture of Emma’s situation, pain, and need for help. They helped paint a picture of child poverty that was moving and interesting, yet informative. It appealed to both the heart and the mind of the reader, which allowed for my audience to become involved with my inquiry on a much deeper level.
E. This semester, we walked into UWRT 1103 with mixed fear, excitement, and trepidation. It was the first class of college, and we were all excited to get started on this adventure. However, it was also a writing class. So we expected long, torturous essays about god-knows-what, and boring lectures. Day one, however, Dr. Rand walked into the room, with a smile on her face, looked at us and continued to explain that we should not write papers for her. We should not write them for good grades, to make her happy, or about whatever she wants to hear. She said we should write for ourselves. When I heard this I was surprised. This totally new idea was followed up with daily writing, videos, PowerPoint’s, handouts, readings – so many different ways of explaining this idea and engaging every kind of learning style in the room.
We hit our first major assignment with the Literacy Project, and again, were told to think outside the box. Literacy was not knowing you’re A,B,C’s, it was knowing and understanding something that could effect your life and your interactions. Dr. Rand carefully led us into our own, individual niches of literacy. Then we were told to write! It was our moment to take everything we’d learned, read about, and discussed and to turn it into a final product. After the dust settled on this, we all looked around and realized we had not only survived, but thrived. Dr. Rand’s crazy ideas and fun videos and readings had helped us all create these incredible stories and papers. We trusted her to help us through this process and to help us succeed. From there on, it was smooth sailing. Writing our Inquiry Project was hard and we had a large workload, but we trusted Dr. Rand to help us, and we also trusted ourselves. We came out of the class with pieces we had created and were proud of. We also felt that we could enter our second semester of college with some tangible ability to write successfully.
I believe that Dr. Rand, the enjoyable readings, and the lessons we learned throughout the semester in her class happily surprised us all. We learned to work with each other, to have meaningful discussions about interesting topics, and to create pieces of writing both on our own and by working together. It was a great class that helped everyone find their footing in college, as well as in their writing.
F. In this course, I have learned that to write a successful paper means to think deeply about a subject, not to simply write facts in paragraph form. I learned that you must look at a subject from many different perspectives, and to question what you think you know in order to strengthen your argument. I learned that first writing down everything that comes to mind, and then creating multiple drafts are key to making deeper connections and revising for a stronger final draft. Peer edits are also vital. Another set of ideas and point of view can add a whole other dimension to your writing that you may not have known existed. I believe that all of this will help me succeed in future courses and writing of any kind.
G. College is like an unopened book with no title – you do not know what you are about to experience, but you know you’re going to learn something. I am avid reader, and when I am choosing a book that I want to read I look at the title, the description, and maybe read a page or two from the middle of the book. They all determine whether I will be interested in what I choose to read and, therefore, if I want to read it.
Coming into college, everyone talks about how it is either the “typical college experience”, or “nothing like what you’d expect”. There is no solid answer about what is to come, especially because the experience is different for everyone who goes through it. College is also like a book, in that those first few weeks are not indicative of what the next few years have in store. Yes, the main characters are there. You have your roommate, your classes, your major – all of the basic fundamentals of college are there. But there is no way to tell what the story will hold. You are not really in it and invested in it yet. You are only trying to find your footing. It takes time, experience, and growth before the real passion and joys come. And when they do, it is an incredible experience. There are also countless plot twists throughout the journey of college. Amazing opportunities, successes, and failures – it is all life-changing stuff that we are dealing with here. But it is all part of the story. It is all leading up to that wonderful ending and the many sequels that will follow after that diploma is in your hand and the rest of your life begins.
College is that book of unknowns where you have no idea where you will end up at the end, but you know it will not be the same place you are standing now. That is why it is such a meaningful and defining experience for people our age. There is always fear for what you are unsure about, and it may take some time to really understand the storyline of it all. But once you do, it is an experience that enhances you for the rest of your life.
B. If I were teaching this class, I would emphasize much of what Dr. Rand did. The ideas that you must write for yourself, have confidence in what you say, and deeply about the world we are trying to understand was crucial to our success both in this class and others. I would work to emphasize the importance of thinking of the world in different ways. For examples, metacognition, defamiliarization, and intertextuality are all examples of ways of changing your perspective. I think these concepts are key to entering the world of college and being able to succeed at a higher level than most.
C. A source that I really enjoyed reading was Shitty First Drafts by Anne Lamont. Lamont has a writing style that allows her to teach and inform but in a way that is interesting and relatable. Her lesson about writing everything down, even if it is terrible, really allowed me to improve my writing throughout this semester. I have always been the kind of person to want to write everything perfectly the first time, but in the process I forget good ideas or connections I come upon. So by just throwing everything down the first time around, I was able to include more thought and ideas in my papers that were getting lost before. Lamont was interesting and thoughtful in how she described something as simple as accepting your own terrible first draft, and it made me want to continue reading the rest of her book in the future.
D. My writing successes came when I took my subject from a different point of view. For example, in my Inquiry Project, I looked at child poverty through the eyes of the child, her parent, and her teacher. When I tried to sit down and write a 5-paragraph essay about a topic that was supposed to be interesting and captivating to my audience, it just did not work. Through the class, we began reading What the Best College Students Do, and working with defamiliarization and intertextuality. All of these began providing me tools with which to transform my writing. I visualize my writing like a cube. At first, my writing was a head-on look at a flat piece of paper. By adding a new perspective, I was able to add a third dimension to both the story and the meaning behind it. I wish I had spent more time working with my papers and projects. I found that the more drafts I wrote and the more time I spent with a paper, the stronger it was. However, my procrastination won over most of the time during this semester.
When writing my inquiry project, I needed a way to describe the facts of the situation those children are in, in a way that was more than simply reciting information. The fact that this paper was research-based terrified me. I have always been a horrible research-writer, and I expected this to be my weakest paper. So, coming into this I knew that if I wanted to be successful, I could not write this paper like a report. I also knew that I needed an interesting way to include my research or I would start reciting facts. The result of this thought process? Using a new perspective. I decided to use Emma’s perspective because of the simplicity of a child’s point of view. She would also be the main victim of many of the troubles as the oldest child of four. A child’s pain is also much easier to empathize with for many people. Next, I chose Emma’s mother’s point of view because she is the one seeing her child suffer, she is the one responsible for her children’s lives, and she is suffering alongside her daughter. Finally, I used Emma’s teacher as a point of view to help show the more official side of child poverty and its effect. Mrs. Lemon’s point of view could be one with less of the emotional turmoil than the two living in the middle of this extreme poverty. She could also help portray the facts from the community, school system, and other officials that interact with Emma’s life. All three of these points of view were used to create the full picture of Emma’s situation, pain, and need for help. They helped paint a picture of child poverty that was moving and interesting, yet informative. It appealed to both the heart and the mind of the reader, which allowed for my audience to become involved with my inquiry on a much deeper level.
E. This semester, we walked into UWRT 1103 with mixed fear, excitement, and trepidation. It was the first class of college, and we were all excited to get started on this adventure. However, it was also a writing class. So we expected long, torturous essays about god-knows-what, and boring lectures. Day one, however, Dr. Rand walked into the room, with a smile on her face, looked at us and continued to explain that we should not write papers for her. We should not write them for good grades, to make her happy, or about whatever she wants to hear. She said we should write for ourselves. When I heard this I was surprised. This totally new idea was followed up with daily writing, videos, PowerPoint’s, handouts, readings – so many different ways of explaining this idea and engaging every kind of learning style in the room.
We hit our first major assignment with the Literacy Project, and again, were told to think outside the box. Literacy was not knowing you’re A,B,C’s, it was knowing and understanding something that could effect your life and your interactions. Dr. Rand carefully led us into our own, individual niches of literacy. Then we were told to write! It was our moment to take everything we’d learned, read about, and discussed and to turn it into a final product. After the dust settled on this, we all looked around and realized we had not only survived, but thrived. Dr. Rand’s crazy ideas and fun videos and readings had helped us all create these incredible stories and papers. We trusted her to help us through this process and to help us succeed. From there on, it was smooth sailing. Writing our Inquiry Project was hard and we had a large workload, but we trusted Dr. Rand to help us, and we also trusted ourselves. We came out of the class with pieces we had created and were proud of. We also felt that we could enter our second semester of college with some tangible ability to write successfully.
I believe that Dr. Rand, the enjoyable readings, and the lessons we learned throughout the semester in her class happily surprised us all. We learned to work with each other, to have meaningful discussions about interesting topics, and to create pieces of writing both on our own and by working together. It was a great class that helped everyone find their footing in college, as well as in their writing.
F. In this course, I have learned that to write a successful paper means to think deeply about a subject, not to simply write facts in paragraph form. I learned that you must look at a subject from many different perspectives, and to question what you think you know in order to strengthen your argument. I learned that first writing down everything that comes to mind, and then creating multiple drafts are key to making deeper connections and revising for a stronger final draft. Peer edits are also vital. Another set of ideas and point of view can add a whole other dimension to your writing that you may not have known existed. I believe that all of this will help me succeed in future courses and writing of any kind.
G. College is like an unopened book with no title – you do not know what you are about to experience, but you know you’re going to learn something. I am avid reader, and when I am choosing a book that I want to read I look at the title, the description, and maybe read a page or two from the middle of the book. They all determine whether I will be interested in what I choose to read and, therefore, if I want to read it.
Coming into college, everyone talks about how it is either the “typical college experience”, or “nothing like what you’d expect”. There is no solid answer about what is to come, especially because the experience is different for everyone who goes through it. College is also like a book, in that those first few weeks are not indicative of what the next few years have in store. Yes, the main characters are there. You have your roommate, your classes, your major – all of the basic fundamentals of college are there. But there is no way to tell what the story will hold. You are not really in it and invested in it yet. You are only trying to find your footing. It takes time, experience, and growth before the real passion and joys come. And when they do, it is an incredible experience. There are also countless plot twists throughout the journey of college. Amazing opportunities, successes, and failures – it is all life-changing stuff that we are dealing with here. But it is all part of the story. It is all leading up to that wonderful ending and the many sequels that will follow after that diploma is in your hand and the rest of your life begins.
College is that book of unknowns where you have no idea where you will end up at the end, but you know it will not be the same place you are standing now. That is why it is such a meaningful and defining experience for people our age. There is always fear for what you are unsure about, and it may take some time to really understand the storyline of it all. But once you do, it is an experience that enhances you for the rest of your life.