My Reflection Of My Writing

My Reflection

Introduction

At the start of this semester I had taken numerous English courses and thought I knew everything there was to know about writing; but I was wrong. This course has taught me the importance of the skills in writing. The topic I chose on infertility this semester does not coincide with my degree in education. I chose this topic because a friend of mine struggled for years with infertility, which intrigued me to learn more.

Skills

Writing is a process that involves a purpose. Throughout the semester, I used the four steps of the writing process: pre-writing, drafting, revising, and editing. I believe pre-writing and brainstorming is the most important step because it allowed me to organize my thoughts in an outline.

After I decided on a topic, I posed a question to be answered, which helped me develop my thesis for the upcoming paper. Next, I read through and found articles that supported my argument. Throughout the weeks, I chose four scholarly articles which I read in depth and kept organized by writing summaries of each one. Having this information was important when writing my synthesis essay. After reviewing my summaries, I chose one common point and divided it into sub-topics which I could later argue in my paper. The purpose of an argumentative synthesis is to use my point of view supported by relevant facts. The thesis I chose could be debatable, and someone else could write a paper using the same topic with an opposite point of view. That 's the beauty of an argumentative

Maintaining a strong foundation, allowed clarity throughout my essay. Each paragraph in the body related in some way to one of the three points listed in the thesis. I kept my sentences simple and clear.

Revisions

I worked on higher order concerns in stages: focusing on the main point first, identifying my audience and making sure my argument was strong enough. For my synthesis paper, I did not have a strong enough thesis statement. During the revision process, I stated my main point in my introduction as well as in the conclusion. Also, I reviewed my writings to answer the question "why?". Next, I noticed that several of my paragraphs were undeveloped. I moved a few paragraphs to help strengthen the meaning of the essay.

Next, the lower order concerns in my synthesis paper were word choices and run-ons. I tried using "fancy" words when in reality, simple words create the same power when used properly. Reading my paper aloud helped catch run-ons which made some areas hard to understand. A strength in the revision process was understanding that revision is not simply fixing commas and periods, but reconsidering arguments, and reorganizing the purpose.